Latest / The Magic Guys / From Engineer to Magician: Derek Ostavani on Cruise Ships, Crowds & Signature Tricks #235

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From Engineer to Magician: Derek Ostavani on Cruise Ships, Crowds & Signature Tricks #235 · The Magic Guys

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Magic they are the magic guys
0:03
ladies and
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gentlemen welcome to episode 235 of the magic guys i'm josh norbito next to
0:16
me is nick k and underneath me is my name is douglas khan If you're calling
0:23
me for a bill, it's Douglas Kahn.
0:28
You heard that here first, folks. That's how I know you're sus.
0:32
If you say, is Douglas there? I'm like, I'm not talking to you very long.
0:37
Yeah, that's definitely someone's sus if they're asking for your full name.
0:41
If I ever hear it, whenever in an email I hear Joshua, I'm like,
0:45
come on, mate. That's not true.
0:47
Get to the back of the line. And when you get the, I get the phone calls and
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it's like, hello, can I speak to Nicholas? Nicholas.
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And I'm like, no idea who that is, buddy. Gotta go. That's it.
1:00
We're going to have to start calling you Nicholas.
1:03
From now on. Nicholas. That's.
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Anyway, look, this is obviously the Magic Guys podcast.
1:12
FISM award winning for interviewing fantastic guests who you'll see shortly.
1:17
Are we getting an actual award?
1:18
Have we figured out if we get a thing? Or you already got it,
1:22
Hunter Norbido. He sleeps with it under his pillow. And we haven't seen it yet.
1:27
Just a treasure chest of like a million dollars. What about just stickers,
1:32
but official stickers from the Fism?
1:35
Could they do that for us? Just be like.
1:37
Hmm look we're not blind buddy all right
1:40
we just we talk in a microphone we're not we're not quite um
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morton christian josh i'm not
1:46
asking for much i'll take stickers i'll
1:49
take you know what we're gonna have to look into this nick who
1:52
we got in the chat today we got some in the chat in the
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chat we have a good friend scotty link tim askin we
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have tim uh ed ed blise who was lovely to catch up with
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him and his lovely partner in las vegas a good friend scotty
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oh and our friends from canada the magic buzz
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good to see you here friends guys if you are in the
2:09
chat feel free to oh gut buster mike good to see you
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bud if you guys do have questions please pop them
2:14
into the chat because today we have an awesome guest are you ready to bring
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on this fella say yep yep today's guest is a magician mentalist sailing all
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the way from san diego he's wowed crowds at the magic Casa Chicago Lounge and
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corporate stages across the country of America.
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With an engineering mind and a showman's flair, he's hella smart and hella handsome.
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And he's here to have a chat with us today on the Magic Eyes podcast.
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So please join me in welcoming my good friend, Derek Ostalvani.
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Oh yeah gentlemen derek welcome
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to the magic guys podcast please tell our friends who are you and what do you
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do hey it's great to be here my name is derek ostavani i'm at a san diego full-time
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professional magician mostly the uh corporate circuit but i do uh theaters trade shows cruise ships.
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I kind of trying to, trying to dabble a little bit and a lot to just, you know, keep myself,
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fresh yeah living it up doing it all it's so good do you have a favorite by
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the way like a favorite cruise ships trade show corporate event no you love
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it all okay good uh uh i mean.
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I mean ah you know the the
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trade shows are are great because you you know
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you go on for a couple days you know and then you come home
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and it's usually during the week and then you can still have your
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other gigs during the weekend cruise ships are
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great too i love them it's it's a great way
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to see the world you know it's some of the best stages i've ever
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been on you meet some fantastic people and you
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know part of the part of the best one of the best parts of it is you get somebody
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else to do your sound cues so it's nice having a tech in fact you know there's
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as we perform more and more on stages one of the things we do talk about on
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the show quite a lot is how we run the tech and so forth.
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Before we jump into like, so what, how we go about doing queues,
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I wanted to share something that I was tinkering with over the weekend.
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And it's this little doodad, which I'm showing on screen right now.
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We are not sponsored for this little jigger, but this is called an Insta360 Flow 2 Pro.
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And what it is, it's like a little gimbal that you put your mobile device on.
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And basically the app connects to it and it tracks you with AI.
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So it's like having a camera operator. so once you plug a
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microphone into your phone which basically sits like this it does
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everything it's supposed to do it's kind of awesome it's
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a couple hundred bucks and it's like having your own camera operator and so
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i just wanted to be able to capture stuff good and proper and at an affordable
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price and basically camera phones are pretty great nowadays i mean yes i won't
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argue that like camcorder type.
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Cameras are going to be a lot better i'm not going to dispute that
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but i think for your social media and for content it's
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actually a pretty cool little do that and i tried
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it out also a gimbal did you say that yeah it's
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also a gimbal so you can just use it as a
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gimbal as you walk around and so forth so it's self-leveling but then
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what's great about it is that you could just turn on the tracking
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so that when you're on stage it literally just follows you
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around and it is so i love it i love that
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company are you using their instacam three uh
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insta webcam yeah i use one i'm
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also a big fan of their insta 360 with the
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full capture uh you know 360 view that
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is a very cool product yeah it's very cool
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and it's basically just clip this onto your phone and away you go it also works
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with like other non-apple phones it's better with an apple phone you know i'm
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not going to try and put sell the product with every single feature it has but
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it's so nice to be able to capture things like I'm going to get a few of these
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so that I can just have like three cameras recording every close like stage set that I do.
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And then just giving that to my social media guy and going, cut it,
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edit it, make it awesome. But no doubt.
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Camera vertical videos. Let's go. So great. Absolutely.
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But outside of that, cueing your show audio wise, lighting wise,
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are you a Q lab guy, Derek?
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Do you use other sort of software? Are you an audio ape guy? What's your deal?
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Yeah. So, you know, I, I think it's very important that, you know,
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I don't have a team of people or anything, and I don't always have people who
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can make my show, so I do it all myself.
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I use MediaStar Pro from Pro Mystic.
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And that's a great piece. And I just connect that into my iPad and have all
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my tracks set on a Go button, which is an amazing piece of free software, by the way.
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I've upgraded to the $100 so you can have different set shows.
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I used to just rearrange all my songs, and that just got such a pain.
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And so I just upgraded, and I have these different set shows, and it's beautiful.
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I really wish there was a device out there like it's
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the single box which had your audio out and it had like two universes of dmx
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that you could just be like rock up to a venue plug in your lighting like universe
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and then just be like i'm ready to do a show and like seriously i'm like yep
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everything i need is right there just if you got wishes i'm still rocking the
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walkman with the auxiliary audio card.
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And the audio tracks were captured off the radio in 1986 doug has one of those
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record plays that you turn a crank like this and it's like a big horn.
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I called the dj and i'm like can you play magic by steppenwolf yeah and sorry
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uh do you have a head i need a headset mic doug no no i got this horn that you
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just put over your mouth you just put it over your mouth and you talk to everyone.
