Have you ever had a magic trick go wrong while onstage? If so, how did you handle the situation?
In a live show, you can expect the unexpected. Especially in a show with so much audience participation, involving audience members introduces an element that changes with each show. For me, the key is to remember that the audience doesn't know how the magic trick is supposed to end. If you're prepared as a magician to pivot and take the audience down a different path, then you can bring the trick to a successful conclusion (even if it may not be the conclusion you were initially planning on). Whether the cause is a technical issue or an audience member saying or doing something unusual, the goal is to stay a few steps ahead, so that you realize what's happening and can take the trick in a new direction before the audience has any idea that anything went awry in the first place. From their perspective, all should appear seamless and ... well, magical!
Jen Kramer appears in The Magic of Jen Kramer at Westgate Las Vegas, in which the Yale graduate astounds audiences with magic of the mind, turning what seems impossible into the impossible-to-ignore.
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