EDITORIAL: Sleight of Hand, Centerstage By BECKY O'MALLEY
Old-time vaudeville conjurers, before they went Las Vegas, used to rely on a series of clever effects known as “hat tricks.” The magician, elegantly attired in white tie and tails, would produce a series of unexpected objects out of his top hat: playing cards, brightly colored silk scarves, and for the grand finale, a live rabbit. Audience members, particularly small boys, would avidly watch the magician’s hands to see how he did it, but they seldom figured it out. A friend of mine used to do a funny imitation of the patter with which the magicians accompanied hat tricks: “At no time do my hands leave my arms!” It was designed to do what’s called “misdirection” in the trade. The idea is that you keep the watcher’s attention focused one place while the trick is actually being done someplace else. Sleight of hand, as the stage magician’s craft is sometimes called, is also practiced in other places, notably in “the shell game,” where con artists on the street move around peas under walnut shells and lure gullible watchers into betting on where they are. -more-
