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1:15

When I design a magic presentation,

1:17

I try to start in the

1:19

action or very close to it.

1:23

101 advice for writing stories, right? You

1:25

don't start with background on all the characters,

1:27

and then only when you're all caught up

1:29

do you start your story. You start with

1:31

Indiana Jones being run down by

1:33

a boulder. Welcome

1:37

back to working. I'm your host,

1:39

June Thomas. And I'm your

1:41

other host, Kristen Meinzer. Kristen, it is

1:43

such a blast to be talking with

1:45

you today. You're one of my favorite

1:47

podcast hosts. You just always are so

1:49

much fun to chat with. But

1:51

say, whose voice did we hear at the top of

1:53

the show? That is Joshua

1:56

Jay. He is a magician.

1:58

He is fantastic. But he's

2:00

not just a magician, he's also a writer,

2:02

a speaker, and just an

2:05

all-around creative guy. And why

2:07

did you want to speak with Joshua? Well,

2:09

I have to give credit where credit is

2:11

due. Our former working

2:13

guest, Margalit Fox, she's the obituary writer

2:15

from the New York Times, she

2:18

and I have stayed in touch since we had her on the show.

2:20

And she said to me, your next

2:23

guest has got to be Joshua Jay.

2:25

He is just fantastic. He's going to be the

2:27

best interview you ever had. And I said, I

2:30

don't think that's true. You're the best interview we

2:32

ever had. And she said, no, it is going

2:34

to be Joshua Jay. And

2:36

I said, Margalit, coming from you,

2:39

that's high praise. So yes, let's try to get

2:41

him on the show. And surprise, he said yes.

2:44

Well, that is definitely a tip to

2:46

follow. You obviously did the right thing.

2:48

I'm very excited to hear this interview,

2:50

but something tells me you have an

2:52

extra segment exclusively for Select Plus members.

2:55

What will they hear? Of

2:57

course we do. So Select Plus members

2:59

are going to hear about the difference

3:01

between different kinds of magic, for example,

3:03

close-up magic versus parlor magic. I didn't

3:05

even know what these terms meant before

3:08

I talked with Joshua. And

3:10

they're also going to hear about

3:12

the various magic styles from around

3:14

the world, because it turns out

3:16

there are differences in magic in

3:18

different cultures. That sounds

3:20

amazing. If you're a member of Select Plus,

3:22

you'll hear that at the end of the

3:25

episode. And if you aren't,

3:27

well, let me just say it's super

3:29

easy to join. As a Select Plus

3:31

member, you get to hear extra segments

3:33

on this show and others like Culture

3:35

Gab Fest. You'll get bonus episodes of

3:37

podcasts like Slow Burn. And

3:39

of course, you will never hit a

3:41

paywall on select.com. You'll also

3:43

be supporting the work we do here on

3:46

Working. To learn more,

3:48

go to select.com/Working Plus. All

3:53

right, let's hear Kristen's conversation with Joshua

3:56

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4:48

Joshua J, welcome to the show. Thank

4:50

you so much for having me. Joshua,

4:52

as little kids, a

4:55

lot of us find ourselves

4:57

entranced with the idea of magic. I know

5:00

I was very entranced as a little kid, but

5:02

I, like most little kids, never got

5:04

past those one or two card tricks.