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I got a little something called the happy amp happy,
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moving on moving on how is that
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doug i've heard of that is it good you like it you have let me tell you here's
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here's the great thing about the happy amp i use one no no
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listen it it fits in here
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okay so you can put a sound system in a carry-on bag with all the props and
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your you know so it's an on-the-go system that fits in a carry-on and it's hard
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to you know that it had enough power for me for a long time i used one actually
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but that's years ago okay,
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Well, I'm just glad we got that sorted now. Yeah.
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I was just thinking how I could improve the theater of magic sort of thing.
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Cause you know, when you, when we play sort of music in between the shows,
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like we could actually use go button where we could have another track,
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which is just the audio voice over ask telling people that like the second part
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of the show will start in five minutes time.
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Please make your way back to your seat. You can just hit the go button to do
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that and get people to go back to their seats and so forth through the sound
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system. Like that is something that just struck me then. And that's what we
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learned. We learned through conversation.
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So Derek, thanks for being our guest today and listening to us talk about our work.
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What do you like about my shows? No.
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What I want to know is how do you pack for them? Because you can only put two
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cases at most in your show.
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What's the trick? What's the secret to packing small and playing big?
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So that is a great question. And I see so many magicians just prop after prop
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after prop and table after table after table.
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You know, as you may or may not know, cruise ships require two different 45 minute sets.
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And I pretty, I pretty much, I would say I get 90% of that in one case.
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And so, you know, the, the secret, what, I mean, you guys have heard it,
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right? Like you pack small, play big.
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And you know, I think a lot of mentalism does that. Now I don't strictly do mentalism.
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I sprinkle mentalism in my show, so it's a combination of magic and mentalism.
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But also, presentation is a huge part of your show.
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And I take a lot of pride in my show being a show and not just trick after trick.
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It comes full circle.
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There's a theme, and that kind of helps elongate the show.
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Not that I'm just trying to drag it on. That's not it at all.
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But, you know, you want to have some substance to your routines and you want
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to give your audience a reason to care instead of just going into it.
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Yeah, I couldn't agree more. There's a clip. Have you seen Jeff Hobson's cruise ship show by chance?
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It's an old video, but is that something you've seen, Derek?
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I mean, I don't know if I've seen that. I mean, I've seen him live do his whole
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show and I've seen bits and pieces.
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Yeah, and I mean, it's the same. I don't know if I've specifically seen his cruise ship act.
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It's it's essentially the same idea right of
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what you're saying like having substance around what can
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even be a very basic trick in essence right
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that you make it play big and play like so
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great anyone listening should sort of
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source it out i think you can buy the show to view
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on his website jeff hobson's website but like
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it's essentially five tricks over
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like a 45 minute show and it's
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so entertaining and he's dancing around and he's got
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all these jokes amongst like stand-up comedy
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written into between the sets and like there's so much happening and basically
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when you watch his whole show you realize his whole show can fit into a tiny
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little bag and he's on a cruise ship it's incredible so what i find interesting
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about that is when you fill your show with personality,
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it's it it can be difficult because it requires you to invest in your audience.
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Have you ever been in scenarios derek where you've gone
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okay i'm gonna pad this out with my personality with my jokes and everything
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else but then you find that like you're not getting the investment from the
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audience back they just got a different mindset where it's like no no we're
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just here to not be fooled don't try and distract me with your humor and your
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handsome looks and then it doesn't kind of like hit have you ever been in a situation like that.
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You know, every, every audience is different. And it's, it's funny.
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Like one, one show comes to mind. I remember I was doing a show for a bunch
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of doctors and I did, you know, close-up magic strolling for cocktail hour.
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And then I don't know, 45 minute show on stage. And I remember thinking during
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the cocktail hour, everybody was fun and jiving and they were happy to participate.
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And it was, it was all good. Right.
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But all of a sudden something, something, something switched the moment I went
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on stage, all of a sudden, nobody wanted to come up. Nobody wanted to come and help.
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And, and I think that that largely speaks to the demographic,
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you know, I mean, doctors feel like they're very prestigious and I mean, don't get me wrong.
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They do great things, right. But we're all people at the end of the day.
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And, you know, magic isn't about fooling somebody. That's not the purpose.
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It's a form of entertainment. It's an art.
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And I think a lot of them felt like oh well if i
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react does that mean i got fooled and my colleague didn't
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or if i go up on stage is he gonna embarrass me
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and you know i don't know if they think that because they've seen
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other magicians embarrass people that's that's
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not that's not my style i definitely don't do that and
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i was i was really hard on myself after that
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show and i was like man like what what happened and
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then you know maybe less than a week later i did
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virtually the same show and they loved it you know different audience obviously
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couldn't get enough of it you know praised me and that's when i realized that
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the more you do this you're going to realize that not every show is a 10 and
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it's not always your fault you know then when they say you're only as good as
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your audience it's 100 true.
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Hmm. Yeah. I think it's important that we don't realize like magic is the gift
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that we give to them and it's not their responsibility to do anything for us
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in a sense that it's not their job to clap and cheer, to make us feel good.
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They're still going to receive the magic in the way they're going to receive
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the magic. That is it. You know what I mean?
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Like just because they're not expressing
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it through standing ovation and applause and, and whatever else,
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it does not mean that they're not enjoying it i think that's part of our job
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as professional magicians is to elicit the
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response a desired response and a
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lot of times people don't know how to respond to magic so
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you're going to develop a relationship with
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your audience and it won't always be clapping and cheering sometimes there'll
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be laughter some performances are just dramatic and
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don't have either of those other features so
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yeah that's important to develop that
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whole character and dynamic that you know gives
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the audience a ground you know you know
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what i'm saying i'll quit talking i do but like you
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know question for the group you know you mentioned that there's probably
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scenarios in which a spectator has seen a magician or experienced a magician
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in which it's made them look foolish or or just belittled them in some way i
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really struggle to find i guess with my style I'll speak from my experience
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that I've struggled to find an excuse,
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reason or need to have to do that to a spectator.
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And I'm curious if you guys feel like there's ever a need to have to do that.
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Sorry, just so summarizing that question, is there ever a need to do what, sorry?
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Well, if people are terrified of you getting up and making them look foolish
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on stage, making them look dumb, right? Right.
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Like, when is there ever a need to do that as a performer?
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That's just what I was saying. If you're the amazing Jonathan,
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then there's a need for that in your character and your performance, and you might do that.
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Unfortunately, the public might see that and relate it to an average magician,
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which God let's hope we're not all embarrassing our spectators.
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It happens too often. like we've just accepted that's you know something we can do,
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yeah I think more in the last in the past but yeah because there is a good answer
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to this I just don't know what it is because I've I've got friends of mine who
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built their entire careers by doing this by taking the piss if you will so yeah
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and I really want to hear Derek's thoughts as well the few things that are in my head are,
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like at the Theatre of Magic for example we make a big point of letting people know.
