Jinx Navigator Podcast — Episode 10: Issue #10
Issue #10 of The Jinx opens with Annemann on his soapbox about impromptu magic — and Jay gets on one of his own — before delivering a signed card on a ribbon, a startling deck production, a masterclass in cigarette vanish presentation, and a one-person picture-duplication effect that Annemann vouches for with characteristic honesty. A strong issue from start to finish.
Effects Covered
[0:52] Editorial — Theodore Annemann Annemann makes the case that working professionals who can’t perform on the spot are failing at showmanship, pointing to Harry Blackstone and John Mulholland as performers who built their public reputations largely on impromptu work. Jay weighs in with his own take on the “I’m not a performing monkey” crowd. The editorial also covers news from the New York scene, U.F. Grant’s new newsletter The Trickster, and a firm no to advertising in the Jinx — because, as Annemann puts it, he’s selling usable information, not ads.
[4:30] 20th Century Cards — Theodore Annemann A helper signs their chosen card and punches a hole in it with a ticket punch, making it unmistakably theirs — then it vanishes from the deck and reappears threaded onto a ribbon between two other cards, everything examinable. The method uses one prepared card and a lead-based adhesive that Annemann called Diachylon, for which Jay suggests magician’s wax as a perfectly reasonable modern substitute.
[6:07] Surprise!! — J. G. Thompson Jr. A full deck of cards is produced from nowhere by plunging a bare hand straight through a tambourine — the hand goes in empty, comes out the other side holding a fanned deck, faces out toward the audience. The method centers on a wire gimmick illustrated in the original article, and Jay suggests the gimmick itself is worth studying even if tambourines aren’t exactly standard equipment anymore.
[8:02] The Henry E. Dixie Cigarette Vanish — Henry E. Dixie A cigarette is lit, smoked, pushed into a closed fist, and vanishes — performed entirely without words, unhurried, and utterly natural. Annemann’s point isn’t really the method, which uses a standard piece of apparatus working magicians will recognize immediately — it’s that what made this remarkable was Dixie’s presentation, and he uses it as a broader argument that performers spend too much time chasing new methods and not enough time on what actually happens in front of an audience.
[10:27] Extra Sensory Perception — Theodore Annemann Thirty-two cards bearing hand-drawn sketches are shuffled and distributed, helpers concentrate on their top card, and the performer reproduces the drawings on a slate from across the room — leaving everything with the audience at the end. Annemann is upfront that Julius Zansig’s two-person act was the gold standard for this kind of work, but calls his single-performer version as clean as anything he knows of. Jay has performed this one recently and left notes in the comments at jinxnavigator.com.