I was driving home from a gig tonight (great strolling audiences - I live for these gigs) and the hour-plus drive allowed me to listen to an NPR program about the recent "balloon boy" hoax.
For those of you not in the US, a six-year-old boy supposedly flew away in a family's helium balloon. After continuous television coverage, extraordinary expense and effort on the part of authorities and interruption to local airport traffic, the event proved to be a hoax.
The discussion on the thought-provoking radio program got me thinking about TV magic. The purist pioneers of TV magic, Mark Wilson and Doug Henning, always made sure that a live studio audience was an integral part of their shows. And everything that viewers at home saw on television was exactly what was seen by the studio audience. Henning went as far as to broadcast his early TV specials live.
The Blaine Levitation
Enter David Blaine and the infamous levitation on his first network special. While most of the magic that Blaine performed was recorded live in front of real spectators, his levitation had some assistance, which I have written about earlier. And Criss Angel has numerous feats and effects that can't be reproduced live (floating from the top of one building to another, for one).
I rather despise magic tricks that only exist in edited television shows and are solely designed to puzzle television viewers. If an effect can't be performed for live audiences, it's a hoax on the order of "balloon boy" that is designed to make suckers out of everyone.
And most detrimental to our art, when television magic starts to resemble special-effects in movies - the use of camera tricks, green screens and the like - the "magic" itself becomes insignificant and drags down everything else with it.
More Reading
Exposed: David Blaine's Levitation
What Makes Great TV Magic?
Recalling Doug Henning
Magic Circus by Mark Wilson
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