On a recent trip to the UK to visit with the estimable video auteur Owen Packard, a/k/a Big Blind Media, we filmed a “bundle” of the various false cuts I had developed over the years. For those who would like to engage the other side of their brain, “John Bannon’s Cutting Falsely” offers video instruction of six utility false cuts—all of which have also been described here.

My old Genii column, Dealing With It, typically included a video link (which, I am told, typically got the most hits that month). I’ll try to continue that tradition here—as my available technology allows.

The Cutting Falsely bundle will be exclusively available at Big Blind Media. Stay tuned.

THE “BOOK-BREAK” glimpse is a classic method for glimpsing a selected card and there have been many applications and handlings for it. Most of the ones I’ve seen are contrived and seemingly gratuitous. This one, however, is natural, logical, and completely covered. So let’s not conflate this one with the larger set of “book-break” glimpses. It’s new and different, and may become your new favorite glimpse.

The Shuffle Transfer Glimpse is my current favorite. I arrived at it by combining three elements. First, was the “step configuration” which historically often has been used for a center glimpse. For example, the step configuration is the basis for the Draun glimpse. The second influence was J.K. Hartman’s “Transfer Glimpse,” which uses a pivoting motion to glimpse a single card (or the bottom card of a deck) as the card was transferred from hand to hand, or from hand to table. Lastly, I combined these elements with the motivation of transferring the deck from hand to hand in readiness for an overhand shuffle.

The “Shuffle Transfer Glimpse” was published in “Mentalissimo” (2016).

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OLD DOG. NEW trick. A different look at divining the “name” of a selected card. In this trick, the “naming” is not part of the method at all. Instead, the “naming” is used to create moments of humor, mild confusion, doubt, and finally resolution. Much better than simply revealing a card: your audience is first taken on a little ride.

A PARTICIPANT FREELY selects a card from a shuffled deck, remembers it, and returns it. The performer gives the cards a quick shuffle and then hands them to the participant who, in turn, shuffles the cards.

The performer calls attention to a note card that has been in full view and hands it to a second participant.

The performer does not re-take the deck and has not seen the faces of the cards. Nevertheless, under these strict conditions, he undertakes to name the selected card.

After a bit of concentration, he dramatically states,

Jessica, I know the name of your card. The name of your card is …

A melodramatic pause, and then,

… Freddy!

You look skeptical, but it’s true. You see I have given names to each and every card in the deck. Freddy was one of my roommates back in college. Go ahead, take your card out of the deck and put it face down on the table. Don’t show me what it is.

He turns to the second participant and asks her to look at the note card she is holding.

Go ahead, Anjali, take a look. There’s a list of playing cards, right? And each card has a name assigned to it? And each name is different? Do you see the name, Freddy?

The performer puts his hand on the selected card in readiness to turn it over.

Anjali, what card is named Freddy?

She says it’s the Five of Clubs. The first participant visibly reacts.

The performer flips the tabled selection face up. It is the Five of Clubs—the card named Freddy!

Everything is examinable. Regular cards that can be borrowed. No memorization.

IN HIS SEMINAL trick “Fred” (in various incarnations, also known as “Phil” or “Clyde”), Fred Lowe created a very clever method to have apparently discerned or predicted a thought-of card. He also introduced the disconnect where he says the “name” of the thought-of card is “Fred.” The moment is equal parts surprising, puzzling, and fun. Then, all becomes crystal clear when the performer reveals that the thought-of card has the name “Fred” inscribed on its back.

I always liked the idea of the trick, but also found the method (one or two gaffed, unexaminable decks) to be too cumbersome and impractical. Here, we introduce a new method (with a chosen card) in order to preserve the “naming” moment but doable with ordinary cards at any time (as long as you have the index card with the list).

It’s a different kind of mapping. Instead of mapping cards to names by apparently writing the names on the backs of the cards, we record the mapping on a list. Having all fifty-two name pairs clearly identified, however, means you can’t cheat on the mapping. Nevertheless, the method may make you smile …

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And the night got deathly quiet / and his face lost all expression / Said, ‘If you’re gonna play the game, boy / you got to learn to play it right. — “The Gambler,” Rodgers and Hart

YES, ANOTHER packet trick that you can put together yourself. A quick trick in which suddenly— and unexpectedly—nothing is as it seemed seconds ago.

