Continuing his 12-part series of letters from Egyptian Hall, Mike offers a 1902 handwritten note from T. Francis Fritz to his friend, W.D. LeRoy, better known by his stage name of Frank Ducrot. Both were working professional magicians, who had branched out into other areas within the magic world. LeRoy owned the Martinka Magic Company, while Fritz was the publisher of Mahatma magazine.

Rick Maue was one of the hits of this year's MINDvention, a conference devoted to mentalism. He gave two excellent lectures; one dealt with sŽances and haunted-magic themes, and the other was dedicated to theatrical close-up and stand-up. His opening piece went like this: he presented an envelope with some cards inside, and asked a spectator to name a number Ñ she said seven. He removed four jumbo Sevens from the otherwise empty envelope. Direct, non-procedural, and fair. Joshua Jay immediately asked if he could have the routine for his column. Not only did he agree, but he also supplied an entire issue's worth of material.

Many of the great two-person comedy acts had their roots in vaudeville. Many multi-person clown skits go back even further than that. These acts have two things which solo acts lack. First, there is dialogue between the two people where one can be the straight man and the other responds with the punch lines. And second, there is a lot of great physical comedy that can only be performed with more than one person. After all, someone has to throw the pie. What can you do if you want to add classic multi-person comedy to your show? Put your own kids into your show! This is exactly what Ron Manoviec does, and he and his kids are having a great time and enjoying much success working together. This month, we feature one of their routines.

This month, Andy struck by how uninvolving magic and mentalism is for an audience. As he puts it: Think about it, in most tricks the spectator is almost inconsequential. They are simply the tool that is needed to create a random, or apparently random, choice. The epitome of this is: "Pick a card," followed by a flashy who-gives-a-crap move and, "Is that it?" Or its mentalism cousin: "Think of a word, write it down," followed by who-gives-a-crap pompous frowning and, "The word you are thinking of is..." Who cares? I believe that the magic must be active for your audience; the more they engage, the greater their reaction will surely be.

With that in mind he presents an effect which is loosely based on Peter Nardi's Common Sense and Tom Lauten's CETA deck. It's all about the spectator using a memory from her past; it requires her to invest everything into repainting pictures and emotions from her life.

Imagine a slender, elegant table with a beautiful rose in a vase occupying a pool of light on stage. Romantic music is filling the theatre. You enter the light and admire the flower. Removing it from the vase you take time to enjoy the fragrance. You gently run your finger down the stem and, quite by accident, your finger finds a thorn. You wince in pain and quickly get angry. The music instantly stops. You gesture to the rose and the bloom burst into flames and vanishes; you just reacted without thinking. You stop and realize that life is better with the beauty of the rose. You show your hand empty, cover the top of the stem, and magically the bloom has returned, even more beautiful than before! The music begins again; you place the flower back in the vase and walk out of the light.

Dale Salwak guest viewpoint.

While fiddling around with someone's ring, it becomes stuck. Naturally, the only logical way to remove it is by yanking your finger off. This is the perfect stunt to pull while trying on wedding rings, especially if you'd like to remain single. If you're married, then you've already got your prop.