5:07

How old were you when you first became interested

5:09

in magic? And what made you stick

5:11

with it beyond me or all

5:14

of the other little kids out there? Stubbornness

5:16

is what made me stick with it,

5:18

I guess. I, like so many kids,

5:20

my dad did a card trick for

5:22

me when I was a little kid,

5:24

seven years old, and he didn't tell

5:26

me how it was done. And

5:29

that, in a way, was the

5:31

transformative thing because I went up

5:34

to my room, I

5:36

worked on it, I tried to figure it

5:38

out, I took out my deck of cards,

5:40

I made charts, and I eventually figured out

5:42

the trick. I reverse engineered the trick. And

5:45

then I went downstairs and performed it

5:47

for him. And it was

5:49

that cycle of, like, being amazed by

5:51

a trick and feeling astonishment. But

5:53

then reverse engineering it, and it became like

5:55

chess to try to figure it out. That

5:58

scratched a different itch. And then the last

6:00

one was performing it being on the other side

6:02

of the looking glass looking out and

6:04

all three of those things combined

6:06

for kind of the three feelings I

6:09

love chasing even now and

6:11

in terms of why I stuck with it

6:13

I mean I I've never done anything else

6:15

I have never had another job I never

6:17

had the job

6:20

bartending in college or you know

6:22

moving stuff out of a van and you

6:24

know for extra pocket money this is

6:27

the only thing I've ever done well

6:29

how does it become the only thing

6:31

you've ever done because when

6:34

I a non-magician thinks about

6:36

career paths I think you know maybe

6:38

you study how to be an electrician

6:41

you apprentice with an electrician and then

6:43

you become an electrician yourself but

6:45

I guess I don't really quite

6:47

understand how you starting from age seven became

6:49

the person who has only ever done magic

6:51

in your life how does that career trajectory

6:54

work so I went to

6:56

school I went to Ohio State University and I majored

6:59

in creative nonfiction I knew writing would be important

7:01

you know when I went to school I thought

7:03

about going to business school I thought about getting

7:06

a degree in theater but I

7:09

ended up getting my degree in

7:11

creative nonfiction to be a writer

7:13

because magic is the kind of

7:15

storytelling it really the parallels between

7:18

magic and storytelling are are

7:20

numerous and you know

7:23

my particular path I didn't have a

7:25

manager or an agent that sort of

7:28

blazed the path for me it's

7:30

always been a very personal individual

7:32

path and I've

7:34

just always pursued what

7:37

interested me and that

7:39

leapfrog from one thing to the next

7:42

I will say I got one big sort

7:45

of surge which was right out of

7:47

school my senior thesis was a

7:49

magic book a curriculum a beginner's guide to magic

7:52

and I sold that as soon as I moved

7:54

to New York that put me on

7:56

a lot of TV shows I did a big book tour

7:58

which was one of my first tours and that

8:00

sort of opened all sorts of other doors.

8:02

But yeah, I mean, I've

8:04

never been motivated by what's the next career move.

8:06

I've always just been motivated by what would be

8:08

cool, what would be interesting to me. Was

8:12

there a magician school that you ever attended though?

8:14

Was there anything along those lines? No,

8:16

you know, creating magic for

8:19

me has always been very personal about

8:21

inventing the tricks. But, you

8:24

know, many magicians, most magicians buy

8:26

their tricks and

8:28

perform it in their own personal way. But

8:31

I create nearly everything that I

8:33

do. So everything for

8:35

me is a multi-year, multi-month

8:38

process of dreaming up ideas

8:40

and then performing those ideas

8:42

on stage and refining them and evolving

8:44

them. Well, let's talk

8:47

a little bit about that process. How

8:49

do you come up with these ideas? And

8:51

then how do you refine

8:54

them and so on? So

8:56

for one thing, I tend to

8:58

be an effect-based creator. So

9:00

there's two ways of approaching

9:02

magic. You either approach it by method or

9:05

by effect. If you approach it by method,

9:08

an example of that might be like, hey, look

9:10

at this new technology. How can I use that

9:12

for magic? Or, ooh, there's this move where it

9:14

looks like the card goes in the deck, but

9:17

it actually ends up in my pocket. How can

9:19

I use that? That's method-based creating. What

9:21

can we use this tool to do? Effect-based

9:24

creating is the dreaming, right? It's

9:26

going, what would be really interesting?

9:28

What would be a cool trick? Wouldn't it

9:30

be cool if I could get a card between

9:32

the layers of a postcard? Okay, that's

9:34

cool. How do I do that? So

9:36

that's, I tend to go from

9:38

the dream. And then the way that I've had

9:41

the most success is just chasing the narrative. So

9:43

there are narratives in all of our lives

9:46

passing us all the time. And

9:48

I try to grab hold of the

9:50

narratives that interest me most and pair

9:52

them with tricks that feel compatible. So

9:55

one example is that I teach magic

9:57

to incarcerated magicians all over the world.

10:00

magic to people who are serving sentences

10:02

in institutions not just here

10:04

but abroad as well. And

10:08

they have crazy constraints like they're allowed to have

10:10

Gatorade bottles and pencils but no pens. They're allowed

10:12

to have playing cards but the playing cards have

10:14

to be on paper and not plastic. They're allowed

10:16

to have this, they're allowed and allowed to have

10:19

that. And so I came up

10:21

with this trick that I call balance. It's become kind

10:23

of a signature piece for me where I take all

10:25

of these props and I tell the story of people

10:27

in prison and doing magic and the difference it makes

10:29

in their lives. And then I stack

10:32

these objects up, all the objects they're allowed

10:34

to have in their prison cells in

10:37

an impossible way so that they're

10:39

basically levitating. Another

10:41

example is how my parents met. The

10:44

kind of bedtime story I always heard

10:46

is this crazy almost Benjamin Button type

10:48

story of so many weird

10:50

things that had to happen in just the

10:52

right sequence for my parents to meet and

10:55

they would have 30 seconds later that had

10:57

been coming out the door at different times

10:59

but all these things in their days both

11:01

delayed them and allowed them to hit

11:04

each other coming in and out of a doorway. And

11:06

that became a trick called Trojan Deck where I

11:08

have a spectator shuffle a deck and I shuffle

11:11

a deck and then the cards end up matching.

11:13

The whole deck matches card for

11:15

card. And that felt like

11:17

a really good pairing for two people meeting and

11:19

falling in love. So there

11:22

are all of these narratives. You know as

11:24

I sit here doing this interview with you

11:26

I'm in New York and Chelsea right across

11:28

from the largest blind center where

11:30

people who are sightless go about their day. So

11:32

every day when I'm going to

11:34

the donut store and walking around there

11:37

are all sorts of people who lack

11:39

eyesight crossing the street going

11:41

about their day and some of them live

11:43

in my building and I've talked to them

11:45

and I realized one day none of these

11:47

people will ever be able to see what

11:49

I do because magic is a visual art

11:51

form. But what

11:54

would it look like if they could? What would it look

11:56

like if they experienced magic? Well I'd have to do magic

11:58

for their mind not their eyes. eyes. And

12:01

that paved the way for a

12:03

trick called out of sight, which became

12:05

the trick that I fooled Penn and

12:07

Teller with. So all of these tricks

12:09

start from some interesting narrative perspective. Wow.