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This is an entirely interactive show, but we're not here to make fun of anyone.
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We're all going to be friends by the end of this. And I even now say,
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everyone's going to be involved in the show, whether you're just sitting in
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your seat or da-da-da-da.
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And if you genuinely don't want to come up on stage, it's okay to say no.
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And then I make a joke, but you will be asked to leave and keep it light and fun or whatever.
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But I will say that because one in a hundred times someone will say no,
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but it's not they're being rude.
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They're scared of that moment. They're a moment. And the good example of Prime
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and the audience. Letting them move. And we're going to work.
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And then when we had John Armstrong on, he explained it really well too.
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He's like, your audience, you need to be on stage long enough for your audience
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to understand who you are and actually feel comfortable being a part of you on stage.
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Like, he says, too many magicians bring an audience member on too soon.
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And you haven't even really earned the right for them to be a part of it,
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you know? And so I try to take that in as well.
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So they're the things that come to mind from guests we've had and stuff.
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But Derek, what's your perspective?
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And where did you get your good looks from too?
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I got it from my mama. I got it from my mama.
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Derek looks like a magician. You were born to do this, obviously.
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I do get that a lot. They're like, oh, you look like a magician. And I was like...
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What's that? I said, yep. If you're watching from home, tune into YouTube and
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absorb the awesome magicness of Derek Castavani. You know who Derek looks like?
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Have you seen the Days Gone video game of the guy that rides the motorcycle
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and kills all the zombies?
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Dylan, make a video.
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There's a little bit of that as well. This will be the short. Dylan, make a short.
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It'll be like Derek Castavani and the guy who rides the motorcycle killing zombies.
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Same guy yeah derek do you
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ever get anyone saying oh you you really look like
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an engineer does that ever come up or is it always magician no no
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that's never come up and in
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fact it's the opposite they go you know what you don't look like an engineer yeah
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yeah yeah so so firstly what
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are your what's your take on audiences in in
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in respect to people being shy to
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come up or thinking they're getting to get embarrassed like is there do you
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handle that in some sort of way do you have a yeah you
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know i i think no no i
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don't think that people are always embarrassed to come up because or i should
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say i don't think they're afraid to come up because you're gonna embarrass them
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i think the main reason most people don't want to come up is the the fear of
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public speaking right or being in front of an audience did they say that that
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literally goes up there with the fear of dying.
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You know and i think that's like the number one yeah it's
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like number one fear right yeah and
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so yeah i think i think that's kind of generally what it
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is and i i agree to that you know
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or you know subscribe to the idea of don't just
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start off your show and bring somebody up immediately because they
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kind of have to know what they're getting into and and what they're you
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know who you are as a performer and so i never do
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that you know that my my first effects never involved uh
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never involve an audience at first because i want them to
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kind of sit and i even start in my my introduction i
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go i go look you know for the next 45 minutes or
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so i'm going to take you through a roller coaster of magic and so you can
20:26
somewhere you can sit back relax and watch what i do but other
20:29
parts of it are going to you know involve you and involve you
20:32
know psychology and the mentalism part so i i kind of i kind of state that without
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saying without kind of like taking back and saying okay like you know this is
20:43
an interactive show you can come up you don't have to i don't know i don't i've
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never enjoyed saying that i almost feel like.
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It takes away from the show. Like, why should you have to say that?
20:54
You know, it should be implied. And yeah, I mean, they're there to watch you and enjoy you.
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Now, I think I think that the best audiences are always the people that are there for the magic.
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Right. So like at your theater, theater of magic, people are there coming to see magic.
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Oftentimes when I do a corporate event, they don't even know that there is entertainment,
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you know. So it is our job to make our audience feel comfortable.
21:21
Yeah what about in trade shows because in
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a trade show you're not only do they
21:26
not know there's a magician but you're they're also not technically
21:29
planning to even stop in that space so you're
21:33
sort of having to do everything in one go like make them stop stay watch get
21:38
the message sure sure and that's a little bit of different environment i think
21:42
it's okay to be a little bit more aggressive but also it's well let me let me
21:47
rewind a little bit it's okay to be aggressive because that's your job,
21:51
right? You want to pull in people.
21:52
Not aggressive, you know, in a negative way, but it's also a little bit different
21:57
because, you know, trade shows are for the most part kind of close-up,
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maybe somewhere between close-up and parlor.
22:05
And I think people feel a lot more comfortable when it is close-up.
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Like my example in the show for the doctors, you know, during the strolling, people were fine.
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It's when they're on stage in front of hundreds or thousands of people that
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they get uncomfortable.
22:21
There's a level of audience management required across all these
22:24
different platforms that you perform across but tim askin is
22:27
asking a question asking do you do you
22:29
get many hecklers on the cruise ships or are they pretty chill
22:33
yeah no i i really i really
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don't they are they are always chill you know they're it
22:39
that's kind of equivalent to somebody going to
22:42
a magic show because they're on a cruise ship not only are they
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going to magic show but they are there to have
22:48
fun to relax to be entertained right i
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mean everything about a cruise ship is pretty much about that and
22:54
generally depending on the cruise line you know some of your spectators can
22:58
be on the older side and so no in my experience i've never really had problems
23:03
with hecklers on cruise ships so i was great audiences yeah you've had old people
23:07
fall asleep in the show have you ever had old people fall sleep in the show?
23:13
I don't think so. I remember seeing an old person falling asleep at the comedian
23:19
show and he really poked fun at the guy and he made a bit out of it.
23:25
You can see it happening like when you're i see many
23:28
conventions because like you're lecturing all the magic and then
23:30
you just you start seeing this face where like the head starts
23:33
to go back their eyes to the clothes and their mouth just stays open like
23:36
yeah oh man day three day three
23:40
at magic live like that's happening no matter whether people want to or not
23:44
in the in the sessions 100 yeah and you know it's like you can't even take offense
23:48
to it you know like at live like you're staying up late you're you're getting
23:52
up early you know on the cruise ships they're they're older and they've been
23:55
out all day you know especially that i've been that guy.
24:01
Last couple years you've heard it first you've heard it first you're in,
24:07
three two eight doug's old he's self-proclaimed he's
24:10
done it himself i mean i've been to 8 000 magic
24:13
lectures and yeah i'm old and if it's day three you better
24:16
be freaking interesting things right yeah
24:19
especially the the
24:23
port days you can really tell that the the
24:26
energy is is lower in the audience right because they've been out
24:29
all day walking in the sun so forth and so on yeah yeah oh so so just to be
24:35
clear a port day is when you dock and then all the folks on the cruise ship
24:39
will bugger off for the day and explore the land so to speak correct you then
24:44
come back on the ship and watch your show in the evening but they're all pooped
24:47
out from being out in the sun,
24:49
exactly yeah right okay so we we
24:52
we briefly brought up being an engineer earlier with the looks but that that
24:56
actually was your career before moving to magic correct that is correct so you
25:02
know i i got a little bit of a late start in magic i felt like i mean doug what
25:07
were you were you five when you started,
25:10
Yeah. In the words of Vernon, I wasted the first four years.
