Great Idea But Fired – Trade Show Magician CannedInside MagicMagic News Updated Daily for the Professional Magician

Terry DeVos – Trade Show Magician

There was an interesting debate on one of our sister sites, Insight Majik, that seemed interesting enough to be brought here to the big time. Insight Majik is a smaller webpage started by a half-brother (and we joke, half-sister, of Tom Hardy).

We would give you the url but the hits Tommy would take could sink his Commodore 64-based server. The article is written by Terry DeVos of Illinois. As far as we know, he is not one of the more famous Trade Show magicians in the Midwest. The comments that follow are from readers and were posted on the Insight Majik board and copied to this board with permission.

Great Idea But Fired

by, Terry DeVos – Professional Magician

Anybody out there who thinks that being innovative is good needs to read my story. I lost my job as a tradeshow magician thanks to the prejudice and intolerance that fills our society like sewer water fills my basement during a bad rain.

I was hired for the recent Food Distributors Expo (“FDE”) over at the Amphitheater for a five-day run. My job, as always, was to get people over to my client’s booth so the salespeople could “convert them” or get a sale from them. I was doing some of my best stuff ? Invisible Deck, Mindwave Deck, Mental Photography Deck, Glorpy (some call it Hyrum the Hilarious Hank ? but I don’t), and a Tear-Apart Dove Vanish. Only thing was, because it was a food expo, I couldn’t have a real dove so I had to used a big beanie baby that looked like an eagle. It wasn’t a big deal.

Anyway, I noticed that a lot of the people walking by were Christian. They had jewelry on with crosses and tee-shirts with Christian sayings and references like “John 3:16.” So I figured I’d bring more of them in to see the show by being innovative.

I had a little picture of Jesus on a business card I got from a missionary friend. I cut it out of the card so it was just his picture. It didn’t wink or do anything weird or distasteful, just a picture of him looking up and…

Terry DeVos – Trade Show Magician

Great Idea But Fired

by, Terry DeVos – Professional Magician

I would tell people walking by that I wanted to show them a Christian trick. Sure enough, they would come over to see what I was doing. First I did a trick where the volunteer could use the Jesus card to locate their chosen card in the deck. I did a whole thing about “your card is Chosen!” It was pretty funny.

Then I did a thing where Jesus would read the people’s minds and tell me what card they had thought of (ala Invisible Deck) and it would be the right one face up. I made a big thing about “see, your chosen card is facing upward!” This got laughs and I think it astounded people too.

The last trick I invented was where I put Jesus in the Glorpy silk, folded it over and said that even though he was laid in the tomb, he rose. Then I would make it look like the Glorpy had come to life and Jesus was standing up.

This went over really well. Then someone said, “yeah, but why is he still under the handkerchief if he had risen? Didn’t the women go to the tomb and found it was empty and all the linens were folded up?”

Beats me, I thought. I wasn’t sure if that was what happened or not but the person who said this had a cross on his ring and was wearing a hat that said something about God being his co-pilot. So I used my imagination and invented a new trick based on the trick I had just invented.

The next time I did Glorpy with the Jesus picture, I put it in the silk, made it rise, and then asked the crowd, “And what happened after Jesus’ rose from the dead?” Some said, he “ascended into Heaven” or “he went to be with his followers” or stuff like that. It didn’t matter because of the way I had the trick set up.

I said as I started to undo the silk, “alls we know is that he was gone, right? But how could someone who was gone rise like it just did?”

This stumped them.

“That’s because,” and I opened up the silk all the way to show Jesus picture was replaced with a picture of the Pillsbury Doughboy. “That’s because, someone took his place in the tomb! The Pillsbury Doughboy popped fresh out of that tomb.”

This was killer material. The audiences were stunned by the transformation and usually didn’t say a word.

Then I got a call to go back to the sales booth and talk to The Man. He said he had heard I did the Doughboy transformation and that it was out of place. I agreed that because we didn’t carry Pillsbury products in our line, it could seem like we were helping the competition. But he went off on this whole religious trip about how Jesus and the Pillsbury Doughboy should never be in a trick together. In a way, he was condemning all of religious magic.

He fired me right after I asked him if he was a Christian and if he was, how could he want to ban religious magic that was getting sales?

I think he was wrong but maybe I’m the wrong one. What do you think?

Terry DeVos, Carbondale, Illinois.

Comment: Terry, I don’t know what kind of product your client was selling, but he was wrong to not tell you in advance what kind of magic you couldn’t do. Just like they told you couldn’t use no doves, they should have told you no religion magic. Keep your chin up!

Comment: You do a whole tradeshow with three gaffed decks, a Glorpy, and a Tear-Apart Vanish? That’s why you got fired. You’re stupid.

Comment: I would sue his —! That’s wrong and a violation of your Constitutional rights to preach religion or practice religion. So would he say it would be okay if you made Osama BinLaden appear? What’s his point? He’s the stupid one.

Comment: TD, you should write up your tricks and sell them. I have some you could include too. I was thinking of doing one for Ash Wednesday where you could have the person write down their biggest sin on a piece of paper and tell them you’re going to burn it and then you do a center tear and burn the remainder, and set up a David Blaine ashes on the arm showing that their “sin” came back from the ashes. You could even do it so it didn’t say exactly what their sin was. Like if they wrote down that they had an affair, you wouldn’t write that on your forearm. You could write, “chases skirts” or “gold-digger” or something funny but the volunteer would know that you knew what the sin was.

Comment: Terry, weren’t you the one that was trying to sell that Twin Towers illusion? It was where you were handcuffed to the model of the Trade Center and then they were lit on fire and you had to escape before they fell on you?

Comment: I don’t know if you are just making fun of me but I never did try to sell the Twin Towers illusion. I performed it for a show on the one year memorial and it was very powerful. You could have heard a pin drop in the auditorium. In fact, I was going to go on to do the rest of my act with a flying carpet (“this is what we’ll fly into Osama’s house with”) and What’s Next (I don’t have any 9/11 reference for this trick but I always close with it). But the stage manager felt the Twin Towers was so strong he told me to stop right there.

Comment: I invented the Jesus to Michelin Man trick using a change bag and a Zombie gimmick. As far as I can tell, you were fired because you are nothing more than a knock-off artist. Funny how the Michelin Man and the Dough Boy look alike, huh? Stop stealing magic!