I wasn’t even going to publish this effect, but I was convinced by a couple of friends that it was good, so here it is! Credits for this go to
American card magician Jason England for a culling idea.
Basic Effect
A deck of cards is borrowed from a member of the audience and shuffled thoroughly by anyone who wishes to mix them. A card is merely
peeked at, but somehow, the Mentalist always knows!
Presentation
The Mentalist asks for a participant to help him with his next ‘cardboard creation.’ A deck of cards is borrowed from him (let’s call him Steve) and the cards split into four random piles.
‘Ok, so you look like a smart guy. You probably know all the tricks using key cards and ‘secret helpers’ and that sort of crap. So what I’ve done is split the deck into four piles. Pick ‘em up on at a time and shuffle to your heart’s contents. ‘
The helper does just this. He shuffles the packets on at a time. The packets are then gathered and squared.
Right, so I’m going to turn my back and what I want you to do is lift up a section of cards
anywhere, peek at the card, then slap the deck back together and thoroughly shuffle. You done? Good.
The Mentalist should have no inkling as to what the card is. He stares into the participant’s eyes.
‘I’m getting a red card, yes. Look at me please, it’s a heart yes? Ok, now think about whether or not it’s a picture or a number card...it’s a
number card. Now for the value. It a high card, is it not? I thought so. Look at me here, the 8, no 9 of hearts yes? Thank you very much.’
Steve confirms this is the card and the deck is fully examined, and there are no gimmicks or stacks to speak of. What I love about this routine is that it is totally impromptu and can be
performed at the drop of a hat. I like to use this effect with the ‘move monkeys’ as it really
confuses them.
This effect is extremely simple, and there are no hard moves at all within this routine. The basic idea is that at the beginning, you separate the deck out so that one pile contains all of the cards of one suit, and from there, it’s just fishing.
Performance
To begin, have any deck of cards borrowed and shuffled. It isn’t crucial that it be a full deck, but it will make the effect easier to do. After it has been examined, pick it up and spread the deck with the faces towards you.
As soon as you spread the deck, upjog the first two cards. You now want to upjog the values one to ten of the same suit as the second card. For example, if the second card is a heart, all of the hearts would be upjogged except the picture cards. This is all done so only you can see the faces.
Strip out the upjogged cards and place this packet face up on the table. You can slightly spread the top card of the packet to show red and black cards. With the rest of the deck, do the same action but this time, really do remove
random cards. Repeat this two more times. You should now have four packets that supposedly contain random cards, but the first packet is
actually full of hearts and the five of clubs, which will act as a cover card to hide all the hearts. Turn all the packets face down. Have the
spectator mix the four piles one at a time until they are happy the cards are all mixed. Of course it doesn’t matter how they mix them as all the hearts will stay together in one pile. Gather up all the packets making sure the hearts is on top. Now, you want to cut the cards to centralise the hearts packet. However, if you’re doing this for a woman, cut the cards do that the hearts are bang in the centre. If, on the other hand, you’re doing it for a man, place the hearts a little lower down in the deck. The reasoning behind this will become apparent in a moment.
Place the deck face down on the table. Now, to the audience, the deck should appear
completely shuffled. Say that in a minute, when you turn round, the assistant is to cut the deck about the middle and to peek at a card. As you do this, you are going to demonstrate what they are to do by cutting off a quarter of the deck and flashing the face card. This is just to show the assistant what to do so that they are one hundred percent sure.
Square the deck and turn around. As you do, say ‘so cut off ABOUT HALF and remember the card.’
Nine times out of ten, they will hit the hearts packet. I will cover outs of they don’t later. With your back still turned, have them square and shuffle the deck.
The reason for placing the hearts in slightly different positions depending on their gender is because I’ve found from experience, when asked to cut ‘about the middle’ women will go right for the centre, but men will cut a bit deeper.
Obviously, this is not an exact science, but it does make a difference.
Ok, so you now know that the card is a heart, but you’re going to present this as three hits. Have them place the deck down and stare into their eyes to ‘receive their thoughts.’ Again, see
presentation at the end for all of this. First reveal that it’s a red card, then a heart, then a number card. Now all you need to do is fish for the value. Begin by saying ‘I’m not getting a high card, am I?’ If they say yes, reply with ‘yeah I thought so…’ but if they say no reply with ‘no I didn’t think so…’ This is an old technique but does the job perfectly. Let’s say it was a high card. Look at them and call out the values five to ten, as
though studying their facial expressions. Now say ‘this is quite high, is it not?’ If they agree, you can assume it’s the nine or the ten. If they
say ‘not really’, it’s a six or seven. If they have trouble answering, it’s the eight. The same
applies with the low values, but ask, ‘this is quite low, isn’t it?’
You should now have a choice of two values. Simply call either out. If they react, finish here. If they don’t, immediately click your fingers and say ‘eliminated, because your card was the…’ and say the second value. And that’s all there is to it. Obviously, there are a lot of other, quicker methods out there, but I like fishing as I think it works well.
Outs
Ok, let’s be frank here. This effect doesn’t always work. Once every so often you’ll get a spectator who misses the block, and gets a different card. And, although this section is called outs, I don’t really have one. So, when it does happen, and you get the colour or suit
wrong, I will say something like: ‘sorry, there are just too many thought going on in your head. Could you write your card down on this piece of paper for me?’ Then just resort to a centre tear. Not too ‘clever’, I know, but as it happens so rarely, I don’t have an out.
Also, the spectator may have cut to the cover card, in this case the five of clubs. Always
remember the cover card and you can use it as a second resort.
You could, of course, try and fish your way out, but you must be ready with lots of double
meaning sentences such as ‘the value, it isn’t high is it?’ and so on.
Final Thoughts
One final tip I would like to add is that if the spectator looks a little confused when you say the sentence about whether the value is high or low, it means they have selected the five.
Don’t be put off by the simple method behind this, as it really does work. What I also love is that it creates a double bluff moment. After the effect, magicians will approach me asking the method, and they’ll always begin with ‘I know that the four packet splitting was just bluff…’ But it isn’t! I love things like that!