12:12

So is your process

12:14

of making magic is a lot of

12:16

it about writing things down? Absolutely.

12:19

I have very complex

12:23

note taking system in my phone. Now

12:25

I have notes for every project I'm

12:27

thinking about every project I've started and

12:29

so on. Does it

12:32

also involve things like charts?

12:34

And I'm just trying to imagine what your

12:36

workspace looks like. Yeah, you know, the

12:39

one thing that I will say from a

12:41

project management perspective that I've found is helpful,

12:44

sounds quite negative, but I only meet

12:47

in the most positive ways. Basically,

12:50

I'm a project junkie, like so many people, but

12:52

I do tend to finish what I start, because

12:55

what I do is I try to find ways to

12:57

fall out of love with an idea. So, you

12:59

know, if I wake up and I'm

13:01

super excited about a new trick, or I'm super

13:04

excited about a book idea or an article idea

13:06

or a fun collaboration with a musician that I

13:08

just met, you know, I'm so excited about all

13:10

these things and I write them down and I

13:13

hope to harness that enthusiasm. But what

13:15

I do is I make myself sit

13:17

on an idea and poke holes in

13:19

it and find reasons that it's

13:21

not great. Well, that's so similar to what

13:23

I already did, or that's so and so

13:25

already did that to a great degree. I

13:28

don't think I bring anything new to this.

13:31

And that's how most of the

13:33

ideas fall away. But what happens is if

13:35

I can come back in two months, three

13:37

months to an idea and I

13:40

can't figure out an idea not to do

13:42

it, that's when I know I have to

13:44

do it. If I can't fall out of

13:46

love with the idea, then I go for

13:48

it. And

13:50

the other thing that's been very helpful to me

13:53

and I had to have somebody else in my life

13:55

point this out to me because I didn't

13:58

know this about myself is that I'm not going and I'm

14:00

kind of always road testing ideas verbally. In

14:02

other words, in my circle of friends, I'm always

14:04

going, hey, so I've got this new trick idea,

14:06

and what I'm going to do is da, da,

14:09

da, da, da, and I kind of walk them

14:11

through it, and what I'm doing is like looking

14:13

for their response. And if they

14:15

don't give me a really great like, ooh, how

14:17

would you do that, and so what would happen

14:19

next? You know, that shows me they're engaged. If

14:22

it's like met with, oh, cool, well, I hope

14:24

it works out. I know that they

14:26

aren't grabbed yet, you know? And so

14:28

in a way, I'm refining the elevator

14:31

pitch of all of these ideas so

14:33

that I can figure out what resonates

14:35

with people. I can figure out the

14:37

idea myself and go from there.

14:40

And once you have those ideas, how long does

14:42

it take you to turn that

14:44

into an actual trick? That's

14:47

a harder one to answer because there are

14:50

tricks that fall into

14:52

place. I mean, there's a new thing that

14:54

I've been doing around, and I've just started

14:56

performing it in my smaller shows that

14:59

truly fell into place, I mean, in a

15:01

matter of two months. And I can't believe

15:03

it because from a structural standpoint, it's quite

15:05

complex, and there's a lot of original

15:07

ideas in it and things that haven't been done

15:10

in that way before. And it's the

15:12

kind of thing that if I looked at this, I

15:14

would say this would take me six months or a

15:16

year or more. And in two months, it's like falling

15:18

into place. That's the best case scenario. But

15:22

contrast that with I had

15:24

the idea during COVID of borrowing a

15:26

ring and making it appear, like a

15:28

finger ring, and making it appear inside

15:30

a flashlight. And

15:33

the idea would be somebody would be

15:35

in the audience shining my flashlight on

15:37

stage, and I would be doing shadow

15:39

puppets, shadowography. And then I

15:41

would take their ring and incorporate it somehow

15:43

into the shadows. And then

15:45

the shadow bird, for example, would eat the

15:48

ring, and it would end up inside

15:50

the flashlight. I think

15:53

that's a cool idea. It goes back to where

15:55

it started. It's got this circular plot to it.

15:58

But in order to even just test that, idea

16:00

out, I had to learn shadowography.

16:03

So I started taking lessons and I learned that

16:05

it's not something you can do

16:07

with a shortcut, you can't just fake it.

