Steve Dusheck's 'Ringer'

What The Audience Sees:

'This week Jamie borrowed a ring from one of us. He put it in his hand and then used his lucky quarter to make it disappear. He then said he would turn his quarter back into his ring, but when he opened his hand his house key was there. He looked a bit confused so he took out his keychain and the ring was on it!'

How It Went:

I'm going to run out of adjectives here: fantastic, amazing, incredible, etc. Take your pick, they all fit. There's something extremely popular about Ring Flight effects, just take a look at how many different kinds are on the market and you'll see what I mean. There's something inherently magical about rings, and to watch one disappear and be found in a different location on an impossible object is, in my opinion, one of the most truly magical experiences an audience can witness.

So that brings us to Steve Dusheck's 'Ringer'. I am extremely fortunate to have become friends, over the past year or so, with Steve and I can't really say enough about him as a person, let alone the brilliance of his magic. And make no mistake, Ringer is brilliant. It does away with the 'flying' ring flight method and uses an idea that makes it unbelievably easy to load the ring. It does take the ability to vanish the ring initially but that's what we do, right? It's fast and easy- what more could you want.

Best Lines:

I only performed this for half the day today because I had to get my wisdom teeth out (not pleasant) but what a half it was. Laughter, surprise, applause- the three things in a perfect magical experience. There was one reaction in particular that will make my Best Line History, however. I was performing Ringer for a group of people that work in a Securities Firm. We are seperated by a huge pane of glass which is about a foot above the counter with a hole in the middle to speak through (I'm hoping they'll suprise me one day with a Pepper's Ghost routine) . There's about eight of them in this firm that always run up to the window on Magic Friday and jockey for position. Here's their reaction:

The ring vanishes:

'Ooooh!','Aaaahhh!', 'Nooo!', 'Where is it?!'

The quarter turns into the key:

Laughter. 'WHAT?!', 'Noooo!','Hey, where's my ring!'

The ring is found on my keyring:

Silence. Nothing. Stares. I actually thought that I had totally messed up. My mind was racing with "Do they not think the effect is over?", "What should I say? Maybe that it wasn't that bad?" I could feel my face starting to get hot and was simply floored. It's been a long time since I've been embarrased and I couldn't believe I tanked. What on earth had they seen...Then I heard one single, solitary word. It was said in a sort of awed whisper, by one of the girls...

Very quietly she said,'...how?...'

and one of the guys replied in a whisper that they could all hear, '...Magic...'

Brilliant.

Angry Bob Rating:

I have a co-worker (Bob) whose uncle was a magician and thereby has a good working knowledge of how magic works. He's pretty grumpy but likes Magic Friday's because he can tell me how he figured out how the effect is done... A high rating means he'll never figure it out.

Angry Bob was actually quite nice today, go figure. Anyway about 2/5 for the vanish (Angry Bob has been known to throw out a French Drop or two himself), 3.5/5 for the Funkey (that's Steve's quarter to key that he explains in the notes and on his amazing 1982 DVD- best $10 you'll ever spend!), but 5/5 for Ringer.

"That was magic." From Angry Bob no less.

My Rating:

This is an easy one with no need to worry about being too lenient. 10/10.

The JDG Tip:

I use a small piece of double sided tape and taped a small, thin magnet to the fob. That's where I keep my Funkey so that it's always together. Works Awesome. Once I grab the key, I bring it to my front pocket and give the illusion that that's where it cam from. I believe that that erases the memory of the idea that my hand ever went behind me (under the pretense of looking for a quarter). I should note that if you don't like that handling, you can simply reach behind you to grab your keys and hand them to someone, and the ring is already on. It's that fast.

Closing Thoughts:

I was really in a debate with myself whether I should write about this for Magic Friday. It's simply so good that I just didn't want too many people to know about it. I'm still not sure if I'm going to hit the 'Post' button down below or if I should tell everyone I was sick today... The one thing in my favour is that, at the time of this writing, Steve doesn't take Paypal so it takes a little bit of effort to get your hands on a Ringer- that makes me feel better.

Oh, what the heck...

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND EVERYONE!

Jamie D. Grant

______________________________________________________________