YOU OFFER TO SHOW the spectator a game of chance that is “impossible to lose.”

You display a packet of cards remarking that the backs are marked. Three blue-backed cards have the word “Joker” boldly marked on their backs. One red-backed card is just as boldly marked “Queen.” The “Queen” card is shown to be the Queen of Spades.

The cards are marked: Joker, Joker, Queen, and Joker. Guess which one you have to keep track of? The Queen? Absolutely right. The Queen of Spades is the card you have to keep your eye on.

The cards are mixed and then counted again—this time the faces of the “Joker” cards are shown and, sure enough, are Jokers.

You see how you can’t lose. Each of the Jokers is marked and so is the Queen. It’s impossible to lose. In fact, there’s no way to make it any easier. Except, maybe, if I got rid of one of the Jokers.

You take one of the “Joker” cards, cleanly shows it, and places it in your pocket. The packet is counted to show two “Joker” cards and one “Queen” card. The top “Joker” card is placed on the table revealing the “Queen” card.

So all you have to do is choose the Queen of Spades, which conveniently is marked with the word ‘Queen.’ Tempted? HA! As soon as you choose the card marked ‘Queen,’ the game that is impossible to LOSE becomes the game that is impossible for you to WIN!

You spread the packet which now consists of three red-backed cards marked “Queen.” These cards prove to be the Queens of Clubs, Hearts, and Diamonds. The money card, the Queen of Spades is found to be the blue-backed “Joker” card.

As soon as you chose the ‘Queen’ card, I’d ask which Queen card. And it doesn’t matter which you pick because that’s the Queen of Hearts, that’s the Queen of Clubs, that’s the Queen of Diamonds—none of these are the Queen of Spades. That’s because, Jokers are wild . . . and the Queen of Spades is over here.

Everything comes crashing down at once. All four cards apparently change. Blue-backed “joker” cards change into red-backed “Queen” cards. The red-backed “money” card, the Queen of Spades, changes into a blue-backed “Joker” card.

Everything can be examined.

LIAM MONTIER says he was inspired by Jack Parker’s “Visual Acuity” (52 Memories, page 150). In playing around with the trick, he saw an application for the Bullet Party Display. With a little engineering, he eliminated the gaffed cards and double-stick tape from the Parker routine, but kept the full packet change of back designs and combined it with the full packet change of faces from the “Bullet Party” trick. The coordination of the names on the backs of the cards with the faces shown in the Bullet Party Display makes the whole thing extra-deceptive. According to Liam, “Happy times!”

I have slightly customized Liam’s basic routine to bring about a slightly different series of changes which simplifies the routine somewhat.

THIS TRICK IS all climax. After the initial set-up and display phase, everything happens at once. That is, as soon as you’ve established what the cards are, you immediately show that they’ve all changed to something else. A functional kick in the head.

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Tangerine trees and marmalade skies . . .A girl with kaleidoscope eyes . . .
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green . . .— “Lucy In The Sky,” Lennon and McCartney

UNABASHED, NOT APOLOGETIC aficionado of packet tricks. Gotta love them. All sorts of of reasons. This and the next are personal favorites that, while they appared in Triabolical (2011) and on Fractalicious (2012), were not released as separate packet tricks. You can put this together yourself; no special cards required. (If you happen to have my best-selling :) packet trick “Spin Doctor,” you can use the same set of cards.)

YOU PLACE A packet of playing cards wrapped with a dollar bill on the table. A spectator chooses one of the Aces, for example, the Ace of Hearts. The bill is removed from the packet and the packet is shown to have one face-up reversed card—the named Ace of Hearts.

You then state that you were so sure that the Ace of Hearts would be chosen, you didn’t bring the other Aces along – the rest of the packet is shown to be blank.