16:09

You have to learn this whole other art

16:11

form that people dedicate their lives to. So

16:14

truly four years later I still take

16:16

lessons twice a week. I still practice

16:19

between an hour and two hours every

16:21

day just so that I

16:23

can do this six-minute trick in my new

16:25

show. And I was scared to

16:27

death because I've taken big

16:30

financial risks, I've taken big time

16:32

investment risks, but I've never put

16:35

hundreds of hours into

16:37

a trick not knowing whether it would

16:39

work or not. But fortunately this shadowography

16:42

trick has worked, it's been good, life

16:45

is good with that one. It's

16:47

amazing that you say two months was really

16:49

fast for you to develop that trick. That

16:52

makes me think you know in a good year

16:54

you must develop one or two tricks because they

16:56

take so long to develop, right? You

16:58

develop 20 tricks. I mean I developed 20, 25 tricks,

17:01

but 18 of them, 20 of them end up on

17:03

the cutting-room

17:07

floor. Is it hard

17:09

to leave those babies behind? Does

17:11

it feel like oh no what if I never come

17:14

up with a good idea again? Do you ever have

17:16

that fear when you are killing so many of your

17:18

ideas? Yes I do,

17:20

but repression tends to help. Repressing, I

17:22

mean I'll give you an example. I

17:24

have a new show that it's you

17:26

know it's very new. It's less than

17:28

a year old, it's less than I

17:31

think it's just about 60 to 70 performances

17:33

in which is young for a show. And

17:36

this show started

17:40

with two of the most original ideas

17:42

that I've put on stage. One is

17:45

you know it's actually an

17:47

apparatus that was built for me and it's

17:49

right on point. My show is called Look

17:51

Closer and these are all like look closer

17:53

moments. I'm not wearing glasses, these aren't even

17:55

my legs, that sort of thing. And then

17:57

the next piece in the show is my take on

18:00

a classic trick over the cup and a ball that

18:02

I have a totally original prompt

18:05

for. And the tough

18:07

part was both went over pretty

18:10

well. Pretty well. But

18:13

after the shows, I always ask the people I trust, what

18:15

was your favorite thing? What was your least favorite thing? And

18:18

those two things never made anybody's favorites

18:21

list. And

18:24

people always had gripes or like, well, I think it could

18:26

be better if it was this, not just

18:28

people going to enjoy the show, but people looking at

18:30

the show critically. And what I

18:32

realized was despite thousands of dollars, despite

18:35

hundreds of hours, those

18:37

two pieces were inessential. They were good,

18:39

but not great. If you were grading

18:41

them on a scale of one to

18:43

10 without bias, I think they fall

18:45

somewhere in the six, seven category. And

18:48

so I made the choice in the last

18:50

week of shows to cut them out. And

18:53

it was, you know, it was really giving up

18:55

on, on two big ideas and

18:57

the show was instantly tighter. It

19:00

was instantly better. And

19:03

it hurts. When I think about it, I think

19:05

about, oh, should I have tried other things? Should

19:07

I not have given up so fast? But we

19:09

tried so many things. We tried so many things.

19:12

So in the end, I think

19:15

it was the right call, but yes,

19:17

it stings and it hurts. And knowing

19:19

when and why and how to cut

19:21

things is always difficult. But

19:25

I am positive that it's an important part

19:27

of the creative process. We'll

19:32

be back with more Christian's conversation with

19:34

Joshua Jay. This

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22:05

Let's return to Christians conversation with

22:07

Joshua Tree. I

22:10

really love that you are actually

22:12

trying to get feedback from other

22:14

folks when you're in. The midst

22:17

of this, not all of us deal

22:19

with feedback well, sometimes feedback and really

22:21

stinks. But in addition to getting feedback

22:23

from others, are you also trying to

22:25

objectively look at yourself by let's say,

22:27

it's filming and I'm looking. At the

22:29

video afterwards are there other things you're doing

22:32

to try and see how things are going.

22:34

Yes, Ah, there are and

22:37

you know. I. Love

22:39

the. The. Drive of

22:41

this podcast. This is the kind of

22:44

I read lots of books on this

22:46

and I think it is so fruitful

22:48

and helpful to hear how various people.

22:51

Handle their creative process and their

22:53

past to improving and making their

22:55

work. I am always weary of.

22:59

Codified. Have too much, You know

23:01

what I mean. Like I love this

23:03

quote from Neil Gaiman the authors who

23:05

says he never really learned to write.

23:08

A. Book. You only learn to write the

23:10

book, your writing And that's so true. I

23:12

mean once a show has been running for

23:14

five or six years and it's consistently where

23:17

I wanted to be. I are in. I'm

23:19

so proud of it. I'm so confident in

23:21

in the material and I think to myself

23:23

I could take the world on. And so

23:26

then you start the next show and you

23:28

quickly realize that everything you did in the

23:30

previous show loan apply here because if it

23:32

does your just recreating the same, you're hitting

23:35

the same note as the previous show. So

23:37

what you realize going. Through just like wow

23:39

this is gonna be so different or what

23:41

worked last time doesn't work this time or

23:44

I have this new constraints that I put

23:46

on myself so. You. Really

23:48

are just figuring out what it's

23:50

about. With. Each one and one of

23:52

the things that I can chat about. at

23:55

this juncture which i'm feeling with this

23:57

new show you know the you talking

24:00

to me at a very interesting time because I'm

24:02

very much in the act

24:04

of creation. As this new show becomes

24:06

whatever it is, I'm at a point

24:08

where I have realized, truly in the

24:10

last two weeks, that the

24:12

show I set out to

24:15

make is not the show

24:17

I've ended up with. In

24:19

other words, I was so sure I

24:21

was creating a show about a certain

24:23

thing and approaching in a certain way

24:25

with a certain format. But

24:28

when enough people repeat it back to

24:30

me, and it's really even helpful when

24:32

journalists cover the show and they describe

24:34

the show because you sort of

24:36

go, that's what they left with?

