Penn & Teller Fool Us - New Season

Cafe Society
201

On the video for Denny Corby… Maybe he was able to have the phone beforehand and set it up. For example started the calculation with"8675309 + 0 * (" and then let the other person put in whatever she wants. The answer is always 8675309. A professional could come up with something better.

On the menu… I was thinking he might have different pages that he could choose from. For example, if on the meat page the person picks something that costs 12 dollars he would go to one page. If the meat item selected was 10 dollars it would be different page where all the items were 2 dollars more than the “12 dollar” page. And a professional could come up with something better.

202

For the restaurant menu trick, the part that was challenging to figure out was getting the right amount of cash into Wallace’s pocket. My suspicion is that he has many folds of cash on him and starts out by putting one of them (perhaps the most likely sum that will be made by the choices) in his pocket at the beginning. Then if the sum turns out to be different, he switches that one out for another as takes the cash from him at the end. But I don’t know the math on how many cash folds he would need to make that work.

For the Mona Lisa number trick, I think most of it is just math and he would place the cards differently to get to whatever number he needs. The 8 on the chalkboard is the puzzler for me. But I think P&T got it wrong when they said they were fooled if it was real chalk. It was real chalk and the magician made a point of swiping through the number with his finger at the end to prove it. But was it a real chalkboard?? There was a lot of room in the construction of the easel and chalkboard, so my theory is that it wasn’t a chalkboard at all but rather a roll of black paper that could be moved back and forth through all the pre-written numbers.

203

I watched the menu one again. Part of my guess isn’t correct. However, the “customer” turned the pages in all cases except for the last one. The magician took the menu away and turned the page to the last page.

204

Seems like all of the drinks in a specific category share a price. The drink is chosen last, so he can fix the price to total 83$ by choosing a specific category. Suppose all the dessert wines cost 12$, all the red wines cost 11$, cocktails 10$ etc. All the previous menu items are free choice, but he has a drink category to fix it to 83€ with the last choice every time.

205

This is correct.

The App he chooses is $14. The group includes (8.5, 12.5, 12.5, 14, 14, 20)

He is then directed to soups and chooses $10.50. (10.5, 14.5, 16.5, 16.5, 16.5)

His total at this point is $24.50.

He is then turned to grilled meats and chooses $32 (32, 32, 40, 40 (possibly others offscreen))

His total at this point is $56.50.

Then cakes for 14.50 (14.5, 14.5, 18.5 (possibly others offscreen))

Then dessert wines (all 12)

Ignored categories:

Salad (12,12,16,18 (possibly others out off screen))
Bread (4.5, 8.5, 10.5, 10.5)
Pasta (16, 16, 20, 22)
Specials (36, 36 (probably others off screen))
Mains (26, 26, 34, 34)
Desserts (6.5, 6.5, 10.5, 10.5)
Aperitifs (not shown, but also fixed price)

Could be a back of the menu too, if needed
There are two final categories that allow him to do a final adjustment if the total ends up too low. All of the later categories also all seem to feature only two prices - limiting price variation. The earlier ones have more variety, but also have repetition so that a certain price is more likely and he doesn’t have to goto categories like “bread” as often, which might seem a bit harder to fit into patter as part of a typical meal.

The two prices of mains (26/34) are $8 apart. The two prices of meats (32/40) are also $8 apart. The mains and the meats are $6 apart.

So, for example, if he had chosen the $16.50 soup instead of the $10.50 soup, Denny could have asked him to choose a main instead of a meat and been at the same point in the math.

The desserts (6.5./10.5) are $4 apart, as are the cakes (14.5 and 18.5) - the two are $8 apart from each other.

So if he had chosen the meat that was $40 instead of $32, he would have gone to the ‘desserts’ instead of the ‘cakes’ and again been at the same place in the math.

We can’t see the price of the Aperitifs, but I am confident that the price would have been $8.00 for all drinks. When George picks the $4 cheaper cake, he directs him to the $12.00 dessert wine section. If he had picked the $4 more cake, he would need a category that was $4.00 to still hit $83.00.

We can extrapolate the rest of the routine from that. The prices in the soups are all $6 more than the prices in the breads, so if he had chosen the $20 app instead of the $14 app, he would have gone to the breads instead of the soups to offset the $6 spend in the apps. If George had chosen a $12.50 app ($2.50 less), he’d have gone instead to the salads ($2.50 more than the soups). And for $8.5 ($5.5 less than $14), he would have gone to the Pastas.

So to summarise for my own edification to ensure the math works out:

An app is chosen with one of four prices (8.5, 12.5, 14, 20)

Based on which app price is chosen (highest to lowest), he picks the corresponding group of three prices:

Bread (4.5, 8.5, 10.5) [+20]
Soup (10.5, 14.5, 16.5) [+14]
Salad (12, 16, 18) [+12.5]
Pasta (16, 20, 22) [+8.5]

Total is always 24.5, 28.5 or 30.5 depending on if they picked the lowest, middle or highest price of the second group. He then picks the right entree group for the total he has at this point:

Mains (26, 34) [+30.5]
Specials (28?, 36) [+28.5]
Meats (32, 40) [+24.5]

Total is always either 56.5 or 64.5 depending on if they picked the lower or higher price of the entree group. I note that I am presuming that there is probably a special priced at $28 for the consistency of the trick, though it could be all specials of $36, and there is no second option if that group comes up. Same for Dessert:

Desserts (6.5, 10.5) [+64.5]
Cakes (14.5, 18.5) [+56.5]

Total is always either $71 or $75 based on which lower/higher price again.

