David Letterman had a magician on the other night who did some sleight-of-hand with cards and a sugar packet. I’m bored right now and I might like to explain how he did a few things so that I can feel very clever and happy with myself. I deduced his methods using the mystical power of the Tivo as well as the kid’s magic book I remember buying and flipping through some twelve years ago at a shop at Wintergreen resort.
I’ll start with one:
The one where he had Dave place the Jacks in the assorted deck of cards is simple. The top and bottom cards were the relevant “Las Vegas” Jacks. The magician dealt the one off the top, followed by a few more cards, and Dave put his first Jack down face-up. The remaining cards were put on top of this. Now the first Jack, the one on the bottom of the deck, was above Dave’s and the other is on the bottom since it was dealt first. He dealt a few more, Dave put another Jack down face-up and the magician put the rest on top. Since the other Jack had moved to the bottom, it was thus placed on top of the second Jack Dave put down.
So is anybody interested in this, or does everybody already know about thumb-tips and such, or what? I’m wondering how he did his first trick. I can’t figure it out.
The sugar trick was surprisingly obvious. It was a gaffed thumb. He held the fake thumb in his left hand and poured the sugar into it. He then slipped it onto his his right thumb. Opened his left hand to show that the sugar was gone while he slipped the fake thumb off. He then poured the contents out into his left hand.
The one with the 2 of spades, if it didn’t involve conspiracy, involved a trick deck. Every other card was a 2. They had some defect such as being narrower, which allowed him to spread them out, with his thumb not catching the 2’s, and only have the others show. The same defect helped him deal 2 cards at a time so he always had a 2. I think.
Some of the others involved a lot of flipping of cards. He would just, for instance, flip a card over, then flip two cards back while saying he was flipping the one back over. Also at one point he counted four aces out, but he counted one twice while leaving the fourth unseen.
The guy was OK but can’t hold a candle to Ricky Jay. Ricky can tell you exactly what he is going to do and there is still no way you can see him do it. Never play poker with Ricky Jay unless you want to lose against 4 aces every hand.