24:39

That's not at all what I set out, but actually, if that's

24:41

what they left with, that is what the

24:43

show is to them. So, wait a minute,

24:45

should we lean into that? Should we accent

24:47

that more? Should we fix it

24:49

so that's not what they lean into? Well,

24:52

so anyway, the show has become something quite

24:54

different. Not totally different, but

24:56

different than what I thought it was.

24:59

And I've realized that where we've ended up

25:01

is better than what I set out to

25:03

do. It's a more noble, worthy direction

25:06

for the show. And I have

25:08

started describing it differently because clearly

25:12

what people are taking from it is very different

25:14

than what we set out to do. So

25:16

it's so interesting, I guess, if I had

25:19

to say it a little more succinctly, to

25:22

find the essence of whatever it is you're

25:24

working on and to find that essence, it

25:27

many times takes somebody

25:30

else telling you. Is

25:32

that hard though for you when you had

25:34

this vision, you had this story, you had

25:36

this narrative, you put your heart into something

25:39

and does it ever cross your mind? Oh, they're just not

25:41

getting it. What's wrong with them? Why don't

25:43

they get what I'm trying to relay here? This is

25:45

my heart. This is my creativity. Why are you not

25:48

understanding? Does it ever feel like that? Yes,

25:50

it feels like that most of the time.

25:54

It's very frustrating, especially because, you

25:56

know, we all know,

25:58

it's cliche to say it but

26:00

it's so true. It's very vulnerable to take

26:02

notes from people and I'm in a point

26:05

in my show where I'm taking notes from people every

26:07

night so you have people you respect come and they

26:09

tell you what they liked and they

26:11

try to sandwich it with compliments but

26:13

of course you're really just listening to

26:15

the critical parts and when they when

26:17

they don't get what you're trying to do

26:20

or they don't get the purpose of a

26:22

piece or when they complain about something and

26:24

I'm going yeah but yeah but yeah but

26:26

what about what about what about it's very

26:28

frustrating because in a sense no

26:31

rebuttal matters at all because if they felt that

26:33

way something wasn't

26:35

coming through on

26:37

the other hand you have to

26:39

hear everybody's criticism but you only listen to

26:41

the parts that you you want to

26:44

address and so knowing

26:46

where that line is is endlessly

26:49

complex but I'm

26:52

a big believer in building consensus

26:54

one of my friends in creative

26:56

collaborators believes that any kind of

26:58

audience involvement is the

27:01

antithesis of art like he would never allow an

27:03

audience to shape his work he would never go

27:05

by their reactions and shaping his work and I

27:07

think that's like a really noble misguided

27:11

approach I don't

27:13

think you can work in total isolation I

27:16

know that lots of people feel that way

27:18

they're painting their writing whatever it is that

27:20

the audience plays no role they want to

27:22

get what's inside out and that's what it

27:24

is but I

27:27

don't know I think that the the

27:29

beholder share is wildly

27:32

important to the whole mm-hmm

27:35

so I've often heard the adage

27:38

that a magician never shares their tricks right

27:40

we've all heard that adage right but

27:43

in a lot of cases you have you've taught

27:45

magic you've written books on

27:47

how to do magic yourself what

27:51

made you decide to be one of the

27:53

magicians who actually spills the beans and

27:55

how do other magicians feel about the

27:58

fact that you're sharing all these secrets I

28:00

think that you're right. The older that

28:03

adage is that magician never reveals a

28:05

secret, but actually that's not strictly true

28:08

Magicians have a wonderful community.

28:10

They've always had a really

28:12

robust Inner craft

28:14

and I think it's one of the

28:16

reasons magic is so great is because

28:18

for the most part Magicians

28:21

are quite they have a sharing

28:24

spirit. They they help each

28:26

other out when possible and you know exceptions

28:28

to these rules, but there

28:30

are more books published on

28:32

magic than stand-up comedy and Most

28:35

other performing arts even though those other

28:37

performing arts dwarf the size of magic

28:40

And that's because magicians do share

28:42

their secrets and their philosophies and

28:44

their techniques with other magicians So

28:47

yeah, I have traveled the world

28:49

lecturing and going to conventions magic

28:52

conferences magic galas magic Festivals

28:55

we run our own my business partner and

28:57

I we run several conventions

29:00

and retreats and and Festival

29:02

type things and it's

29:04

great. It's really great and you know

29:07

as long as you're aiming these at

29:09

magicians It's not considered exposure right it's

29:11

considered teaching Well

29:14

since we're talking about spilling secrets

29:16

are there any common

29:18

tricks or tactics? That magicians

29:20

enlist that you can share with our listeners I

29:22

I know you said most of

29:25

the talks you're giving are targeted at

29:27

other magicians but are there certain things

29:29

that you know are just part

29:31

of the craft of magic that Lay

29:33

people like me might not understand or know about Yes,

29:36

and no, I mean coming back to

29:39

something that we covered earlier. I think

29:41

that there are numerous parallels between

29:43

magic and storytelling and For

29:48

the most part You

29:50

can cross-pollinate those things there are a few

29:52

that I find that are in conflict with

29:54

each other, but for example When

29:58

I design a magic presentation I

30:00

try to start in the action or

30:02

very close to it. And

30:05

this is one on one

30:07

advice for screenwriting and for writing stories,

30:09

right? You don't start with background on

30:11

all the characters and then only when

30:13

you're all caught up to you kick

30:15

in and start your story. You start

30:18

with Indiana Jones being run down by

30:20

a boulder. You start with somebody

30:22

screaming at the main character. You

30:24

start with the main character losing his pocket

30:27

watch and it sets you on this adventure.

