The Real Thing

The House of Cards made its initial debut this past Saturday, when I went to the T Schreiber Studio to coach the actor in the use of the card house, how to set it up, store it, and drop it on cue. (See picture at left). The show itself, The Real Thing by Tom Stoppard debuts on February 25. It is directed by Terry Schrieber. It is a really enjoyable play for anyone who is not familiar . . . terrific script and an excellent group of actors. The set, courtesy of George Allison, is brilliant as usual.

I was asked by set designer George Allison and producer Cat Parker to come in and work with the actor and the production assistants as we went through the order and mechanism of the card house. It does take some learning to make sure that the card house functions properly. In rehearsal, the actor with practice was able to handle it very well, but I suspect that after six weeks of performances, the cards will suffer a little from wear and tear. Afterall, they're only cardboard. The creation, methodology and psychology behind this effect is highlighted in an earlier post. Scroll down, if you'd like to read more.

Recursive Acronymns hidden in poster

All:
This is one of my new posters, highlighting my successful escape from a regulation straitjacket 150 feet above the street. Since I love word play and have, for years hidden messages in almost all of my posters, decks of cards, and other materials, this time I wanted something different. So, for you wordsmiths, and puzzle fanatics, I have placed within the text AND design several recursive acronymns.
Can you find them? I've placed a little hint, to make it slightly easier. Each acronymn is connected to another word, so look carefully.
If you have trouble reading the text, just click on the poster to enlarge it.
Good luck . . . oh and in case you hate puzzles or can care less about wordplay, I hope you can at least say you like the poster straightaway.

Peace

A House (of Cards) divided by itself cannot stand

I was recently hired to create a house of cards effect for an Off-Broadway show. The play, "The Real Thing" by Tom Stoppard is being presented by the T Schrieber Studio on 26th Street in Manhattan. My good friend, a very talented director, Cat Parker, will be producing the show with Terry Schreiber directing. This is not the first time, I have worked at T Schreiber and I always find what those guys ask me to create, a welcome challenge. T Schreiber performs some of the most cutting edge and unique theatre in the city and with their very talented in-house designer, George Allison, they have created effects here that, I kid you not, rival what's being done on Broadway and on television. Just a sampling: In "Night of the Iguana" they (we) created a rainstorm (yes, a real rainstorm, ladies and gents, with water) on the 7th floor in an old building equipped with the usual old plumbing and electrical systems. An incredible and risky challenge that was rewarded with standing ovations every night. It was incredible, to say the frickin' least.

So now, I was asked to create a "House of Cards" that would collapse on cue. George Allison, the designer, created a rendering of what he had in mind. (See picture) In the bottom right corner you see the actor stacking cards. The effect will be that this actor is stacking cards methodically, a door slams and the entire house collapses.

So, creating this posed for me several challenges. First, the card house had to be set-up quickly every performance yet had to fall on cue in a logical manner, the way a real card house would fall. Moreover, the audience would have to perceive the card structure as authentic which meant no obvious tape or other fastening agents or glue. People understand and have handled playing cards and so, these cards had to act and behave in ways that people know they should. Also, for all intents and purposes, the card house could not stretch the credulity of the audience, in other words, no cards hanging off the end or positioned in such a way that would fly in the face of physics. So, with George's initial phone call a month ago and with the above cavaets in mind, I began. Honestly, when I first heard of the effect, I thought it would be simple. Well, I thought wrong, this was . . . not by any stretch of the imagination easy. Three weeks of drawings and concentration, one complete roll of packing tape, two coat hangars, seventeen one inch metal washers, three pieces of cardboard and more than eight decks of Bicycle Playing cards later, I emerged with a prototype (pictures above and left). I'm proud to say, that after much trial and error, I came up with a combination tongue and groove/tape process that collapsed on cue in enough of a believable way to scare my dog (who jumped everytime it collapsed). The card house resembles a puzzle in that all pieces consist of two, three or four cards. The entire house is built upon one hinged, load bearing wall at the very bottom. A hidden wire, (see picture above of back of house) when pushed by the actor will knock over the load bearing wall bringing down the entire house in several seconds. I will have to train the production assistant and actor in the set-up of the house as it does require some practice. Once you know where all the pieces go the house can be put together in about 30 seconds.

