Confessions of a Conjuror

by Derren Brown

  The Cigarette Chopper belonged to the sub-category of magical apparatus designed for the demographic of novice or even child performers, among whose numbers I certainly counted in both instances. Whereas the best magic props should be instantly recognisable and beyond suspicion in their everydayness, these contraptions resembled nothing else on earth. Such things of course remove any sense of real magic from a performance (by putting the focus on a childish prop rather than the performer himself) and replace it with the less wondrous sense of being fooled by a shop-bought puzzle. Yet I have a passing fondness for these awful tricks: the design and thought that goes into the cheap, mass-produced box that vanishes a coin, or allows a miniature sword to penetrate a borrowed ring, or indeed the device that cleaves a fag in three and then restores it, do speak warmly of our capacity for whimsical design and a jostling delight in fooling each other through invisible mechanical means. The fact that the Japanese Tenyo company, which makes many of these tricks, not only exists but seems to flourish is a testament to their peculiar appeal; perhaps not so much to a magic-watching public, as these are not the apparata we would expect a professional to use, but to amateur magicians, and the designers who sit, try to sleep, or go for long walks while pondering how a pen might be made to visibly penetrate a plastic sheet or a borrowed, signed penny disappear from one box and appear in another upon a little tray.

  I have known such a designer well, and he lives solely for the joy and pride of claiming new innovations in this area. He carries footage on his mobile phone of him demonstrating his inventions, and will show these films at every opportunity. He lives among a mess of card, scissors and glue, constantly building and rebuilding prototypes of some new device to make a box change colour or a deck of cards slowly disappear, and is shy and awkward when not talking about magic. The pleasure he takes in the appreciation of his cleverness means that, after impressing an audience with the footage on his phone, he will eagerly tell his spectators the secrets of the design, and therefore the method of the trick, to secure a second gasp of astonishment and fair recognition of his extraordinary mind. There is undoubtedly a pathological geekiness about the whole venture, but equally something touching about the capricious silliness of it all, and the fact that this life and so many others could be unapologetically devoted to the seemingly childish act of fooling other people as prettily as possible. It is one of the beautiful whimsies of humanity. I do not know of any appropriate correlative in the rest of the animal kingdom. I have neither observed my pets nor heard of giraffes vanishing small objects to amuse each other.

  I must have eyed the Cigarette Chopper trick jealously for some time, as I remember feeling quite excited to buy it. Being expensive, it was all the more wonderful to bring it to the counter and pay for it. I imagine that I had seen the trick performed by a shop assistant first, been fooled by it, and, eager to know the secret as well as handle such a strange contraption, had made the decision to save or steal to acquire the clever piece of plastic.

  It was a small rectangular object, a little longer than a cigarette and perhaps three inches wide. The central length of the prop was exposed, so that a cigarette could be pushed vertically into its middle and be seen clearly. A central horizontal section could then be quickly pulled outwards, apparently sliding the central part of the cigarette out with it, a little like the way a magician’s assistant’s tummy is apparently dislocated sideways in the stage illusion known as the Zig-Zag Lady; similarly, here the cigarette would be visibly sliced into three. Then, by pushing the central section back into place, the cigarette would be impossibly restored, and could be fairly removed for inspection. The spectator, of course, would not be allowed to examine the Cigarette Chopper itself.

  One has only to perform the slicing/restoration sequence in slow motion to see how the trick works. At that point one no longer enjoys the illusion, but instead marvels at the beautiful efficiency of the design, and above all the satisfying action of what amounts to an invisible, mechanical production of a matching middle section of cigarette from within the workings of the toy, combined with a simultaneous concealment of the actual centre. Performed slowly, it is fascinating to try to follow both aspects of the exchange at the same time.

  The delight that is immediately taken in the design of the trick reminds me of the enjoyment provoked by those travel alarm clocks or business-card cases which contain a slow-motion sprung cover that, upon the press of a button, gradually unfolds itself in a beautifully controlled, drawn-out action not only to reveal the timepiece or cards inside but also to elevate the clock or case from the table so that the time display can be read with complete convenience, or cards can be removed at the leisure of a busy executive who may not have time to pick up the case from the table.* I feel a slight frisson of the same satisfaction when I close some modern drawers. I gently push and begin to let go without thinking, expecting to consider the drawer-closing act no more, but then, a moment before the drawer would otherwise thump into place as anticipated, my attention is suddenly drawn by the engaging absence of that impact: it is as if the drawer unit says, ‘That’s fine, I’ll take it from here,’ takes the sliding unit in its own gentle hands and guides it slowly and professionally into place. When these drawers started appearing in the nineties, I would find myself, upon coming across one, repeatedly opening and closing it, as if caught in some obsessive-compulsive ritual, purely for the joy of that denied moment of wood hitting wood. I could attempt to violently slam, but regardless of my intentions, some elegant piece of engineering ensured that the drawer, as if in defiance of my resolute aggression, still closed silently and elegantly. In many ways this action mimicked those doors seen in office blocks and multi-storey car-parks which use some form of air-cushioning to avoid the jarring noise of heavy slamming. But in the case of these drawers, and because the sudden deceleration might happen while the hand is still in contact with the fascia, the action has a pleasing, almost tactile quality that such hefty doors do not. I like to imagine that the designer who first included this closing mechanism was surprised by this aspect of his own ingenuity, and stood opening and closing his drawers with the same gratification, wondering at the tiniest element of disappointment that is also engendered by the experience, as he was denied the sound and feel of his applied force impacting as expected. Undoubtedly this lack of resolution is the very feeling that moves one to try again and again, as if looking for some sort of closure, as it were.*

