Here is a change in presentation (routine).
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Vanishing Cigarette Tube
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The Good Old Routine
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Take a cigarette and put it into a black tube, tap on it and it magically shrinks into a tiny cigarette!

The New Routine
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Take a cigarette and put it into a black tube and wave your hands over it. Magically the cigarette vanishes and a small 3" X 3" silk with a thin black border is pulled out from the black tube. The silk can have a message "Cigarette Smoking is Injurious to Health" along with a small drawing of a skull & bones.

Do you think differently?

From India with regards

CHEERS!!

Very nice!

Fon

That would be a great one for kids especially, because if you present it right, where they look up to you, I bet that's gonna slow 'em down when they think about smoking when they're older!

I did a few kids shows with my brothers where we put all kinds of stuff in a cigarette, including part of a sparkler fire cracker (the kind that looks like a small stick and when lit, it emits a fountain of sparks), and we said "cigarettes are bad, 'cause you never know WHAT'S in 'em" after the thing was done shooting sparks and bangs everywhere (but not too far)! It was cool! I think the kids liked that better than our magic! Darn! Lol!

5150,
Bird Brain

Thanks Fon and Bird Brain. Anybody else with a new Idea?

From India with regards

CHEERS!!

Excellent Idea, I like it!!!

Thanks Magicman. Lets have some more Ideas coming forth.

CHEERS!!

This may be on the gross side , but I think it would get the point across.
Load something slimy & disgusting, a bit of stage blood perhaps?

Personally, I think some folks might find this trick terribly off color. My wife's mother died of lung cancer, and she would either start crying or punch your lights out if you showed this to her.

One man's personal vendetta is another persons life-long tragedy.

And my wife just walked in and said she wouldn't cry or punch your lights out, but she would have a few words for you. She also said that there isn't a smoker in the world (including her mother) that doesn't know that smoking is bad for them. They choose to do it anyways and won't appreciate the reminder that they might someday die from it.

In conclusion, I think this idea bites. Sorry. But, I really like your hat, Ustaad.

As an alternative how about producing a silk that looks like a cigarette? White with a tan filter on one end and you could even have some ashes fall out of the "lit" end when you unroll it.

For the record I despise smoking.

Ustaad! That is a great idea! I wanna do something like that for my mom. she is a heavy smoker. But she has a sense of humor.

It's a shame that most will overlook this strong effect. Put your minds to work and you can come up with an incredible routine, as I have, that gets probably the strongest reaction from anything that I do. Nobody says you have to use it in it's current form.
(hint, hint)

Jeff

Actually I would like to qualify my previous statements.

As Peter Loghran pointed out in another thread I think it's about knowing your audience. In Coolmoney's situation it could be really clever and possibly make a difference for his mother. But in the case of my wife it would be terribly insensitive.

Clever thinking but I think the practicality of it limits your audience to friends and family who you know very well. But the possibility of hurting that one person makes the whole thing not worth it IMO.

But nice hat.

Wow! Someone Finally found a use for that old trick! Good thinking Ustaad! But I have to admit I dig Ichazod's blood idea...

Dear All,

The idea behind the post was to focus our thoughts in a different direction. There are numerous big and small props out there and the inventors generally suggest a method of performance/routine/effect. Some props are so versatile that there is ample possibility of creating a number of new and varied routines and effects with them.

A change in routine/effect for a particular prop has always been appreciated by the audience, especially when the original effect is well known.

The suitability of a Routine/effect will (and always) depend on the type of audience one is entertaining. Magic must be a source of pleasure and entertainment. The audience must go home happy and relaxed but at the same time they must also have something to think and wonder - How did he do that?

From India with Regards.
:xmas: USTAAD
CHEERS!!

Here Here Aasaad! Very well put.

He who succeeds is the one who tries what others wont!