One of the first problems, I encountered initially, was to get the house to fall in a believable manner. If you were to really build a card house, it would consist of single cards leaned on top of, around, or against each other, forming each story. Since a standard poker sized playing card is 3 1/2 inches by 2 1/2 inches, any cards that appear above other cards have to be justified in the audience's mind with a logical reason, in this case a second, third, or fourth story upon which cards sit. Often times, when I would initiate the collapse, several pieces would fall but others would remain standing. After much experimentation, I decided to conceal metal washers inside of the top steeple of the house as well as the top and side floors. These metal washers, taped inside of two sandwiched cards would add weight and bring the house down in a uniform manner sandwiching upon itself.

The second problem also arises in any disturbance of the house. When set-up, the house will withstand a herd of elephants walking past it as long as the table on which it sits is not nudged. A small tap or nudge of the table could bring it down prematurely. Since the rendering shows the actor at close proximity to the audience, it was decided that an usher would stand near the entrance as the audience arrives to make sure no would-be knuckleheads decide to topple the house. Strengthening the house in any manner, with wire or additional tape would prevent its rapid collapse thus compromising the overall believability of the effect.

Experimentation last night and dinner with George and crew has resulted in some minor changes to the prototype card house before the production begins.

Stay connected for more details.

www.thomassolomon.com---------steampunk

All:

As of 10pm EST last night, October 28, the new content on my website--thomassolomon.com--- has gone live. This remains only the second major overhaul of the design and content on my website since early August, 2001.

There are lots of new features incorporating a totally new look. Most of my work, since 2001 and prior, including the several television shows I have done is represented in some way with pictures or articles on the site.

There is a new flash intro with audio and a whole new look to the site, incorporating a newly flourishing genre, called "steampunk" which, I am happy to say, has been a hallmark of my act for at least ten years. It is only within the last year that other clever people have coined the term for this new genre. Before that, it was "just a look." Now, thanks to other artists following a similiar format, someone has given it a name.

Back to the website. There is a mission statement page that outlines my 'reasons' as they apply

to magic; a new gallery page with pictures that you can click on and download if you so desire, there is a re-written and streamlined biography and milestones page with links to my fan site where you can read press about my career as well as a link to this very blog.

The 24/7 store allows you to purchase posters and limited edition decks of playing cards in your pajamas at your convenience by a simple click of the button. (How great is that!!!) Posters remain availible but decks of cards are on a first-come first-served basis, since quantities were limited.

So, if you have time . . . put on a pot of coffee, mute the TV, shut off the phone and find a comfortable chair. Then, log on to----thomassolomon.com-----tool around the site, read the articles, order merchandise or just look at the pictures . . . hopefully . . . you like : - )

As always--thanks for your interest.

Peace

Official Thomas Solomon Deck of Cards

I'm proud to announce, they are finally here! For months, I have been responding to emails "When are they coming?" "When are they coming?" Well, as of July 1, the Official Thomas Solomon deck of cards is now availible. Made of high quality casino stock with Linoid and Air Cushion Finish, these cards have a back design I am most proud of. Working with my graphics guru, we created an unusual design for both box and cards utilizing one of my favorite publicity photos taken in New York City back in 2002. The actual photograph has been converted to art work and when viewed a short distance away has all the attributes of a photograph. In addition the Jokers have been replaced with Trixster cards with artwork converted from pictures of my upside down straitjacket escape performed in the rain in Portland Oregon back in 2006.
The Ace of Spades has also been retrofitted to fit not only my performing style, but the style of the cards.

The poker-sized, plastic coated, linen finish cards are a limited printing and are going fast. They handle well if you are a magician and will last eons if you use them to play cards. And, for all you poker and Black Jack players, these cards WILL win you the money, ever since I blesssed them with my special mojo. : - ) Ah . . . just kidding, well hey, a little faith can't hurt, right?

Email me if you are interested. They are $6.00 per deck.

This deck of cards has been designed to promote my upcoming History Channel show, "No Jail Can Hold Me."