25:15
Right. Right. I feel like seven to 15 is like the classic age to get started.
25:21
I didn't get started until I was 21.
25:23
And it was literally the summer before I went to university to study structural engineering.
25:28
And I was just so gung ho, you know, passionate about magic that before I even
25:35
took my first engineering course, I, I already said to myself,
25:38
I'm going to, I'm going to go through school. I'm going to get my degree.
25:42
I'm going to, I'm going to work in the field and I'm going to wean off engineering.
25:45
I mean, you know, cause it's like, you know, as, as a, as a young man,
25:49
you don't, when you choose a major, you don't really know what that's, what's all involved.
25:54
And so I felt like I liked it and I did like it, you know, and I was,
25:57
I enjoyed math and science. But then when I, when I found magic,
26:01
it just, you know, well over trumped, you know, liking engineering when I loved something else.
26:09
Right. Where did you get your education?
26:13
I went to, I went to school at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
26:17
It's in central California. And it's, it is, it's a great school and a beautiful city.
26:22
If you guys haven't been there, you should go check it out. And it is,
26:25
it is predominantly known for an engineering school. So they have good programs there.
26:30
Yeah. Right. And then what, what advantages do you find as a magician you have
26:35
from having an engineer background?
26:38
So, you know, I would say that, that one of the biggest advantages is because,
26:41
you know, engineering is very technical.
26:44
Now my degree was structural engineering, but my, my proper title of my major
26:50
was architectural engineering.
26:51
And before I got into magic or engineering, I was an artist and I loved drawing and painting.
26:57
And so I felt like the architectural side would be a splash of that creativity and,
27:03
And, and, and it is, but with architecture too, it's, it's very structured, right?
27:08
So it's not as creative as, as you would hope, you know, there's a lot of,
27:12
there's a lot of, you know, codes that, you know, stop you from making a design
27:18
that you might really want to make a design or, or money often will be that case.
27:23
So, you know, I did get a lot from engineering on the technical side.
27:27
It, it's hard to necessarily apply it to the magic because they are so different,
27:32
But, you know, I did get a lot being an engineer because I really did see the
27:38
business side of things.
27:40
And I realized that it doesn't matter what you do, engineer,
27:45
magic, or owning a grocery store.
27:47
At the end of the day, it's all business, you know, in exchange for money and services or goods.
27:54
Yeah. So I learned a lot of that, you know, what's that?
27:58
Well, show business is two words and it's two parts to it. There's the show and the business.
28:02
I was going to say you're a magic creator right you design magic effects would
28:09
you say some of the skill sets you acquired as an engineer applied to like creating magic,
28:15
i mean potentially you know like i said with with engineering like all the creativity
28:20
parts of it were like okay how am i gonna connect you know this beam to this
28:25
column you know how do i craft up the the proper bracket to do that you don't
28:30
you don't really think of
28:32
about that too much in in magic so i would argue that we do that.
28:40
I have an elmsley count and a
28:43
jordan count i need to make it look like i'm making this
28:46
card appear face up how do i do no i
28:49
i get it i totally agree there is there
28:52
is that similarity but it's just it's still so different
28:55
you know it's so different from you know
28:57
creating a connection in in a building yeah
29:01
one question we have from ed is with
29:04
your engineering background do you develop large stage
29:08
illusions i i do not i've never been one i've always enjoyed big stage illusions
29:13
but i've never kind of got into that aspect of magic yeah you know i suppose
29:19
if if i did go that route that that background you know in the drafting that
29:24
that i i did on cad would help me.
29:27
But I always thought, you know, with the big illusions, you need a team and
29:30
you need a big space and you need, you know, a means to transport these things
29:35
and, you know, build it and break it down and all that stuff.
29:38
So I've always stayed, stayed with close up and kind of stand up parlor magic.
29:43
It is interesting when we first get into magic, how we look at people doing
29:48
big, massive illusion touring shows and think that's like the goal, you know.
29:53
And for some people it is. But isn't it interesting how we grow up and we're
29:56
like, oh, actually, we can make an awesome living doing something that fits
30:01
in our suitcase traveling.
30:03
It's true. And I think, too, that, like, you know, you like,
30:07
for example, metamorphosis box, right? Your sub trunk.
30:09
You can't just go out to a bar or, you know, to a friend's house and perform that.
30:14
Right. But, you know, a deck of cards just fits in your pocket.
30:18
You can go anywhere and and practice this and and show show these to spectators.
30:24
Yeah. I got a little professional Greg Gleason. He comes by the shop.
30:28
He does cruise ships and has for 30 years. He's currently doing a full evening
30:34
show with the deck of cards.
30:36
There are 1,200 people on the cruises. On the cruise ship, yeah.
30:40
I think Shin Lim really made that popular, right? Kind of close-up magic on stage.
30:45
You know who I'm going to give credit to? Matt Franco. He's the one that showed
30:49
us we can do our card tricks from the stage.
30:52
Yeah, no, and it's true, and I think it's a great way to do it.
30:56
And I remember my first cruise ship and realizing, oh, I have to do two 45-minute sets.
31:01
And at the time thinking, that's a bit daunting and thinking,
31:04
maybe I'll do a close-up.
31:06
And I remember reaching out to my agent asking, hey, will I have access to a camera?
31:11
Will I have this ability? And they didn't really give me a straight answer.
31:15
And so I said, you know what, I'm just going to not worry about that.
31:20
I'm going to develop two different 45 minute acts on stage that play for a thousand people.
31:27
Yeah. So there's something beautiful about that. Like you said,
31:29
when you could just have a pack of playing cards and play to that many people,
31:32
I'm reminded of a story of Denny telling us, Denny D. Ortiz.
31:36
And he said he was sitting with Rene Lavonde and Rene goes, they were just sitting
31:41
there and he's playing with the cards. And Rene says to him,
31:43
I travel the whole world and all I got to do is take this pack of playing cards with me.
31:47
And then Danny goes, I travel the whole world and I borrow me the deck.
31:52
And I just thought that was beautiful.
31:57
Now, this is the thing. Your passion obviously lies within the close-up round, which is awesome.
32:02
I think that was reflected in your 2012 win where you won the close-up competition at the IBM.
32:07
Soon after I believe you became a two-term president of
32:11
the IBM ring in your area as well as that you were
32:14
also invited to be part of the 4F convention now
32:17
the 4F convention for those who aren't aware that is
32:20
an invite only for the best slider
32:23
hand artist it is I believe it's limited to 250 people so you obviously have
32:30
some pretty amazing accolades to be a part of that what sort of routines you
32:34
coming off with and inspirations that are leading that are granting you invites
32:40
to things as prestigious as the four F.