  The Chopper presented some challenges: firstly, no cigarettes offered themselves at school for marvellous trisection, and secondly, the duplicate pre-sliced cigarette part had a tendency to spill the dried musky flakes of its innards into the mechanism and preclude a smooth operation. Thus, as with so many other magic-trick purchases that would follow this first acquisition, the Chopper soon ended up at the back of a drawer, ignored for years, and eventually simply disappeared. Only recently, long after Hamleys of Croydon had closed and in a sudden burst of nostalgia, did I buy myself a second one. It was a little slimmer and shinier, as were the new Penguin Bars over the old ones of the seventies, and the packaging was different, but I took great pleasure in trying it once quickly (to fool my eyes) and then again slowly to try to follow the beautiful substitution.

  If we were to continue this early narrative, such fledgling excursions into trickery would find their natural resolution many years later when, as a student practising extra-curricular hypnosis, I started to learn conjuring from a book entitled Mark Wilson’s Complete Course in Magic, bought from a remainder bookshop in Bristol. Fascination and dedication led to small local success and a couple of books written for the fraternity, until the comedian and magician Jerry Sadowitz thought my name worthy enough to suggest to a television production company intrigued by the notion of a mind reader – and the rest, as they say, is selective and incomplete history. For there is also a quite different psychological narrative, which I perceive just as clearly and which might follow these lines:

  1. Only child until a
ge of nine; precocious and sensitive; spent much time alone.

  2. Father key figure in the sports department at school, which was much loathed and avoided by the creative/sensitive son.

  3. Friends consisted mainly of other members of ostracised and ridiculed ‘Music School Gang’ (also known charitably as the ‘Poof Gang’), enhancing general sense of alienation from the milieu of a sporty all-boys school.

  4. Constant teasing from said sportier boys, who were ungenerously disposed towards scrawny and effete games-dodgers.

  5. Sixth Form provides a relief: pupils seem to grow up overnight and friends change. Excited at sudden acceptance, I become an eager showman and comedian. Popular caricatures of teachers get me welcome attention.

  6. University provides a completely fresh start. Two related threads run parallel: firstly, a desire to be noticed and different (after many years of being treated as an outsider, there is a now adult urge to not conform at any cost), and secondly a residual fear of ridicule (and presumption of non-acceptance) from the sportier types. Result: a garish and mannered personality, starkly built in contrast to the beery, butch world of fellow students.

  7. Hypnosis and magic provide a means of resolving both threads. Performing permits the attention-seeking traits to be validated, meanwhile the tendency for the more laddish students to be quite responsive hypnotic subjects allows for a kind of confidence to be finally enjoyed in their presence.

  8. Lack of relationships during and after university (a means of avoiding the awkward confusion of whether I should happily accept the whoopsie within or wait for him to somehow pass) frees up huge amounts of creative energy to spend practising card-sleights and developing tricks.

  I have retained a belief that it is the popular sporty kids at school who grow up to have the least interesting lives, and the unhappy young souls who develop into the most extraordinary adults. Whoever heard of a creative genius being understood as a child and well loved by his classmates? Who likes to imagine an artist who emerged into adulthood content with his lot? And, conversely, how satisfying to hear that almost without exception, the untroubled, popular kids at school have ended up blandly as accountants, solicitors or ‘in IT’. Hold on, misfits, your day will come.

  * A pillowcase identical to our spare ones kept at home in the airing cupboard. This also provoked concerned requests for clarification. Had Father Christmas been to our house first and helped himself to bed linen? His MO became weirder and weirder.

  * For many people of my age, there is a clear memory of when we first discovered as an adult that our parents were at least a little bit racist. It’s up there with hearing about a relative’s affair or Nana’s first cappuccino. Maybe not seriously racist, but certainly prepared to say things that sound as much by today’s standards. A fantastically misjudged comment is made over turkey one Christmas and a tiny piece of us dies. I am sure that a lifetime of reading the Mail, with its life-affirming editorials and open celebration of diversity, never once contributed to such lingering views in our household.

  * Having recently bought a box of After Eights to compare the old packaging to the new, I offered a friend a chocolate from within. He made a point of removing the little sleeve and discarding it, proclaiming the act of leaving an empty one in the box a ‘cunt’s trick’. I made a mental note.

