Blake Vogt Hello, welcome to Inventing Magic, Episode 13. My guest this month is the one and only, amazing, Ben Seidman.
Ben Seidman Hello world. I’m in a hotel room somewhere in Georgia, I think.
BV Do you like traveling/being on the road?
BS It depends. I didn’t know what this podcast was going to be like, so I went into my notebook, I have a digital notebook note app, and I thought, “Let me see what things I haven’t thought about for a while.” I spent five hours from LA to Atlanta looking at ideas. And it was so cool, because I don’t pop that open enough. And I thought, “Oh my God, this became a thing I’m doing now. And it was just an idea that was kind of silly. I put it in there and forgot about it.” And I thought, “That one’s terrible. This one’s still promising. Oh, I should still do that. I should publish tomorrow. This is in the stage show right now. I’ve done it around 70 times. It’s my favorite thing to perform.” Seeing those ideas was so exciting. That was an amazing travel day.
My organization is not great, but I have one kind of master note, which is just everything: the good, the bad. I don’t differentiate when something actually gets created.
BV: I have one note. I think it’s just called “ideas” on my phone, and it’s just massive. I like going through it every once in a while, but it’s hard to remember to do that. So that’s a good thing to do on a flight. What is your go-to? You’re mainly doing stage performing? Or do you do much strolling anymore?
BS I’m only hired to do strolling maybe 2% of the time. But how often do I stroll? I do it a lot, because even if the client doesn’t ask for it, I always suggest it. You’re essentially getting a feel for the room. You’re warming up. It allows me to try new things, too. I feel like I’m getting in the zone. And then when I go onstage, some percentage of the audience doesn’t go, “Oh, who is this guy?” Some percentage of the audience thinks, “Oh, it’s our friend, Ben.” And that, like, feels awesome.
BV Where do you try stuff out? I have an idea that I’ve been playing with in the back of my head, and it was just such a big build, the most ridiculous build for the smallest of tricks. And I just kept putting off. And the other day, I finished it, and I was so excited that I had built this thing that I ran to the liquor store to buy a bottle of wine for my wife and I. The store was empty and there was just the guy behind the register. And I said, “Can I show you a magic trick?” I showed him this thing that I spent an obscene amount of time building. And he was like, “That’s pretty cool.” I left there thinking: “This was a waste. This is too complicated. The method is so much cooler than the trick. I could have done a double lift, and he would have been more impressed.”
BS First of all, I don’t know what the effect is. You might show it to me, and I’d say, “No, Blake, this is great, and maybe it has legs, and maybe that was the wrong context.” But also, yes, it’s really hard. That’s why classic magic tricks are classics. You and I have this dear love of creating new magic. Doing something that is stronger than changing a card in someone’s hand is not an easy task. But for me, I want to do both. I want to know that if I’m at a gig where I have to change the card in someone’s hand in order to do my job, I can do that. But I’m not going to be happy if that’s what I’m doing at all of my gigs.
BV What’s a size to jam on, or a category. I mean, you’ve got crazy pickpocketing skills. The average person doesn’t have those. How long did that take? I told you, this wasn’t an interview show, but I’m just curious.
BS That stuff is very hard to work on in this context, because it’s not like a thing that you can [just] learn and then do. It’s been so many years of slowly building the skill, and I don’t look at myself as someone who can just go into any situation and steal anything. You have to be amazing at thinking on your feet and changing in the moment and adapting to the situation. I’m OK at it, and I’m getting better. But yes, it’s a thing I’ve been doing for a long time.
BV I’ve seen you work, I’ve seen Apollo [Robbins] work up close. I know that you’re doing really hard stuff. Once you’ve established yourself as a pickpocket, and people know you have these skills, can’t you get the credit for pickpocketing when you’re not necessarily doing it? Can you mesh pickpocketing and magic?
