Last night on The Learning Channel I came across a show which, in the grand tradition of TLC, exploited the world of the sideshow performer. One performance artist billed himself as “The Torture King” and among other things, impaled the middle of his biceps with a bycicle spoke and put scewers though his cheecks. OK, been there/ done that. But the one thing that caught my eye was a bit where he swallowed a six foot long piece of string and, using a scalpel, digs around just below his breastplate and pulls the string out from his chest moments later. Is this humanly possible? I remain sceptical, though from the video footage it looked totally believable (ie. no sheet or hand coverup like you see in “psychic surgery”). Anyone familiar with this guy and is he for real? If so…YEECCCHHH!
OK , since this hasn’t recieved any replies, I must conclude:
A: NO ONE BUT ME HAS SEEN THE SHOW. Possible, as it was on at midnight Chicago time on a Sunday, but doubtful since TLC tends to run shows repeatedly during the week.
B: NO ONE CARES. C,mon… a guy makes an incision on his own chest and retreives a previously ingested item…now that’s entertainment!
C. I DREAMED THE WHOLE THING It was late at night. Maybe I’m dreaming now. Someone pinch me…OWWW, not there!
Just so you don’t go without any reply, I’ll say that I think I might have seen this guy on another documentary. I remember seeing a guy who ran bicycle spokes through his biceps and cheeks. I think it might have been the Torture King, but I can’t recall perfectly-how odd to think there might be more than one. I don’t recall him swallowing anything and removing it from his chest, but it’s been years since I saw the documentary, and the TK could have always added something to his act.
Thanks, Ballybay.It was getting awfully lonely in this corner.
Anyway after doing my own search under Torture King, I came up with the guy’s site:
http://www.bme.freeq.com/spc/galleries/other/zamora/index3.htm
Which includes a reference to the aforementioned stunt. To wit:
“Torture King lived up to his name, doing acts such as putting redhot steel to his tongue and feet, bicep and forearm skewering, an amazing “under the tongue out the jaw”
piercing, and the most original act I’ve seen in some time, swallowing a length of string, cutting open the abdomen and retreiving it. It’s a “oh my god how did he do that”
kinda moment.”
(Hope this copied quote isn’t to lengthy, mods.)
So real or not, he’s certainly got his act down.
I did a search on Google for the Torture King. It seems like he is for real. Go here for some info about him.
These kinds of acts are confusing because some of the stunts are fake, some are for real, and some can be done either way.
Take skewers through flesh. This can be faked, but it can be done for real. To do it for real, you start your practicing with very sharp, fine sterilised skewers and some local anaesthetic (or a good swig of whisky). You gather some loose skin (around the arm or cheek) and push the thing through. It hurts, it bleeds, it ain’t nice. You leave it a while and then pull it out. Do the same thing twice a day. Eventually it hurts less and you develop a kind of ‘channel’ of tissue which accomodates the action. And you gradually use bigger and thicker spikes.
I haven’t done this myself, but I do perform hammering a nail into my head, which again CAN be faked but can also be done for real, safely and without harm.
Please don’t try any of these things without expert guidance and supervision. Readers take responsibility for their own actions.
However, the string thing is a trick. First, the guy gets a small bundle of string. He makes a very fine cut in the flabbier part of the abdomen - no worse than a cut during shaving. He stashes the rolled up string inside the cut. He stanuches the wound and waits for it to heal. He does this as far before the actual performance as he can (anything from an hour to a day). He swallows a different piece of identical string (or appears to). Then it’s just a case of opening up the recent cut and extracting the duplicate piece of string.
ianzin -
While channel-surfing, I saw the same string trick pulled off by an Indian family group on a Penn and Teller show. I was wondering how they pulled it off. Thanks for the info.
-ellis
I saw this guy live and in person last week, and I assumed the string trick was done as described by ianzin.
The skewers through the arm thing was a little different though. They looked to go through not just the skin of his arm, but smack dab through the muscle of the arm. He put one through each arm, then he pushed one down through his tongue, and out the bottom of his head behind his chin.
It really, really looked like he actually put these skewers through himself, and not just through skin.