  * The corrugated paper seems to be made of the same crisp substance as the little covers for the mints, which means that the action of removing a mint from the box is quite noisy. While not necessarily being intentional on the part of the manufacturers, this crinkling sound, unchanged over nearly fifty years of production, has become part of the ritual of After Eight eating, as intrinsic and satisfying as removing the square from its wrapper and admiring it before consuming. Immediately recognisable, this crinkling is a sound many of us have unconsciously stored, ready to be rocketed back to the pungent minty-chocolatey moments of our childhoods whenever it is heard.

  * This slow, automated movement concerns me in the example cited here of a business-card case. Any form of card-case, beyond the most battered and unassuming, is surely an aesthetic and social travesty. To withdraw, say, a silver case from the pocket before removing a card is surely to trumpet a ludicrous gaucheness and maladroit pretension. It is impossible for the intended recipient of the card to view the case as anything other than a misjudged piece of peacockery; unfeasible to avoid a brief inner commentary along the lines of oh, he’s bought one of those . . . he decided this would make the act of handing over a card a signal of his success as a businessman and a certain refined elegance as a gentleman . . . probably picked it out himself . . . please God it was a Father’s Day gift from a child who knew no better. Thankfully, by the time one has wondered whether one is obliged to comment politely on the item, it has been returned to the pocket and one is holding a card bearing a number one hopes never to have to call. But imagine the act of having to place your card-case on the table, in response to a fellow executive asking for a card; having to hold him back while you activate the slow-motion revolving lid; watching it interminably self-open and believing yourself to be making a tremendously positive impression while all potential of future business slips away with the same systematic inevitability demonstrated by the mechanical action of the case; then, most insulting of all, gesturing to the would-be recipient of the card to take it himself from the now proffered stack.

  * There is a musical equivalent of this drawer-slamming feeling at the start of the Sanctus of Schubert’s Mass in E Flat. I first heard this played on a crackly eighties record player belonging to the father of a German friend while we ate unusual cake in the front room of his parents’ Franconian farmhouse. Strings build dramatically over a few bars to an anticipated climax that is then cruelly denied us: a choir leaps in but withers rapidly with a ‘Sanctus’ that fades to nothing. Again the trick is played, and the repeated effect is enormously affecting. ‘Jeder Satz eine Entäuschung,’ my friend commented – ‘Every phrase a disappointment’ – and I concurred: the rising passion and consistent denial of satisfaction (until the final explosive resolution) is very stirring, urging the listener towards resolution. It also has an obvious sexual quality, in a way that drawers really do not.

  After flicking the final card with that unnecessary gesture following the production of the cards from my pockets, I dropped it on to the table alongside the other two. Showing my hands empty brought applause from Joel and Charlotte: the open-handed pose, made while standing, was an applause-cue, silently calling a ‘Ta-da!’ that naturally provoked a response; at the same time, the showing of my hands empty demonstrated that nothing was concealed, that there was no solution to be found for the appearance of the cards. This latter point is noteworthy, as showing the hands empty after producing cards from pockets proves very little, in fact is an irrelevance; yet by allowing the spectators to see bare palms even when they would not expect to see anything concealed, the impossibility of the flight and the seeming innocence of the magician are somehow, illogically, amplified.

  As Joel and Charlotte reacted with delight from either side of the table, they turned their gaze to look at each other in disbelief; both leaning forward, their wide-eyed faces came close together, the cotton-covered stone slab of the table between them. They wordlessly exchanged their shared feelings of incredulity and pleasure, before sitting back: the applausecue had apparently signalled the end of the trick and it was natural to then relax and allow the feeling of what had just happened to settle into the bones. In doing so, Charlotte found herself again alongside Benedict, who, already leaning far back into the sofa, looked at her and let the tiniest half-laugh move through him – a spasm of amusement that consisted of a sudden contraction of the chest muscles, which in turn forced a tiny expulsion of air up from the lungs and out of the nose in a ripple of movement that tipped the head momentarily backwards and left it rocking slowly back into place like a parcel-shelf dog. It was the mildest half-chuckle the body can produce, the sort of brief, closed-mo
uth response that might occur when privately watching something only slightly entertaining on television. It was a detached, mocking response not to my trick, but to the pleasure his girlfriend was taking in it. From his removed position, he was presumably interpreting the enthusiasm of his two companions as a sign of childishness, and the easy rapport they shared in their delight as something to treat with disdain.

  I neither liked nor disliked Benedict. His displays of indifference were a little tiresome but would be forgotten the moment I left the table to repeat the trick elsewhere. I accepted that I was a threat to his place in the group, as I had seen this disdain many times before, and would many times again, until theatre and television audiences replaced those in close-up situations and such obvious exhibitions of apathy were no longer necessary. I do not presume that people should enjoy magic, nor, in a case such as this where I was forced to ingratiate myself into their company, that I should find myself welcome. It is just that where people choose to engage, and are fascinated, they become more suggestible and my job becomes easier; otherwise I must rely on the calculated, fixed structure of my script to ensure that the trick at least works correctly.