CARDOPOLIS 38 - SPRING BONUS

LOOK BACK AND LOOK AGAIN

This is a special issue of Cardopolis going out to all subscribers. As new readers join I’m inviting you to check out material from past issues. For those fully caught up, I’ve included some new material I’ve been thinking about, some vintage material, and news of a BBC radio show about David Berglas.

Cardopolis is devoted to the history and craft of card magic. A celebration of magic and the people who spent a good deal of their lives creating it. Two or three free issues are published each year and there’s a free archive of past issues online. If you take a paid subscription, you’ll have an issue of Cardopolis every month, access to the entire archive, and the Comments sections in each issue. Annual subscription is just $35.

PRAYER PRODUCTION

Cardopolis has an Instagram account. It’ll update you when new issues are available and will contain videos like the Prayer Production. You can join here. The Prayer Production was published there recently.

The flourish is inspired by the Senor Notis' Stop Trick published in Dai Vernon's Inner Secrets of Card Magic (1959). All I’m doing is putting my two hands together around the deck, pushing the card up with the right forefinger and quickly straightening the finger before turning the hands around. See the Vernon book.

Senor Notis was the stage name of Mario Armando Vigna from Italy, though he spent most of his life in Argentina. He began his show business life in the circus, took up card magic at the age of fourteen, became a gambler and later a professional magician. He was renowned for this sleight of hand and flourishes. Senor Notis died in 1953. His friend, E. Leslie Briant, noted Notis’ love of card jugglery, writing in Abracadabra magazine, ‘He could perform ten single-handed cuts simultaneously in each hand, balancing a feather on his nose as he did so, and he could juggle with three cards as easily as another juggler with balls.’

SNAPPY VICTOR PLUS

Snappy Victor Plus was published in Cardopolis 18. It is an elaboration of Edward Victor's 'A Move for the Rising Cards' published in More Magic of the Hands (1940).

Also, in Cardopolis 18 is a visible Card Thru Glass and a handling for Jack McMillen’s Witchcraft Card Rise. No gimmicks. Just a regular deck. You can access them here.

EVEN BETTER

I published this video in 2021 for Buy Me A Coffee supporters of Cardopolis. Peter Kane had some astonishing magic. Never has so much original material been contained in so few pages as his Card Session with Peter Kane books. The following was inspired by Kane’s Royal Flush Flash.

The idea, almost hidden there by the novel display technique, is that of changing a four-card hand into a five-card hand. When you see the following video, you'll have no difficulty working out your own version. It doesn't use much beyond a double lift.

REJECT JACKS

Reject Jacks was first published on the Cardopolis Blog in Sept, 2006, later in Genii magazine, and then explained in Cardopolis 15. I learned the flourish cut from The Royal Road to Card Magic (1948) where it is called Self-Cutting Deck. In that same chapter you’ll also see the production flourish of Senor Notis under the title of Pop-Up Card.

Cardopolis 15 is also where you’ll find a very easy method for a card at number effect. See The Bogus Effect Revisited. You probably already have everything you need to perform it. For a version with two selections see Double Bogus in the same issue which is here.

FINDER OF LOST THINGS

The inspiration for this was another item from The Royal Road to Card Magic. It’s called The Insidious Dr Fu Liu Tu and though the title is well past its sell-by date the plot of a special card finding the selection still has appeal.

MR TRIMES

I worked out this trick for just one person, my friend Simret. There’s nothing novel in the handling, it’s the usual mix of counts and deals, but I was interested in how you might produce a person’s name piece-meal. Maybe you’ll get some inspiration from it.

CARD MAGIC 1936

There’s a terrific video at The Davenports Film Collection on YouTube. It shows some magicians who were at the 1936 German Magic Circle convention in Munich. It features a lot of card magic. At first glance, some of it might seem dated. But if you look beyond the performing style, and low frame rate, you’ll find many excellent ideas, great skill, and some good lessons in timing and misdirection. You’ll even see the Notis pop-up production performed by Dr. Geimer.

Dr. Georg Schitzkowski, of Dusseldorf, performed a couple of moves new to me. Schitzkowski was known for his card work not only in Germany but elsewhere too. You’ll find his name mentioned in various publications including Routined Manipulations II (1951) which included his Coin Cut routine. One production in the 1936 film I liked was the sudden springing of a card from the hand. Here is what I think is happening:

FINALLY - DAVID BERGLAS

My friend Richard Wiseman presents a BBC radio documentary called Masters of the Impossible. It tells the story of David Berglas and his place in UK mentalism. I did some work on the show and it features a host of well known names in magic. It is broadcast on April 19th and will be archived on BBC online after that. You find details here.

That’s all for now. There will be a new issue of Cardopolis for paid subscribers at the end of the month.

David