One of my favourite episodes of The IT Crowd is when Moss and Roy tell Jen that the man she is dating bares an uncanny resemblance to a magician. Slightly put off she proceeds to go on her date only to realise that her co-workers are completely accurate in their appraisal.



Dating a magician would be weird. The deception, the sneakiness, the fast hands, not to mention the awful clothes- you’d be an audience participant in your own life. I don’t like to generalise, but magicians are a group of people famous for cutting pretty ladies in half- my guess is that magicians wouldn’t make the best boyfriends. If a dude came up to me in a bar pulling silk scarves out in every direction I can’t say I’d be turned on, and I couldn’t help but wonder about the future of the relationship; meeting the parents (Your daughter is a wonderful girl, Sir. Now pick a card), the proposal (Is that a diamond ring behind your ear?), not to mention the child rearing (Now just step into this box Timmy. Don’t worry, Mum’s at the shops). Even a magical one night stand would be out of the question. If you thought waking up in someone else's bedroom was slightly disorienting, imagine waking up levitating. Also, I bet magicians all have satin bed sheets. Gross.

A recent youtube binge led me to watch a few magic videos which cemented my opinion that magicians are creepy as shit, and not just for the reason that they harness the occult and perform false miracles inspired by the antichrist-

… ahem.

Magicians are creepy specifically in their inter-gender relations. You know, relations with the ladies.

The first magician I was aware of, as a young pup, was David Copperfield. Copperfield belongs to a pretty old school of magic, He loves big Vegas style extravaganzas involving tigers, big bolts of silk, making things disappear, and sexy babes. Copperfield was quite suave and debonair. His wikipedia page suggests he developed his magical talent as a way to impress girls as a teenager. It also says that he used to regularly sneak into Stephen Sondheim and Bob Fosse musicals as a teenager so I can’t possibly imagine why he would have needed any help with the ladies in the first place. Regardless, he has become incredibly rich and famous doing tricks and flirting with girls. Look at the way he flirts with this young girl in this clip.

It’s all fairly innocent. He reaches around Corey’s neck with a rope and scissors, lifts her skirt up on stage and asks her to reach into his pants, but it’s all in good fun. The most important thing about professional magic is that there are many witnesses present, which is probably just as well for Corey’s sake.

David Blaine is a newer illusionist, and he illustrates the fact that smooth-talking and the claim to magic can pretty much set you up to do whatever you want, including putting your fingers into a strange woman’s mouth. In this clip, Blaine puts his fingers into the mouth of a pretty girl and apparently removes her teeth. After performing this piece of magic/assault, he restores her teeth by spitting in her face.

Just to reiterate, the magician spits in the face of the participant.

The most disturbing part of this clip is the creepy way Blaine keeps droning “just trust me, just trust me”, and the way the girl’s friends fall about screaming and laughing, slapping her on the back after he spits in her face. If this happened to me I’d be screaming “Stranger danger!” as soon as his magical mitts came zoning in on my face. At a guess this trick probably works better on girls than, say, any of the blokes around her, in which case I’m guessing Blaine might receive a very magical punch to the face.

Then there’s Criss Angel, who creeps me out on levels that extend beyond the fact that he’s a magician, mainly because of his hairdo and the fact he spells his name “Criss”. In this clip he magically tears two different ladies’ bras off without undoing the clip.




At what point along the line did magicians and illusionists decide that producing doves out of hats wasn’t cutting it anymore and that pulling women’s bras off was more entertaining; more ‘magical’. Is this more appealing to modern audiences? Is Criss Angel down with the kids? Maybe it’s down to the fact that magicians no longer have lovely assistants to provide the sex appeal so they have to resort to ripping bras of random women in the street. Maybe pixelated boobs are more appealing than cute bunnies in top hats. I don’t know. I’m clearly out of touch.

I find it rather unnerving how he screams “NOW!” when he performs the trick. I know ‘Alakazaam’ might be a little out of date, but surely there are sexier magic words than ‘now’. I also hate to think that this is somehow part of Angel’s seduction routine- starting with the candles and Barry White, then ripping off a woman’s underwear screaming “NOW!”

The thing is, apparently, it all works with the ladies. David Copperfield was engaged to Claudia Schiffer and Criss Angel was reported to be dating Holly Madison, Hugh Hefner’s former girlfriend, but she was probably just happy to be dating someone who wasn’t an octogenarian with two other girlfriends. From the girls’ point of view I can see how the fame and money are appealing, and the fact that a career in professional magic requires a lifetime of hard work and dedication, which can certainly be an attractive quality, but I personally remain unswayed. The hot celebrity girlfriend is definitely the accessory that carries the professional magician over the line from guy obsessed with card tricks to cool dude. Now I'm not a hot celebrity, but I think I can safely say that a magical boyfriend is not for me.

To leave on a more wholesome note I’ll leave you with this very sweet video of Harry Houdini and his wife, Bess, who was his on-stage assistant for most of his career. Lending a helping hand while your loyal husband immerses himself in an impenetrable water fortress- now that’s good old fashioned romance.