Then he just picks the correct drink group (all priced the same) to finish the trick. $12 Wines if the total was $71, or $8 Aperitifs if it was $75.

The key is memorising all of the combos that make $83.00.

206

But then wouldn’t that scramble the picture?

207

I haven’t looked at this again, but I believe he was turning that pile of cards over at times, so each card could be two sided with a different number on each side.

I don’t understand why P&T say they were fooled by the ‘8’. He could have written that down ahead of time, with the ability to force the number by rolling that fluffy die if he felt like it, and even if the result isn’t 8 he didn’t have to turn that board around and show the guys.

208

Seems right.

And, Penn said something about “ years ago, your pants would have needed to be a lot bigger”, implying that there’s some (these days small) technology inside his clothes, which I think is a small printer to make the receipt in real time.

209

New episode this week, it was a holiday themed show.

The only trick I think I could figure out was the guy who had the randomly assigned flights. I assume the boxes had three separate chambers that had all three destination items. And the destination posters were the same way - depending on how he pulled the front away (like by pulling on a tab) it determined which poster would show. If I’m right, he crafted the trick well because it looked like he opened each box and pulled away each cover with the same hand placement. I didn’t notice his hands being further left or right for each reveal.

Although now that I rewatch those boxes look awfully small to hold all of the things he pulled out. So I may be totally wrong.

210

The “I have 52 decks, but not really” trick felt very much like a PT trick. Loved it.

211

The “reversed card in the deck” trick is a fairly simple one for a skilled magician, I think. (I used to know how it’s done, but I’ve forgotten.) The rest was just theatrics. Not that I didn’t enjoy it; I did. You’re right - it felt very P&T-inspired.

Mat Franco’s bit with Alyson throwing cards over her shoulder was entertaining, but pretty easy to figure out. If he’d never handled the cards I would have been more impressed, but when she was down to three he took them from her, and there was the force. The card in the “empty” box was certainly in the lid when he put it on, and there was an obvious false bottom hiding the rats.

Adam Trent’s act was visually entertaining, but come on - with all those screens hanging down and all the flashing lights and everything, he could have been hiding anything back there. Yes, even a grand piano.

I’m not sure about Mark Shortland’s airport trick; I don’t think it was as simple as ZipperJJ’s theory. But regardless, we’ve seen variations of this kind of thing many times before. If this had been a regular episode I don’t think there would have been any foolers.

P&T’s trick, on the other hand… Assuming Alyson really had a free choice with the bags, it sure fooled me. I know Teller is an amazing sleight-of-hand artist, but was he able to hide and then replace the broken bottle? I didn’t catch him. Great trick.

212

My guess: those spun sugar ‘glass’ bottles, already with their tops broken free. One in each of the three ‘safe’ bags before the start, Teller is holding a fourth safely to the side inside the bag while he smashed the real glass bottle and dumps out the pieces of glass. Then he takes out the jagged sugar bottle top, shows it to the audience, puts it into place and covers it up. Now there are four bags with easily broken sugar bottles, and when they slam their hand down on the paper bags the sugar simply crumples and the whole mess is discarded along with the crumpled bag as if it had been empty.

So it matters not at all which Alyson picks for them to break, and which one survives to the end.

213

I caught him making a movement when he opened the pack and, while I didn’t catch that the decks were all flat, the reveal didn’t sell me at all because the gearing on the cup was too small for him to be able to turn a possible 180 and not have it stand out like a sore thumb.

I’m not sure how he retrieved the correct card but, I assume, his reference to Tommy Wonder was his bit of code to tell P&T exactly what methodology he was using and that they needn’t analyze the magic just the plot.

…And that seems pretty fair for a show where you can’t win nor lose. Magicians are also (and principally) entertainers. If you can’t magic your way to the top and the audience is a pair of magicians, then entertain the hell out of them by throwing em for a loop on the plot.

214

I’m guessing that there really were 52 such decks (at the beginning) and that while he was “explaining” the trick, he expelled the remaining decks into holding compartments in the table’s first “skirt.” When he removed that skirt to show the flat piece, those decks went with it.

215

I think the genius of the 52-decks trick was making the audience buy into the idea that he actually needed 52 different decks hidden somewhere. But all he needed was one completely blank deck in the box and a way to get the single right card, which he then snuck into the deck. I haven’t rewound to figure out where it came from, but doesn’t seem that hard a trick.

Agree that the only real trick with Mat was being able to sneak the card from his pocket into the three cards that Allyson had at the end (seems pretty easy), and then sneak it back out again (mildly impressive from a sleight-of-hand perspective?).

I’m not sure about the travel thing. I thought at first the suitcases weren’t big enough to fit all the items, but I’m realizing the goggles were the only big thing, and everything else was small and/or foldable, so I think it’s possible that all three gates were identical and he just revealed the appropriate thing.

For the bottles, agree there were not-glass fragile ‘bottles’ in every bag. It’s obvious that when Teller put the original bottle in the bag, he was holding something else in the bag and dumped the bottle in the garbage can after ‘smashing’. And the ‘smashing’ was done in a weird cupped-hand way, as if they wanted to be careful to keep any debris inside the bag (plus the immediate disposal of any evidence, rather than the obvious and more theatrical move of picking up the smashed bag to show nothing underneath).