A recent showing on television of the remake of the classic movie: “The War of the Worlds” made me think of the extraordinary circumstances and events which occurred on October 30, 1938 when Orson Welles who was at that time relatively unknown, broadcast his radio drama over the WABC radio network. The first two thirds of the one hour broadcast was presented as a series of semi-real news bulletins, which made many listeners actually believe that a Martian invasion was in progress. This broadcast was to be the making of Orson Welles as a celebrity! 

What isn’t so widely known about Orson Welles however is that he was a very enthusiastic and competent magician who frequently performed card tricks.  In an interview with Tannens Magic a couple of years before he died, he said : 

“My father loved magic and bought me a couple of big illusions when I was a young boy. In those days we had Thurston and all those great stage magicians. I started doing sleight-of-hand when I was 11 or 12. The first thing I wanted to do was the boxes (that’s what Thurston did). I loved Houdini but he wasn’t an illusionist; he was a challenger. He challenged the audience. He didn’t seduce them. He set up a kind of Olympic game and then won it at the end … he was dynamic … he had a kind of contempt for illusionists.” 

Even David Blaine, who like past performers has cultivated an air of mystery and eccentricity has named Orson Welles as one of his major inspirations in this aspect.

Photograph: A young and dynamic looking Orson Welles photographed by Carl Van Vechten

In the modern era where it seems that the world and his dog has a cellphone, it’s surprising to realise that there are  some card tricks which can even be performed using this rather impersonal medium.  Here is a simple trick for you to try over the phone with someone you want to astonish! 

Call your friend and asked them to find a deck of cards which you then tell them to give a good shuffle.  Next tell him to deal the cards face down into a pile one at a time in such a way that is no way you can hear how many cards he’s dealing.  Tell him he can stop whenever he likes but to make sure he doesn’t go past half of the deck.  When he tells you that he stopped, tell him to take a peek at the last card which he dealt and to remember it before returning it face down on top of the pile. 

Next, he is to deal on top of that stack of cards, the number of cards corresponding to the value of his chosen card-that is to say if he has chosen the five of diamonds then he needs to deal five more cards on top of the stack.  If he chose a picture card, the Jack’s will count as 11, Queens as 12 and Kings as 13. Now get your friend to pick up the pile of cards he has dealt and put it back on top of the deck from which he was dealing.  He now has the whole deck in his hand. 

At this point, remind your friend that there is absolutely no way you could possibly know which is his card. Tell him to deal the cards one at a time face up reading them out to you over the phone as he does this.  Naturally, he must not give you any indication in his vocal tones as to which is his card.  All you have to do now is to ignore the first card he reads out, but as he reads out the second card, you start counting with this second card being number one in your mind.  The third card which he describes to you will be your number two and so on….. 

Seemingly magically, you will find that as you count, you will have at least one card which will correspond exactly for example if his card was a five of diamonds then as he reads it out, you will be thinking of the number five.  This is of course because of the fact that you asked him to add the number of cards equal to the value of the card he chose on top of his chosen card and then because you ignored the first card he read out then you must get corresponding cards to the numbers you are counting in your mind!O

ccasionally you will get more than one card which corresponds to the numbers which you are mentally counting and if this happens you just have to try and guess which one is correct. This will be made easier of course if one of the cards is red and the other black in which case you can suggest it is one of these colours and if this is not correct then you can immediately name the correct card in one go.