Finally, sensing the spectator’s skepticism in advance, you made sure to get the Ace of Diamonds from a different deck; turning the Ace over reveals a different-colored back!

You openly ponder what would have happened if the spectator had named a different Ace?

I am sure we could have worked something out.

The three previously blank faced cards now suddenly become the remaining three Aces.

One thing we know for sure, whichever one of the Aces you thought of . . . it would have been different from the rest!

The Aces are turned face-down and each has a different-colored back.

Of course, everything is clean and examinable.

COMRADE LIAM MONTIER was an early adopter of the Bullet Party Display with a number of clever applications. I sent him an early draft of a work in progress which used the set of cards from “Spin Doctor” and the Bullet Party Display. This handling began with a show of a face-up Ace in a packet with three face-down blank-face cards.

Liam sent back a slightly revised handling, but with a fantastic presentational spin: Max Maven’s “B’wave” gone wild. I loved the concept immediately. Liam says, “After seeing a face-up Ace in a packet of (apparently) face-down blank cards, the idea of the ‘B’wave’ as a presentational point occurred almost immediately.”

Liam’s routine began with an equivoque to force one of the Aces. I devised a handling that allowed either of two Aces—the Ace of Hearts or the Ace of Diamonds—to be selected. This was in the excellent Triabolical project. I still think it’s the best solution, but the trade-off is that you had to remember two different ways to do the trick.

So back to equivoque to one Ace. A fair trade. I’ve included my up-to-date, go-to equivoque.

Beware the B’rainiac.

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… Is back!

From Squash Publishing:

Twenty years on, Dear Mr. Fantasy still feels like a secret passed hand-to-hand.

In this anniversary reprint, John Bannon’s signature blend of devious method, elegant structure, and real-world practicality remains as fresh (and as fooling) as ever. These are effects designed for thinking magicians: bold, commercial magic with clever principles hidden in plain sight, all delivered with Bannon’s trademark clarity and wit.

A modern classic when it first appeared, Dear Mr. Fantasy stands today as essential reading for anyone who loves smart, devastatingly effective card magic.

Nineteen effects with playing cards • 200 pages • Hardbound and illustrated with 70 black-and-white photographs • New swoon-worthy cover art by comic book artist Mike Norton (DC/Marvel/Archie).

“What I find interesting about [Bannon] is that he doesn’t take anything for granted. He has the ability to examine all assumptions, question common wisdom, and rethink all or any aspects of a trick’s plot, props, or procedure. Dear Mr. Fantasy is a terrific little book, filled with a variety of card magic that will provide a satisfying fix for cardicians everywhere.”

-Michael Close

$45 from Squash Publishing. Get yours here.

Dreamed that I was lucky, darlin’— But I woke up cold in hand, yeah —Blind Lemon Jefferson

THE ACES ARE shown and three placed in a row on the table. The performer holds onto the Ace of Spades.

In addition to cheating on the shuffle, on the deal, and on the sly, there’s another way … Let’s cut to the chase …

Instead of dealing the cards onto the Aces, the performer dribbles the cards across the tabled Aces, covering them with a spread of cards. Instantly, the Aces suddenly appear in the performer’s hand with the Ace of Spades.

Just plain cheating!

THIS IS JACK Tighe’s “Lemon Pie,” from my January 2020 Genii column, “Dealing With It.” When Jack first showed me this trick, I was surprised and fooled. The speed guarantees the trick surprises everyone; the elegantly minimal method will fool even those who know better.

This trick combines a Marlo switch that uses an Al Leech pickup strategy, with Jack Carpenter’s Blind Lemon production to produce a great moment in which the Aces assemble and appear out of nowhere in your hand. The production happens instantly! From beginning to end, gone in less than sixty seconds.

The trick is an assembly, repurposed as a concluding “poker deal,” without changing much, if anything. Nevertheless, it works as a surprising conclusion to this trio of quasi poker tricks.

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At this time in the world, we are where the energy is. We are the most diverse, the most iconoclastic, the most maverick, and the most skillful.

