I like to peruse around old magic prop and auction sites and I see a lot of gimmicks for cigarette acts, like droppers and what not for sale. Clubs in this part of the country have a no smoking inside policy, so I wonder about the wanna be Cardini's in the forum, have you dropped the smoking magic?

I did when I quit smoking, to keep me from temptation. I used them extensively in both stage and close-up, so it was a huge mental hump to get over, losing that large a part of my act. I use to make all my own droppers, etc. Sold most of my gimmicks years ago.

Here is Rolland Henning performing the best answer to the problem of no smoking policies that I've ever seen. He is one of my favorite performers to watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEfu0l0kdYs

Yes, I know him from The Weekly Magic Failure web site. He is an excellent performer and blogger.

Was cigarette magic something you do or did?

It is still part of Vito Lupo's act and many Europeans. Pilou does a whole act with cigs.

Cigs are great for the streets. as they seperate the performers from the babysitters. many countries in asia still don't mind smoking indoors...
I had a show in auckland and needed to borrow a cig from the spectator, turns out auckland is nearly smoke free, so it took me a really really long few minutes before I got one...next time I will bring my own...

Hey I do it... sometimes. And the patter is all about it being inevitable becoming a magician. When I was little I wanted to be like the cool kids. Smoking and all. But whenever I tried "weird" stuff happened.

Then I go into the routine. It ends with me not seeing that smoking is not cool and thinking that magic is uncool. So basically a nice character piece. And as such cigarette magic still is pretty good. Imagine a noire themed show... dude you gotta smoke there. At least you gotta try lighting a cigarette.

I was never was into the cigarette thing but I once tried a dropper and it left a scorch mark on my jacket, and I burned my hand trying to get one to drop, and the others went out, So that cured me. Made the jacket stink too. Gave up smoking 20 years ago but still got COPD. Lesson learned.

All mine were lit either openly (good reason to produce candles), or secretly once they were otherwise free from holders. I used no tanks that held lit cigs. The timing on stage shows is often so iffy, that finding the perfect time to light cigs for tanks was too nerve-wracking. I quickly abandoned the idea of lighting secretly because of an uneasiness regarding the chemicals.

My droppers held either new unlit cigs, or dummies that matched the anticipated length of any in play. Some dummies puffed, some were simply toss switched. I limited the production of "lit" cigs, and focused on other effects with them, the smoke, the lighters or matches, etc. More variety and less redundancy.

I always wanted to find a dropper that would light them on cue, but no luck, and any prototypes I made had problems. I never saw the real deal to get a full understanding of the working.

Close-up work always involved just one or two cigs, which were always lit openly. That whole routine lasted about a minute unless I did cig thru quarter too, but had a lot of magic packed into that minute.

I've found that you can still perform cig routines by substituting those e-cig devices (although they can be bulky) or small glowsticks. The glowsticks have the advantage of high visibility, especially with low light conditions.

One thing I've been playing around with are hotglue sticks; the mini size are exactly the same size and length as a standard cigarette.
Plus, they're also less brittle.

Has anyone tried using crayons? They look to be about the same size as a cigarette, but far more appropriate when performing before kids.

Using anything but a real lit cigarette is pointless! The whole point of cigarette magic is that has a live burning end on the cigarette. The person could get burnt, which draws the mystery and suspense to the magic. Anything else is so what kind of thing. Sure many cigarette move can be done with dummy cigarettes, chalk, crayons, etc.

I use to do Cigarette Manipulations, and for close-up always did Cigarette-thru-Quarter, but now I am just to scared. There is always someone yelling, you are killing me!

Their Lose!!

I quit smoking and it is banned at all Public places here, but I still perform the Cig thru Quarter,Vanishing Lit Cig and Floating Lit Cig when the oppertunity arises.Mike

Oh by the way,Here is something that might interest some of you,....Here in Alaska, if you can prove that Lighting and/or Smoking a Ciggarette/Pipe/Candle is essential to the Performance ie:The whiff of smoke from a Pipe to spark Jerry's monologue in Edward Albee's "A Zoo Story" or a "Magical Routine",you can obtain a waiver to the City Ordinance.Mike

Toothpicks are a great substitute. It is natural to have them in your mouth and it even looks kinda cool. The manipulation is different though. Much more delicate.

John Calvert still does the old time cigarette magic.

Speaking of John Calvert, in eight weeks he will be 101 years old! An amazing gentleman.

I think that electronic cigarettes could be a viable substitute for the real thing in a manipulation routine. They look real, the tip glows when you take a puff, and they produce harmless "smoke". I agree that 99% of the mystery and entertainment value of a cigarette act would be lost if the cigarettes were unlit. Substituting pencils, crayons, or whatever would be even worse. As most people are aware of electronic cigarettes, if you were to work with actual, real lit cigarettes, they may think you were using electronic cigarettes anyway. Given this, cigarette acts will most likely never have the impact that they once did.

One place where I think cigarette manipulation would be come in handy, would be in the selling of the electronic cigarettes themselves. There is a kiosk at a local mall that sells these things. I have never seen anyone purchase one, or even seem interested in purchasing one. If the guy working the booth could do a short cigarette routine, maybe he could gather a crowd, and then maybe he could sell some of his product.

The only shortcoming to the "E Cigarettes" is their weight. I have had an "E Cig" for over a year and the problem I have found is that to control the weight my hands have adopted a more cramped appearance.

FWIW

Here's what caused the demise of cigarette magic ...

http://youtu.be/3A0_WjWq-1I

(Just kidding - enjoy!)

Ha-ha!!! You should work a spoof of that into your Blackstone reenactment.