mark lewis wrote:OK. Here is the truth behind the above ad. Incidentally all the above tricks had been advertised individually for weeks beforehand and I sold a ton of them with the most blatant misrepresenation which I am very proud of.
By way of explanation "Absolutely Out of This World" was a svengali deck with the reds cut short and the blacks left as they were. If you flick half the deck one way they are all black and the other way all red. That was how it worked. I invented it and it was the biggest load of bilge I ever came up with. I sold loads and loads though! Robert Harbin and Silvan did indeed buy it. They must have been gravely disappointed in their purchase!
And to my great delight I have just found one left over from 45 years ago. Amazingly it is as good as new although the box is naturally a little bedraggled. It is new because I never used it and was never sold.
The Cups and Colours trick was simply the little plastic cups and balls. I disguised the title and description so the idiot magicians wouldn't realise what it was. Ali Bongo was daft enough to buy one which was ironic because he was the one who first sold it to me when he worked in a magic shop. I was a teenager at the time.
The cups were egg cups and were indeed made in Holland but I purchased them from the local grocery store. My "factory" was a table in my office.
As was the Vanishing Royal which of course is the Dutch Looper. I used to make 14 out of one regular deck. I would make all 14 in about ten minutes. It was indeed "made to rigorous specifications at our factory on the premises" . I just had to make sure I cut them properly and put the glue on correctly.
As for the Mark Lewis Magic Theatre that was just a room in my office premises. I only got one punter come in. He was an old man with nothing much to do in Blackpool. And of course I shall let you guess who "one of the world's finest card magicians was"!
That is the funniest read for a very, very long time!
Wow that's a blast from the past - Clifford Davis of New Faces critic 'fame'......or as my Father would refer to him, 'the pompous pr!ck'. Lest we forget that here was a man so well-versed in Magic apparently, that he believed Uri Geller to be the real deal.
The word 'Legend' is very much overused within today's society. However, I truly cannot think of a more fitting term for you Mr. Lewis.
Your contributions most certainly bring out the sun on the very greyest and most boring of days. Thank you!