30:29

Whatever it is, start close to the action

30:32

and that's always so important. Another great

30:34

thing is how to fit

30:36

in exposition. There's so much

30:38

in a magic trick that's necessary

30:40

information like instructions. Just like

30:43

in any story, there's all this background stuff. And

30:46

everybody's first instinct is to sort of put

30:48

all the exposition first and then

30:51

do the magic. But

30:53

you can often put the exposition on

30:55

top of the magic in the same

30:57

way that you can reveal all of

30:59

these background things as you are telling

31:02

the story. Intertwine, intermix it with the

31:04

magic. So that's also something I work

31:06

on with magic students. And

31:08

you know, killing

31:11

your babies is a big one. Where to end? You

31:15

know, tricks don't always have finite endings. It's like,

31:17

well, I could do this and I could do

31:19

this. But knowing how to end a magic trick

31:22

is very similar to the

31:24

difficult process of knowing where to end a short story.

31:28

You know, I watched several of your

31:30

talks in preparation for talking with

31:32

you today. And one thing that

31:34

you brought up more than once is

31:36

something called mental misdirection. Can

31:39

you explain what that is? Sure.

31:43

There are two kinds of misdirection in

31:45

magic. There's physical misdirection and mental misdirection.

31:47

So physical misdirection is you're

31:49

talking and all of a sudden there's a big explosion

31:51

on one side of the stage. Or a dancer comes

31:53

and does a twirl on one side of the stage.

31:56

Or I get you to look at something so

31:58

that you look away from it. physical misdirection.

32:01

You are physically directing

32:03

somebody's attention away from what

32:06

you wish to hide. Mental

32:08

misdirection is doing the exact same thing but

32:10

in your mind. So for

32:12

example, if I ask you a question, Kristin,

32:15

whatever that question is, you're now

32:17

on defense, right? You're answering my question. Oh,

32:20

what's that beautiful frame behind you? Is

32:22

there a story behind that piece of

32:24

art? Well now you're answering my question.

32:26

Your mind, if not your eyes as

32:29

well, are focused on whatever it is

32:31

that I'm asking and you're not looking

32:33

at my hands, which are beneath the

32:35

table right now, right? If I ask

32:37

you, I would like you to think

32:39

of any color, any color you wish.

32:41

Now you're doing something. You're occupied and

32:43

when you're thinking of that color, you

32:45

aren't looking at the box

32:47

of cards that's on the table that my hand is

32:50

on. You aren't looking at the shoes

32:52

on my feet. So that's

32:55

the difference between physical and

32:57

mental misdirection if that helps

32:59

you. I want to

33:01

talk about your company, Vanishing Inc Magic,

33:04

which you founded in 2008. You

33:07

manufacture and sell props for magicians.

33:09

It's one of the largest magic

33:11

shops in the world and

33:13

I can't help but wonder since it's so big, do

33:16

you ever worry about too many magicians

33:18

essentially starting to look like copies of

33:20

you? I don't worry

33:22

about that because as I said, I made

33:24

the artistic decision years ago that I would

33:27

always come up with original stuff. So

33:29

that's one thing I never have to worry about. We've

33:33

sort of grown into one of the biggest companies

33:35

in magic and distributors of magic in the world,

33:37

which is a big responsibility. You know, when we

33:39

put a trick out that becomes a hit trick,

33:42

it really kind of changes the landscape of how

33:44

it looks. You know, these trends you see in

33:46

magic and all of a sudden everybody's doing a

33:48

trick that looks like the one we put out.

33:51

It's a big responsibility, but

33:54

it's great. I get to work with my

33:56

best friend and we have a great team

33:58

full of our other friends. and we put

34:00

on conferences all over the world. I'm about

34:02

to leave for Egypt and do

34:05

a Nile cruise with 60 other magicians,

34:07

and we'll be taking our magic

34:09

with us. It's such a fun thing

34:11

to be able to do. Oh, I

34:13

love your sense of sharing

34:15

and collaboration. It feels like

34:17

the way you talk about magic isn't something

34:20

that you're gatekeeping. It's that

34:22

you're spreading the joy and that you're sharing

34:24

it with other people. I'm

34:26

curious, in your mind, is magic an

34:29

art? A craft? Is it a community?

34:31

Is it science? How would you describe

34:33

it? I describe it

34:35

as a craft. You know, magicians

34:37

have spent truly hundreds of thousands of

34:39

words. I would say one of the

34:41

magicians' favorite pastimes is arguing about whether

34:44

magic is an art or not. And

34:46

that always struck me as such

34:49

a weirdly pretentious, useless,

34:53

weirdly framed debate, because

34:56

skateboarding can be art. Collecting trash

34:58

can be art. Sleeping

35:00

can be art. Anything can be art

35:02

if it's framed

35:05

as art and done at

35:08

an exceptional, interesting level.