32:43
Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. So I was actually at magic live and I was debuting my,
32:49
my jigger that I was telling you about with the shot production.
32:52
And I was doing it for a group of people at a table and, you know,
32:56
I did the whole thing and I did the liquid load and everything.
32:59
All of a sudden I feel this hand on my shoulder and I turn around and he goes,
33:05
holy shit, you, you fooled the crap out of me.
33:08
And I go, oh, you know, I'm glad. Thank you. I'm glad you enjoyed it.
33:12
And he goes, do you know who I am? And I go, yeah, you're Obi O'Brien.
33:15
And he immediately wanted to give me an invitation to 4F, although,
33:21
you know, no special treatment.
33:22
I still had to get sponsored and I got sponsored both by Doc Easton and Eric Jones and went to 4F.
33:30
And it's great. 4F is an interesting convention and
33:34
as your first time there you are you are
33:37
absolutely forced to perform right so
33:40
it's like you get your bachelor's you go a
33:43
second time you perform you get your master's and then if you perform a third
33:46
time you get your phd so you're forced to do it that first time and get your
33:50
bachelor's but but man is it an intimidating room you know it's it's a weird
33:55
room it's huge you know you got that table and 250 magicians best magicians
34:01
in the in the world are there.
34:02
And, and, you know, and, and you've seen a lot of magic, a lot of magic goes, goes through that room.
34:09
And a lot of the people even, you know, aren't English speaking.
34:12
So it's, it's a tough room, but you know, I, I look at those situations and
34:16
I really grow from it. You know, it's like.
34:19
Sure, I've performed for magicians before, right? But being in that room with
34:22
250 people is intimidating. And so I was proud of myself for doing what I did.
34:27
And of course, I had to, I had to do the routine that got me there.
34:30
So that's what I did the first time I got my bachelor's and did it went for
34:34
my master's. I did a coin routine and a fooling card routine.
34:38
And I have been invited back. But I just, you know, it was COVID.
34:42
I got married. I have kids.
34:44
It's across the country. So I haven't had a chance to be back. but
34:47
i do want to it's probably just for the best because here's what happens most
34:50
times when people get the phd in magic they actually go
34:53
to engineering from there yeah you
34:57
didn't need that part anyway so yeah well speaking of like engineering and building
35:02
an effect or building a routine you know i'm most curious about the treasury
35:07
because that's when we first met you performed that for me like just in a hallway
35:11
at a party i think we were like outside the murphy's party or something like
35:13
that and you would perform this for me and it blew me away,
35:17
Now, when you build something like that from scratch, I mean,
35:20
it was the type of thing where you saw the type of gimmick that could be retrofit
35:25
for your effect, or did you build it from scratch? Talk us through that process.
35:30
Yeah. Yeah. That was a good time. That is when we met and your memory is correct.
35:34
It was right outside the Murphy's party.
35:36
And so, you know, I remember coming up with that effect. And,
35:39
you know, I think a lot of times when you come up with an effect or routine
35:43
or a gimmick, you kind of start at the end. Can you explain the effect as well
35:46
for folks who don't know it, Derek? Just explain it as well.
35:48
It's a really beautiful effect.
35:50
Sure. Yeah, yeah. Thank you. Yeah. So the effect is you borrow a bill from a spectator.
35:56
You have them fold it up and hold on to it, and they sign it,
35:59
and they hold on to it. You have a card selected.
36:03
The bill is then wrapped around the deck. The deck is launched from one hand
36:06
to the other, trapping one card. Of course, it's their card.
36:11
And prior, when you first borrowed the bill, you point out. You go,
36:14
look, on every bill, the current treasurer and secretary signs that bill,
36:20
and you show them the signature on it.
36:22
Then you go through the routine, find the card, and you go, now remember the
36:25
signature we saw a moment ago, and you can show them again.
36:28
And then you go, look, I can actually change the ink to actually say,
36:33
you know, the seven of spades or the queen of hearts or whatever selection that they've chosen.
36:38
And it's strong. It's great. And it's a keepsake. And, you know,
36:41
people keep it in their wallet, and they never spend it, and they never forget you. Mm-hmm.
36:45
So anyway so that's that's the routine building
36:49
but yeah building it i i
36:52
had this it was a martin lewis effect and
36:55
i think it was called ghost rider anybody familiar with it maybe maybe oh there
37:04
you go so it's like it's like a it's like a spirit slate thing right so the
37:10
idea is you have a napkin and you,
37:14
you draw like a little circle and there's nothing else on there.
37:18
And they, they take the spectator takes a card and you blow on the napkin and
37:23
it flutters and they open it up.
37:25
And now inside this napkin, you know, in the circle, the spirit has written their card or whatever.
37:32
So I had that, I had that gimmick and I thought it was cool.
37:35
And I actually never used it but then i don't know i was sitting at my desk
37:39
one day and i had a bill next to it and i saw the signature and i was like oh
37:43
man like i what if what if i did that and i start you know,
37:48
refining it and fine-tuning it and then you know
37:51
having to go to a custom maker for custom custom
37:54
gimmick and start making these bills and like
37:57
i said making because the way that his his was was
38:00
was completely different and though the writing
38:03
was completely different so i went i really customize it to
38:06
look you know i mean obviously everyone has a different signature but
38:10
the way i've put it together you know they can
38:12
you can glance that bill at them with the
38:15
the change signature and they'll never know until you really start to point
38:19
out that it's changed so my point is is that it really does look like a signature
38:23
that's so good yeah so what have we done for the device itself like was it something
38:31
that already existed or did you fabricate that yourself,
38:34
uh i it was it it did exist to an extent but i had to take this thing that existed
38:42
and customize that even further if that makes sense,
38:46
It seems to me that kind of effect, you could have a lot of variations on,
38:49
you know, beyond the card revelation.
38:51
Like if you could allow for even customization on some level,
38:55
that would be the coolest.
38:58
Here's the thing, right? Like, you know, Daniel Garcia's fraud, right?
39:02
Where you move the seal or whatever, right?
39:07
That needs to be done with a printer.
39:11
And the concept that I had basically got rid of the printer.
39:15
Yeah. And so, sure, yeah, you could do other things other than a playing card if you wanted to.
39:21
And my big thing is that I didn't need this printer. I could make it with a
39:26
playing card. But if I really, really wanted to impress, let's say,
39:30
a CEO, the other signature, right?
39:33
So the treasurer's signature changes. And then if I really wanted to impress
39:37
the CEO, the secretary's signature changes to their name.
39:41
Now, that is a little bit of no work. That's what I'm talking about.