—David Del Tredici

USING SIXTEEN cards and the Aces, the performer offers to demonstrate a way of cheating. He deals the Aces to four hands, then fills each hand one-at-a-time by ”filling in” four cards to each hand.

I’ll show you another way of cheating at cards called “Cheating On The Sly.” I’ll deal one Ace to each hand, then I’ll fill in each hand. Like this. It’s not “cheating on the shuffle,” because I didn’t shuffle. It’s not “cheating on the deal” because I’m not dealing around, I’m just filling each hand in.

The first rule of “Cheating On The Sly” is that …

The performer turns over his cards—all four Aces!

You don’t talk about “Cheating On The Sly!”

OVER TWENTY YEARS AGO, I put the “Bullet Train” in Dear Mister Fantasy—a trio of Ace assemblies that, while they could be performed individually, played nicely together. “Iconoclastic Aces” was the first of these and required a novel switch and, at one point, a bottom deal. The trick was super-fast and startling in its speed. Now, years later, I discovered that re-framed as a “poker deal,” a bottom deal was no longer necessary. Still just as startling!

The trick can effectively be done by itself, but I’ll describe it as the second in this series.

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I’m a big fan of the lie of omission. —Gillian Flynn

PEOPLE OFTEN ask me if I can cheat at cards. The answer is … of course I can cheat at cards! Let me show you a couple of ways to cheat using the most esteemed cards in the deck: The Aces.

You show the Aces and sets them aside. You explain that one way to cheat is “cheating on the shuffle.” And gives the deck a few overhand shuffles.

One way to cheat is: ”Cheating On The Shuffle.” In the old days, they shuffled like this … To stack the Aces we can shuffle like this … and this … and this … and this …

You shuffle off many seemingly random packets dropping them in a few separate piles on the table. After the cards are exhausted, you slap the piles together.

Believe it or not that shuffle stacks the Aces in a four-handed game. Except for one thing … the Aces are over here.

You pick up the packet of Aces and drop it on top of the deck.

Good thing there’s a way to cheat other than Cheating On The Shuffle. There’s Cheating On The Deal. Watch. I’ll put the Aces on top and then just deal out four hands.

With no further manipulation, you deal out four five-card poker hands. Then, you examine each of the first three hands.

Let’s take a look … see this hand? What’s wrong with this picture? No Ace. This hand? No Ace. And this last hand … No Ace either. That’s because I was cheating on the deal!

All four Aces are in your hand.

Not bad at all!

THIS TRICK is Roy Walton’s “Oversight.” The notion is that you supposedly demonstrate how to stack the Aces only to realize the Aces were not returned to the deck—a small “oversight.” Then you drop the Aces on top of the deck and bring the trick to a successful conclusion. So, this is that. Except I’ve changed the initial switch-out of the Aces, and the method for actually stacking the switched-out Aces. A personal variation? Not really. The switch and the stack are novel and very interesting.

First, a caveat. I see “poker deals” as a plot for a trick, not necessarily as a demonstration of skill (pseudo or real). While I try to observe some semblance of card playing protocol, I am by no means a purist. Most “demonstrations” are tedious anyway with no surprise and very little suspense. (Besides, I have never cottoned to the near-reverence some of our colleagues pay to purported real-life card cheats.) So, not opposed to take extreme liberties in the name of surprise, mystery, and intrigue (and just maybe for ease of method).

A few years ago, I routined three separate tricks in a quasi-poker themed “demonstration.” I called the routine “Bulletproof Poker.” In this column, I have previously described two of the phases as separate stand-alone tricks. While also a good trick on its own, this was the first phase.

That said, no set up. No difficult moves … almost self-working (almost … by some definitions). And some fun.

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Trust everyone, but cut the cards.

Not fancy, flourish-y, or cardist-y, not even complicated, just elaborate. Sometimes you want a lot of moving parts.

Also a related utility false cut that can bring cards from the bottom to the top in a deceptive and satisfying way.

Also, self-working or very easy to do (depending on your definition).

