Props to My Peeps

If there is one thing that bizarre magic really loves, it's props. Incidental items, devices, brick-a-brack, curiosities, novelties, antiques, crafts, oddities, tchotchkes, sundries, and other odds and ends. Bizarrists are all over props like ugly on ape. The issue however is that just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

Think for a minute. Do you have the budget to live in an Old World abode, travel the globe, and collect occult paraphernalia like Ronnie James Dio? No? Then perhaps you should leave the accursed antique whatchamahoochie at home for your next performance. In fact, how much do you really need props? Rick Maue, author of the superlative The Book of Haunted Magick, has some truly astounding mentalism and haunted magic routines with materials culled almost entirely from Office Depot.

Now while I concede that theatricality can aid the willing suspension of disbelief, there are limits based mostly on the little/big rule, which I'll cover in the next entry. The gist of it is that people are less likely to suspend their disbelief when the devil is in the details. I frequently use a pendulum, which isn't a big deal. They can be bought at most New Age or Neo-Pagan shops and are pretty easy to track down through the internet as well. If anyone questions where I got it, I tell them the truth because there's no reason not to. The pendulum is just a tool that enables the effect, there's nothing particularly special about it as a prop. On the other hand, people would be more skeptical if I were to pull out a pair of antique thumb screws because it just seems so unlikely that a shaggy young guy fresh out of college would be able to get his hands on that. And if I were to actually start talking about how they're haunted or something, we have officially crossed the line into a serious WTF moment that is going to bring your credibility and the immersion of your act to a sudden... screeching... end.

When you're young, you have to play to your strengths. If you do use a prop, let it be something fairly unremarkable used in the same way as most magic props are meant to be: incidental. There's a school of thought in magic that we need to be honest that we're doing sleight of hand all the time, that we need more flourishing, all to make sure that we get the credit for the effect and not the prop. I don't buy that logic. Whatever prop you use should be entirely incidental and a matter of convenience.

Docc Hilford has a superb close-up routine called the Nightmare Coins which you can find in his booklet Band of the Hand and the Monster Mentalism DVD set. This is an excellent usage of a prop incidentally and the narrative starts with the idea of having a dream within a dream. A lot of people have experienced this phenomenon or are at least familiar with it. It's believable, provided it's congruent with the character you've established. Remember that you're an actor. So act.

Overall, props can be great but it's very easy to overuse them or mishandle them. Don't get overly exotic for its own sake, and don't do something hokey. I once had a chat with a young spark who thought he was clever for coming up with a "creepy" routine vanishing a fake severed finger. He said to claim it was real and that it was discovered at the site of a grisly murder and that the ghost of the murderer was trying to reclaim it. Try not to injure yourself face-planting your desk in exasperation. I don't want that on my conscious.

The point is, that example neatly illustrates an itemized checklist of the things bizarrists do with props that they shouldn't, and neither should you.

Until next time.