35:11

So my understanding at

35:13

this point is I

35:15

believe magic is a craft. It's something

35:17

that, like other crafts you work at,

35:20

you improve, you lay a foundation

35:22

of skills, and magic,

35:24

like anything else, can be elevated from

35:26

craft to art when it's done in

35:29

a truly artistic way. So

35:32

I don't believe that magic can be

35:34

art, but I think magicians can be

35:36

artists. There's

35:38

a great quote from one of my favorite

35:40

magicians, Darwin Ortiz, and I'll probably butcher it,

35:42

but it goes something like, magicians

35:45

worry about whether magic

35:47

is an art or a craft. If

35:50

you focus on the craft part, the

35:52

art part takes care of itself, something

35:54

like that, which is a lovely way

35:56

of looking at it. If you can just focus

35:58

on being great, getting the... fundamentals correct, getting

36:01

everything as great as it can

36:03

be, the art part just tends

36:05

to wash over you and happen.

36:08

Oh, that's beautiful. Joshua

36:13

Jay, thank you so much for joining us today.

36:15

This has been fantastic. Oh,

36:17

Kristen, thank you so much

36:19

for having me on. I

36:21

love the pursuit of this

36:24

podcast and I'm honored to

36:26

chat with you. Next, Kristen

36:28

and I will discuss killing your darlings

36:30

and learning from reverse engineering of

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37:09

Kristen, that was amazing.

37:12

I always love hearing conversations

37:14

with people who are obsessed

37:17

with their field and are

37:19

consequently like just full

37:21

of insights about it. I'm sure

37:23

we've both come across people like

37:25

this in our professional careers. I

37:28

will note that political journalists are

37:31

the most likely people to be

37:33

consumed by their beat. Most

37:36

of the ones that I know would happily

37:38

devote every hour of their lives to

37:40

studying the minutiae of politics. But

37:43

Joshua seems to have turned his obsession with

37:45

magic into a really fruitful

37:47

portfolio career and well,

37:50

I really want to check out his work. I

37:52

also loved his commitment to actively

37:55

trying to find ways to fall

37:57

out of love with his family.

38:00

fresh new ideas. He pokes them, he worries

38:02

at them, and only the

38:04

ones that survive that process go

38:06

forward. Tell me the truth,

38:08

Kristen. Do you do this? I know

38:11

that what Joshua describes is

38:13

probably the right approach, but

38:16

I feel like I'm constantly trying to

38:18

protect my precious ideas rather

38:20

than subjecting them to a

38:22

rigorous interrogation, as I probably

38:25

should. Well,

38:28

June, this is one way that you and

38:30

I are very similar. I

38:34

have a lot of ideas and I tend

38:36

to think they all have great potential, which

38:38

means I'll sometimes march them out into the

38:41

world with maybe a little too much gusto,

38:43

only to hear from others, from coworkers,

38:45

from bosses, from friends, from my partner.

38:48

You know, maybe that's not

38:50

your best idea, Kristen. And when

38:53

that happens, my instinct is always

38:55

to protect the idea rather than

38:57

do what Joshua does. And frankly, I could

39:00

probably stand to be a little bit more

39:02

like Joshua. That being said,

39:04

though, I am not sure if his approach

39:06

makes sense for everybody, particularly

39:08

young women whose ideas tend to be dismissed,

39:11

even as their male colleagues will present the

39:13

same ideas and be praised for them. So

39:16

I would say, you know, do a little

39:18

bit of what Josh is saying, but be aware of the

39:20

context and what you're doing it because it may not always

39:23

be the right thing to do. Kristen,

39:25

that is a fantastic point. Yes,

39:27

please keep that in mind. But

39:30

this winnowing is obviously really central

39:32

to Joshua's creative process. He also

39:34

talked about giving up on two

39:37

tricks that he had spent a

39:39

lot of time and money developing

39:41

for his recent show because

39:43

they just weren't having the impact

39:46

he wanted. Obviously, in a piece

39:48

of performance, you get to hear

39:50

the audience reaction as well as getting

39:52

feedback from trusted sources to help

39:54

you decide if something's working. And I'm sure

39:56

he's right that the show was better when

39:59

he jettisoned those good but

40:01

not great tricks. But I

40:03

know I find it so hard to just

40:05

cut something that I have devoted

40:08

time and effort and deep thought to.

40:10

How do you cope with that? Have

40:12

you developed any strategies for

40:14

killing your darlings or as

40:17

former working host Rumaan Alam put it so

40:19

beautifully, beheading your swans?

40:22

Oh, that is a brutal way to put it Rumaan.