39:45
Yeah and that's great and what's cool about that is that you
39:48
change the the first signature to the playing card hand it
39:51
out everyone's looking at it everyone's looking at it again no one's even
39:54
noticing the other signature then you grab it back and you go look let's take
39:57
this one step further now you change the second signature on there damn well
40:02
good yeah that's why he gets booked my friends yeah you get a big box yes you
40:08
get perform actually you get booked all over you performed across the Magic
40:12
Castle and Chicago Magic Lounge.
40:14
What do you think the differences between performing in those places that you've
40:18
learned that you can't learn doing corporate gigs?
40:22
You know, again, you know that you go to a place like a theater,
40:26
like the Chicago Magic Lounge or the Magic Castle, like they say that those
40:29
are some of the best audiences in the world, right?
40:32
And I've had people even tell me like, oh, if you're impressing people at the castle,
40:36
like they don't they don't take that into account because
40:39
they're like easy anybody can do that and you
40:43
know those are those are very set special rooms you know where you know you
40:47
can do a close-up routine that you know you're sitting at a table and you do
40:52
switches or or you know you do you can do a routine that is not very conventional
40:58
when you're working a corporate gig and you're working
41:01
out of your pockets like it's got to be strong hard commercial and and again practical yeah,
41:10
yeah you know what you know that you're in a lot of stuff absolutely yeah i
41:14
was just thinking the same thing that like i guess what we have in common performing
41:17
across so many different things like theaters like corporates like trade shows
41:22
i'm sure that we probably have an abundance of cool gig stories to tell what
41:27
do you say josh we jump into it.
41:29
So Gig Stories is a part of the show where we talk about stories about performing
41:32
magic either from our day-to-day or while traveling, which is why I have one,
41:38
which is super annoying, and I have to get it off my chest. Are you ready?
41:41
Let's go. Let's hear it. So I was performing it in Brisbane over the weekend
41:44
and got to see my good friend Josh and, of course, our good friend, the amazing Nigel.
41:49
So flew there, did my thing, and flying back.
41:52
Now, I do this every time where, like, you know, you can't have certain things
41:57
in your checked-in luggage. when you're flying back, but you've got to like batteries and so forth.
42:02
You got to keep those in what you're carrying to avoid any unpleasantry.
42:06
Now I had the smallest amount.
42:08
I know I just want to admit, I know I'm at fault here because I had the smallest
42:11
amount of lighter fluid that I had thrown into my check-in luggage,
42:15
which was a bit of a shame.
42:17
Now, not a big deal. I got to that really early at the airport, check in my bag.
42:23
I grab a coffee and I sit down.
42:26
I get my laptop out. I was going to knock out some work. And then I get a phone
42:28
call from security. You need to go to carousel five.
42:32
There's an issue with your bag. And I'm like, okay.
42:34
Now, annoyingly, the way they make coffee in Brisbane, it's like 10,000 degrees.
42:39
So I couldn't even take a sip of it. So I had to go to, well, cool.
42:43
I wasn't going to frame it. I was going to frame it. I was going to move on. I had to go downstairs.
42:49
They're like, oh, there's something in your bag. And I'm like,
42:51
oh, I might've left my lighter in there.
42:52
I thought to myself, because I packed up in a mad rush. we finished up
42:55
pretty late no no no they go oh it's this and i'm like oh it's basically empty
42:58
they're like oh sorry man can't take i'm like oh no no problem get
43:01
rid of that so they take the lighter fluid away i go no problem zip my bag up
43:05
put it back through thank you very much i go through security a second time
43:08
now they're like you can't bring your coffee and i'm like okay it was too hot
43:12
to drink anyway throw it away go inside i now get my second coffee i sit down get a phone call again.
43:19
You have to come back to carousel five. And I'm like, what is it now?
43:23
They're like, you have to dispose of the liquid. And I'm like,
43:27
but they took it from me. Like they took it from me and walked off.
43:30
No, you have to dispose of it. And I'm like, right. So I go down and I meet this young girl.
43:36
She's not that bright, but I'm not going to say anything. And I'm like,
43:39
hi there. She goes, yeah, you have to dispose of this. And I'm like, okay, not a problem.
43:44
I'm like, yeah, I go, is there anywhere specific I need to do it?
43:46
She goes, no, just, just get rid of it. I go, can I put it in that bin over there? She's like, no.
43:50
I'm like, this is why I'm asking the question.
43:53
Where would you like to get rid of this? She's like, I don't know.
43:55
And it's like, can I throw it outside?
43:58
If I go outside and find a bin, can I throw it? She's like, yes,
44:01
you can. I'm like, great. I'm going to go to the smoker's portion and throw it straight in there.
44:06
Because like, you're an idiot. Like, just tell me, like, go to the men's room
44:10
and pour it down the sink and then put it in the bin.
44:12
Like, what if I threw it somewhere that wasn't very appropriate?
44:14
So anyway, I go and throw it away.
44:17
I go through security for a third time and I managed to catch my flight home
44:21
with like 10 minutes to spare.
44:23
But that's just the fun thing. So like, look, I'm partly to blame and I take
44:28
full responsibility for that.
44:29
But also tell a guy how to get rid of whatever you want him to get rid of.
44:33
So Nick, what if you just never answered your phone?
44:36
I don't know. They probably just wouldn't have let me on the flight.
44:40
How bizarre. That sucks. Yeah. All right. My geek story is brutal. Yeah.
44:46
My geek story is quick and not full of rage, suppressed rage.
44:51
I did two of the events I did on the weekend. One was a strange one.
44:55
There was a lot of government officials and it was like a very social networking
45:00
event for a lot of business owners and higher ups in Brisbane.
45:03
And there were three of us magicians hired to be there to do roving magic.
45:08
Three, I would say, top tiered corporate magicians, which is rare that we're
45:12
all working the same events. and we're like, okay, great.
45:16
This is where they're going to have a really great time seeing magic.
45:20
But then they say, oh, what we actually want you to do for the first 40 minutes
45:25
of everyone arriving is we want you to be basically.
45:31
Escorting people to their seats because it's a big room
45:34
we want the three of you to be sort of at the main gala
45:37
dinner doors and use your conversing
45:40
skills that you would normally use for magic but to
45:43
engage with the guests and chat to them and make them feel great
45:46
and help them to their seats and that's
45:49
what three brisbane magicians did
45:52
for the first like 40 minutes was like very
45:56
subtle bits of magic to like get
45:59
people's attention in the room like throwing some fire or
46:02
like a quick coin one routine before
46:05
you get to their seats or whatever yeah
46:08
you're not an usher yeah thank you for that comment you're right but we
46:11
were very overly overpaid ushers that evening
46:14
so that was super strange sometimes you're an usher you.