08.1 — DOUBLE-DOUBLE DUTCH FALSE CUT

We’ll start with the Double Dutch Cut (Mentalissimo 2017). Definitely related to the workhorse Jay Ose False Cut, the “Double Dutch” was a four-packet false cut that added a twist: as the cut is completed the packets are jumped over each other, apparently mixing the deck further. Here, we’ll push this concept further and make it a more elaborate six-packet cut. This way, with more packets in play, the sequence seems complex, but not at all confusing. For some purposes, you want to have a lot of “moving parts.”

Let’s refer to the following diagram:

A B C D E F

Cut about one-sixth of the deck and place it at position A.

Next, cut two-sixths and place it at position B, and, in an immediate and continuing action, cut half of this packet and put it at position C.

Similarly, cut another two-sixths and put it and position D, and, without pausing, cut half of this packet and place it at position E.

Place the last packet at position F.

The six packets are now in the following order:

1 3 2 5 4 6
A B C D E F

So, to assemble:

Hop packet 1 (A) over packet 3 onto packet 2 (C).

Hop packet 3 (B) over two packets onto packet 4 (E).

Next, hop the combined packet at position C over packet 5 (D) and onto the combined packet at position E.

Now, hop packet 5 (D) over the combined packet at position E onto packet 6 (F).

Complete by placing the combined packet at position E onto the combined packet at position F.

This cut seems regular—the “hops” move from left to right—and a little chaotic at the same time. The progression makes it seems that the packets are truly mixed or at least rearranged, but of course, it’s completely false.

This cut appeared in Very Hush-Hush (2022).

Like the Double Dutch, this one has a lot of moving parts. A mash-up of the venerable Ose, Thompson, and Tap false cuts, it employs fifteen separate cuts in a smooth progression that neither looks nor is complicated.

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Cutting a few cards from the top to the bottom is a piece of cake—use a double undercut. Cutting cards from the bottom to the top, on the other hand, not so much. The typical swing-cut-then-double-undercut, in my opinion, doesn’t “cut” it, so to speak. The procedure kinda looks like cutting the deck, then un-cutting it. While there a couple of other techniques to accomplish this end, the following is direct, easy, and very deceptive.

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Cunning pays no regard to virtue and is but the low mimic of wisdom.—Plato

A PARTICIPANT and the performer each take half of the deck. Following the performer’s lead, they both shuffle and mix their respective cards. Some cards are exchanged and shuffled into each player’s group. Finally, they each divide their respective halves into four piles. The perf…

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Nothing is easy, you’ll find that the squeeze won’t turn out so bad. —Jethro Tull

YOU DEAL AN UNUSUAL playing card face up on the table: A blank card with a large black circle printed on it.

I know that looks like a circle, but it’s actually a “zero.” Most people don’t know that there’s a fourteenth card in each suit—the “Nothing.” Most people have never…

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This fast, easy-to-do Ace production elaborates on a production sequence I originally designed for use in a color-changing deck routine, “Strangers’ Gallery.” (Smoke And Mirrors (1992).) The procedure appears as if the performer is reversing and outjogging certain cards at certain positions in the deck. The produced cards, however, are actually taken of…

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This cut first appeared on my Bullets After Dark DVD (Big Blind Media 2009). I happen to like this a lot. And, if idly handling a deck of cards, I will often be doing this cut over and over.

TAKE THE DECK from above with your right hand. With your right forefinger, swing cut the top third into your left hand. Hold the packet in straddle grip between your…

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You can’t know too many of them. In the course of the cut, the deck goes from being face-down to being face-up, and vice-versa. So, you may consider doing the cut twice in a row.

TAKE THE DECK face-down from above with your right hand. With your right forefinger, lift up about a third of the deck and swing the packet to the left. [1]

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All right, Elvis has left the building … He has left the building. —Hoss Logan, Louisiana Hayride Concert 1954

FROM A SHUFFLED deck, you produce each of the four Aces through a variety of fancy cuts.

One “badge of honor” for magicians, is to take a shuffled deck and find an Ace … Oh, look, an Ace! …

You identify the Ace of Spades as the “lead singer” and s…

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The cloud never comes from the quarter of the horizon from which we watch for it. — Elizabeth Gaskell

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