40:27

Gosh, for me, it's not

40:30

easy. But I do have a little system

40:32

to help me cope with it. Hmm. First,

40:34

I have a whole folder of just half

40:36

finished books, books that I have started to

40:38

write, and I've made it a third of

40:40

the way through, maybe a half of the

40:42

way through. And so

40:45

they're not exactly killed. I call

40:47

them in purgatory. It's book purgatory,

40:49

where these partially finished books are

40:52

that I've written. And for me,

40:54

that feels better than killing them or God

40:56

beheading them. I

40:58

also have a running document that

41:00

is many pages long, of

41:03

just ideas for other books, other podcasts,

41:05

other projects. And knowing that I have

41:07

that document and, you know, adding to

41:10

it regularly, that helps me to be

41:12

more at peace with those projects and

41:14

purgatory. Wow, I think

41:16

also, no, I'm aware that, you know,

41:18

I'm just finishing a book. And there were things

41:20

that got cut after I put quite a lot

41:23

of working to them. And they

41:25

were right to be cut. So it wasn't like I was,

41:27

you know, struggling with that. But I knew

41:30

somehow that would be able to use them, I

41:32

could use them in newsletters, I could use them,

41:34

you know, you always have to do these little

41:36

bits of writing, you know, there's always just something

41:38

that you you want to share with people. And

41:40

so they're never really dead. They're

41:43

always just maybe lying, as you say, in

41:45

purgatory. So that yeah, that makes perfect sense to

41:47

me. I love that

41:49

Joshua's first exposure to magic,

41:52

a card trick his father showed him,

41:54

led him to reverse engineer

41:57

the trick, figure it out, and then perform it

41:59

for his dad. On working,

42:01

we often talk about doing something similar

42:03

with books or sentences or stories

42:05

we admire, breaking them down in

42:07

an attempt to see how the

42:09

author did it, so we can

42:11

then try to create some version of

42:14

that ourselves. Is that something

42:16

you've done in your work as a

42:18

podcaster, writer and cultural critic? If

42:20

so, do you have any tips?

42:22

Well, first of all, yes, I

42:24

do try that. I have tried

42:26

that. And second of all, I usually

42:29

suck at it. So just an

42:31

example, I started writing

42:33

a mystery a year or two ago,

42:35

and I've yet to finish it partly

42:37

because I'm still trying to

42:40

unravel how mystery writers write mysteries. And I

42:42

keep reading mysteries trying to figure out how

42:44

did they do it? How did they lay

42:46

the breadcrumbs? How did they, you

42:49

know, lead me down a path so

42:51

that I would follow them? And

42:53

a lot of what I'm trying to do is I think,

42:55

you know, what young people frequently do when they're learning, I'm

42:57

not a young person anymore, by the way, we

43:00

just copy. And so I'm trying to do a version

43:02

of that where I'm kind of unraveling, I'm trying to

43:04

copy, but I'm also trying to be careful not to

43:06

really copy what they're doing, if that makes sense. Yeah,

43:08

so yeah, it's tough. I don't want to plagiarize. I

43:11

just want to learn how they do it. And

43:14

I'm not a very good student, apparently. Oh,

43:16

no. I see. So I

43:18

want to recommend an episode of Working that

43:20

I think is from last year. And

43:23

that's when I talked with mystery writer

43:25

Ellen Hart. She talked about taking apart

43:27

a PD James mystery when she was

43:29

working on her first mystery. And she

43:31

had some good tips about what she learned from doing

43:33

that. So yeah, check that out. Oh, I will definitely

43:35

check that out. Yes.

43:37

I was fascinated by Joshua's point that

43:39

there are more books about magic than

43:41

there are about stand up comedy or

43:43

a lot of performing arts

43:46

that are objectively more popular than

43:48

magic. And in that

43:50

sense, he's absolutely right that magicians share their

43:52

tricks. But you know, Kristen,

43:54

part of me wonders if non magicians

43:57

really want to know how the illusion is.

44:00

sausage is made, I think

44:02

many of us in the audience enjoy

44:04

feeling that, you know what, we might

44:06

actually be seeing something genuinely magical. I

44:08

wonder if we really want

44:10

to know how it was done. Do

44:12

you want to know how they saw people in half

44:14

or get a ring into a flashlight

44:16

or whatever it was that he said that he

44:19

has in his next show? You

44:21

know, I'm divided on this question

44:23

because on the one hand, I

44:25

just want to believe that this

44:27

beautiful craft, this thing that

44:30

was done for me, that

44:32

it can stand on its own and I don't

44:34

need to unravel it to enjoy it. But

44:37

I also, being perfectly honest with you,

44:39

after watching many videos of Joshua, after

44:42

each trick, I actually said audibly, I said it out

44:44

loud, how did you do that? So there's clearly a

44:46

part of me that wants to know how do you

44:48

do that? So you know, I

44:50

think at the end of the day, it might be fun

44:52

to learn how he did a couple of the tricks and

44:55

I have watched a couple of videos where he explains his

44:57

tricks. But knowing how he

44:59

does a couple of his tricks, I think that's enough for

45:01

me. Yeah, I love the sort of

45:03

the air of mystery dispelled a little bit, but

45:05

we'll leave some unknowns in the world.

45:08

That's probably good for us. Yeah. That's

45:12

just about all the time we have this week. We

45:15

hope you've enjoyed the show. If you have,

45:17

please remember to follow Working wherever you get

45:19

your podcasts. Then you will

45:21

never miss an episode. And just

45:23

a reminder that by joining Slate Plus,

45:25

you'll get free podcasts, extra segments on

45:28

shows like Sloburn and you'll never hit

45:30

a paywall on the Slate site. To

45:32

learn more, go to slate.com/working

45:35

plus. Thank you to

45:37

Joshua J and to our amazing producer,

45:39

Cameron Drews, who performs magic in every

45:41

single episode of Working. We'll

45:44

be back next week with Ronald Young

45:46

Jr's conversation with TV writer Mike Goyo.

45:49

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