46:17
Can it's all right you got to be flexible some night you know
46:20
to be honest we were just like this is funny but
46:23
obviously you know this is so easy and we feel
46:26
like you know they've over we you
46:29
want me to walk people to a chair for you know three
46:32
four hundred an hour sure a hundred percent
46:35
i'm just while you're on the clock it was just yeah it was a
46:38
very odd it was just a very odd thing to happen we
46:41
were happy to take their money to do that and it was fine
46:44
but we were like this is so bizarre then the
46:47
second event was the theater of magic but we had a
46:49
our toowoomba branch we were
46:52
performing there and i was doing rubik's cube
46:55
magic and the husband of the wife i'd
46:58
gotten to help in the routine the husband is an engineer and so when i gave
47:05
the wife the rubik's cube to keep after this routine she sits down and she mixes
47:12
it up because i invite them to you know thoroughly like check like you keep
47:16
it you can check it, make sure,
47:17
because I need you to know this is a real Rubik's Cube.
47:20
It's not like got a spring or a button or something. So she mixes it up, right?
47:24
But to the naked eye, she's mixed it up. But really, you can see it's only like
47:28
three moves away from being solved.
47:31
Anyway, so she mixes it up, sits it down on her table.
47:34
10 minutes later, we're in a totally different routine. And this woman start
47:39
like shrieks very loudly, like, oh my God.
47:44
And I look over and she picks up the Rubik's Cube and it's solved again.
47:48
And she's like, how did this happen? And it became like a showstopping moment
47:52
to deal with for a second.
47:54
And then I look at the husband and I can tell by the look on his face that what he's done,
48:00
secretly picked up that mixed cube and just solved
48:03
it using his engineer brain to see like it's almost
48:06
solved and just sat it there and didn't say anything and for
48:09
the rest of the show she was fixated on
48:12
the fact that this cube that she mixed up became solved
48:16
on her table and we had a gentleman's agreement
48:18
at the end that um he would never tell her
48:21
but it was
48:25
amazing great appreciate
48:28
i have a fun gig story we're going
48:32
back to the pandemic when flashing back
48:34
to my first virtual show which is an utter train wreck
48:37
and a disaster and i vowed never to do another one but then then i got a call
48:44
from the academy of magical arts the magic castle people and i couldn't say
48:48
no to an offer to perform for that group and on that day I had the honor of
48:54
working with Derek Ostavani.
48:56
We did a show together online during the pandemic for the Magic Castle.
49:00
That's right. We were on that same show, Douglas.
49:03
I think you were the closer. So technically, I was the opener for you. It was an honor.
49:08
If I'm not mistaken, and if I am, it's short-term memory loss. But that's my gig story.
49:13
Working with Derek was a joy. Wow. That's awesome.
49:18
That was a good time. Do you still do virtual shows? Is that part of your universe ever?
49:25
You know, man, I, so I was doing it, you know, a couple times a year after COVID
49:29
and then, you know, it just kind of stopped and I, I never continued to promote
49:34
it because I thoroughly enjoy doing it, you know, in person much more.
49:38
And there's some people still do it. I just, I'm curious if anyone does it.
49:42
I had a bachelorette party recently reached out to me and be like,
49:45
oh, how much is it for a virtual show?
49:48
And I was like, at this point, honestly, it's not going to be any cheaper.
49:51
Like I have to reset everything up and figure things out altogether.
49:55
And then I was like, you guys are going to like it much more in person.
49:58
And so sure enough, they had me come in person and do it.
50:01
Right. Yes. And then, and what is your, what gig story do you have,
50:05
my friend? It could be from a cruise ship or trade show, anything, magic castle.
50:10
This was early in my career and I was performing at a restaurant and,
50:17
and I remember a couple came in and they didn't know that there was magic there.
50:22
I was, it was every Friday and Saturday, but they didn't have any idea there
50:24
was magic there. And so I approached the table, you know, and offered you some
50:27
magic for them to like, you know, thrown off and like, yeah,
50:30
sure. That sounds great.
50:31
So, you know, I do, you know, I don't know, seven, eight minutes of magic for
50:35
them. Loved it. Had a great time, blah, blah, blah, blah. Food comes.
50:39
I make myself scarce, go to another table.
50:43
And then shortly after I was, I was near that table again.
50:46
I remember my back was to them and I was putting my cards back in the box.
50:50
And I hear the guy go, my watch.
50:54
And I turn around and he's, he's looking right at me and I go, excuse me.
50:59
And he didn't say anything. He just kept staring. He just kept staring right
51:03
at me. And again, I go, what did you say?
51:05
It was super awkward. And I go, what did you say? And nothing just stared at me.
51:10
So then at that point the girl says to
51:13
me did you happen to notice if he
51:15
was wearing a watch and I walked over there
51:18
and I told him I go no I didn't
51:21
and there was nothing I could do
51:24
shy of producing this guy's watch to make
51:27
him happy and he literally he called over
51:30
the waitress he called over the manager it was
51:34
just really really uncomfortable and awkward and I don't
51:37
know if the guy was trying to get a free meal or he legitimately lost
51:40
his watch or maybe just left on the nightstand
51:44
didn't even put it on that day and just assume all this magician you
51:47
know freaking pickpocketed me but it was very uncomfortable it's
51:51
so dumb i would love to know the aftermath of
51:53
that because obviously he must have gotten home and then gone oh
51:57
i'm an idiot yeah but
52:00
he did not fess up to it so that sucks.
52:03
That's a rough one it was yeah
52:07
look i've been in scenarios like that as well and it's just it's so dumb
52:10
that like why would you think i would like pick a pocket and and
52:13
steal from you and then like be here for the next three hours waiting
52:17
to be found out like how dumb how dumb
52:20
and that's the thing you know a watch still can be risky
52:23
and so i try not to do it at a place of residency because
52:26
i don't want them to feel if i get caught i don't want them to
52:29
feel uncomfortable like i was really trying to do something you
52:31
know yeah yeah and all
52:35
i gotta do is just take it the wrong way and go like oh no talk to the manager
52:38
it's like uh you're such a douche but when you're only there for an hour you
52:42
know yeah and that's what happens like it's been there's been times where like
52:46
i i you know i vanished someone's phone in my routine and they were like oh
52:49
well done mate i saw that you took a tip for yourself i'm like what are you
52:51
talking about it's like 61 hit my account i'm like,
52:55
how much was your order for all the shots? Like $61. And I'm like,
53:00
scratch your head, buddy. Yeah.
53:03
That's awkward. And it's always some douche in knockoff clothing or something like that.
53:09
You know what I mean? Just like, buddy, you think you're on my mark, you?
53:14
Yeah, exactly. I know you're wearing your best tracksuit pants today, but come on.
53:20
Give me more credit than that. I got better taste than that. Yeah.
53:25
Yeah couldn't wait to steal your Toyota Corolla like just that type of,
53:30
but to be clear you did steal his Toyota
53:34
Corolla yes out of principle yes but the
53:37
point is not the watch he out
53:40
for it yeah yeah so Derek this you
53:43
know being in 2025 you've been doing magic for
53:45
a long time now you know you've lectured created effects cruise
53:49
ships now you're a family man like what is
53:53
your focus would you say at the moment is there something
53:56
you're mainly trying to drive towards whether that's
54:00
a good question you know yeah i'm i'm
54:03
trying to not travel as much like i
54:05
don't mind those you know one you know a few days here and
54:08
there kind of thing i don't like to be gone for the week
54:11
two weeks at a time it's hard on me it's hard on my family
54:14
you know as my little boy gets older he now
54:17
recognizes you know daddy's god and that's not
54:20
good so i don't know i i'm i'm continuing i i still enjoy doing the the corporate
54:25
circuit but i think i kind of want to start to lean into getting you know a
54:32
spot at a hotel and kind of forewalling it and having people come to me instead
54:36
of me coming to them you should chat with our team.
54:42
Theater and magic San Diego maybe we
54:45
should talk about it honestly there is nothing more fun
54:49
than that out of every style that I've tried
54:52
performing yeah it's the best framework
54:56
for people to come in that lens and be ready to enjoy magic and you can just
55:01
obviously do the magic you enjoy right without traveling yes that's a great
55:07
answer now Derek You're also out there working like the mystique dining and
55:11
is it prestige? Is that what it is?
55:15
Yeah. No, both of those venues no longer exist in San Diego.
55:19
There's still is. There's one in Utah, one in Folsom, which is Northern California.
55:24
There is kind of a pop-up in Mesa, Arizona. And I guess the newest location
55:30
is, is it going to be in Denver? I think it is.
55:33
And those are great. I thoroughly enjoy them. You know, I've had a lot of fun
55:37
doing that. But, you know, again, you know, it takes me away for a week at a time.
55:41
I'd say I won't do them again. Yeah. Yeah.
55:45
Curious about the dining aspect of that experience. Are people eating during the show? Yeah.
55:52
No no no it's all it's all before and you know even with
55:55
with my private corporate gigs i mean that's the way to go right i would i always
55:58
discourage people to be eating during the show right yeah so for these like
56:03
mystique is a five course meal so they come in they have these five courses
56:08
and then the magician comes out and he does a 45 minute set yeah you should do it doug,
56:14
i'm waiting for the theater of magic las vegas i'm i'm
56:17
holding out for that sorry i'm booked for that
56:20
then again it's actually not an impossible way yeah that's not an impossible
56:26
thing like the theater magic boston is up and running and that's going really
56:29
well and so look at that well we're almost out of time but i feel like you know
56:36
we've only really scratched the surface and derek here.
56:41
And his website and socials are in
56:44
the description of where you're listening to this so do scope him
56:47
out so you can follow along with this journey the effects
56:50
you mentioned you created Derek are they are these available to
56:54
magicians or these are things you keep close to
56:57
you they are yeah I have my penguin live lecture which obviously is on penguin
57:03
treasury is through penguin random odds which we didn't get to talk about but
57:08
it I was telling you guys earlier it is literally one of the strongest effects
57:13
that I can do with just a deck of cards.
57:16
And fun fact, that was supposed to be called borrowed odds.
57:21
Because in theory, you can borrow everything. You can borrow a phone,
57:25
you can borrow the bill, and you could borrow a deck. You probably won't, but you could.
57:31
So yeah, that's- Can you- Sorry. Yeah.
57:35
Could you synopsisize that effect? Obviously, that's something people should scope out.
57:40
Sure. Absolutely. So you ask for a bill, any denomination, kind of leave it on the table.
57:46
Then you take out a calculator, have other people take out calculators and have
57:50
people putting random numbers.
57:52
It could be their first three of their phone number or their social or favorite number or whatever.
57:56
You add up all these numbers and then you put the phone kind of away.
58:00
So we'll get back to that then you take a deck of cards and you you cut them
58:04
into into multiple piles and turn some face up some face down i'll uh play it
58:10
straight triumph by bannon and then.
58:14
Great trick right great trick and then you're you're mess you're left with this
58:18
mess of face up and face down cards you then remove just the face down cards
58:22
and you continue to to mix them up, have the spectator tell you exactly how
58:27
you want it, want them to deal,
58:29
how they want you to deal until you're left with a small pack of cards.
58:33
You go back to the calculator. You say, you know, hit equals.
58:36
What's the very first digit on there? They name it. You turn over the card. It matches.
58:41
What's the next digit? It matches. Next digit matches. So all the way across, it matches.
58:46
And they're so blown away at that point.
58:49
They've forgotten about the bill. Well, at this point, you
58:52
then you talk about you know everyone has
58:55
a unique social security number and likewise bills have unique serial numbers
59:00
you could have brought out any bill turn that bill over read that serial number
59:03
out and that really kind of kicks them in the pants and destroys them dollar
59:08
yes yeah it's very layered right
59:10
there's a lot going on it's awesome right that should be so that's also.
59:16
What's that kicking someone in the pants and just destroying them should be
59:20
the goal of any effect basically 100% agree and that is available through Penguin
59:26
is that what you were going to,
59:28
That is also, yeah, that's what I was going to say, that it's also available through Penguin.
59:32
The one thing that I've kind of, well, there's just like two things that I haven't
59:35
put out through major companies.
59:37
One is I make my own cigars for the cigar through purse routine, the Leipzig routine.
59:43
And then I have my take on Anniversary Waltz. It's an impromptu version.
59:48
I have a booklet of it, and it's called The Horizontal Mambo.
59:53
And that's available through your website, Derek? not on my website but if people
59:58
just contact me yeah and you know i could send it to them,
1:00:01
yeah actually it might be on my website well people
1:00:04
are going to have to go and check to scope it out yeah first
1:00:07
of all look thank you so much for coming on here my friend i look forward to
1:00:11
meeting you in person one day as well and i feel like i've gotten to know you
1:00:14
just a little bit more now which is which is really wonderful and you know just
1:00:18
so good to know there's such handsome magicians out there doing the good work
1:00:22
you know it's really great to see full full head of hair,
1:00:25
real show off, but he, he wore the cap to not make us feel too self-conscious.
1:00:29
We really appreciate that.
1:00:30
Hey, just give me your Venmo's. I'll Venmo you guys afterwards.
1:00:33
You guys don't have to go on about that. Thank you.
1:00:37
We're going to, yeah, it's, it's been a pleasure.
1:00:40
We could chat all day, but we're going to end with the, we're going to end the
1:00:43
episode in the way that we always do, which is by giving our guest the final word.
1:00:52
I guess that's my cue. It's been great being here, guys. Thank you so much.
1:00:56
Again, my name is Derek Ostavani.
1:00:57
You can find me at Magic with Derek, all the socials, my website.
1:01:02
Definitely check out my Penguin Live lecture. There's a killer routine in there called Lie to Me.
1:01:07
Check out Random Odds, Treasury, and my booklet, Horizontal Mambo. See you guys next week.
1:01:13
Thanks for listening. It's time for us to disappear now. Disappear now.
1:01:18
But we'll see you again on the next episode of The Magic Guys. Yeah.