Fedex and the magic of Inattentional Blindness

As a former columnist for The Magic Circular, the house organ of the prestigious Magic Circle in London, England, I wrote a bi-monthly column for five years titled "Escape Velocity." This column talked about my adventures as a full time professional escape artist and related some of the unusual experiences and challenges I have faced over the years. In some articles, I imparted knowledge about picking locks and crafting an escape act, others were strictly about my tales in the performing arena. If you're interested you can download some of these articles by going to: thomassolomon.com/fans and clicking on the Escape Velocity link.

In one of these articles, I talked about the phenomenon of "Inattentional Blindness", the notion that often times, though we may be looking at something, we do not see it. I related an experience in Chicago in which one night, performing my handcuff escape act, I inadvertently and unknowingly tapped into the Inattentional Blindness of the audience, which brought my act to a successful conclusion. This was not planned. I had no idea this even existed. Later, I reflected on what happened. I had convinced the audience I escaped all of the restraints. In reality, I escaped all but one. Again, to read further details about this escape please locate the article through the URL above.

Now . . . you might be wondering. What does any of this have to do with FEDEX? Years ago, I discovered a real-world example of Inattentional Blindness within the logo design of FEDEX. I was reminded of this the other day as I walked up Lexington Avenue in New York City. Among the lunchtime crowds and traffic gridlock were several parked FEDEX trucks. Look carefully at the logo in the photo above. Do you see the white arrow?

OK. Now look at the close-up photo to the right. Do you see it now? If you still don't see it, here's a hint. Between the red capital "E" and the small "x" is a geometrically correct right pointing arrow. It is formed by the precision joining of both the "E" and the "X". The beauty of this is that once you see it, you'll always see it. Now, go back to the photo at the top of this posting with the FEDEX truck in the distance. Easy to see now isn't it? Cool . . . right?

This is "Inattentional Blindness in the real world. Sobering to think of the many other things that are there, under our noses, just waiting to be "seen."

Zen . . . and the art of playing dead.

My last post talked exclusively about my Off-Broadway show, "Theatre of the Macabre" which played for three years in New York City. While I don't plan to talk anymore about this show, the thought occurred to me that you might want to know about one of the more unusual publicity stunts I did to generate buzz for this show. I make reference in the title to Zen . . . as I think that what I did, had a certain amount of Zen to it.

First, a little history. My co-writer Robin Reseen had an interesting publicity idea for Theatre of the Macabre. He wanted to have a dead women lying in a bathtub filled with blood in the lobby of the theatre (as a reference to one of our characters). We looked at different old bathtubs with which we could purchase cheaply. I looked at how much 'blood' would be needed and how long it could last. We toyed with the idea of hiring an actress or placing a fake body in the tub. Eventually the mechanics of having a tub full of 'blood' in the lobby of a theatre became a logistical nightmare. Robin and I talked about other publicity ideas which included outdoor underwater handcuff escapes. One night in Robin's apartment, we were throwing back and forth silly ideas when we came upon the 'corpse' stunt. It went like this: We would have a corpse on the street with a knife piercing a flyer for the show through the corpse's back. At first, it seemed ridiculous, but the more we talked about it, the better it seemed. Robin thought we should hire an actor to be the 'corpse' and we ran several ads but nobody we found, when they were told what they were to do, had the necessary courage. And so, we put the idea on hold.

A month later "Theatre of the Macabre" opened at the 13th Street Theatre on 6th Avenue in Manhattan. I spent an inordinate amount of time handing out flyers (see left) to the show and would stand on street corners in the East and West Village for hours several days of the week trying to drum up interest in the show. One time, I even worked the line at TKTS handing out my flyers to that evening's performance. We gave out half-price tickets, free tickets, I had posters stuck with wheat paste placed on poster boards throughout the city and I ran display ads in the Village Voice--all to get people to come to the show. Still, handing out flyers as I did night after night was exhausting. As any New Yorker knows, it is extremely difficult to hand out anything paper on the street. People are inundated with requests and most are savvy enough not to take them or if they do take them they usually end up as litter a block away. You must be very clever to reach a jaded New Yorker, with the old rule being that if you want someone to take your notice, your coupon, your announcement, your half-off ticket . . . you better include something to eat with it.

Anyways, we had a difficult time handing out flyers so Robin and I decided to make our 'corpse' stunt a reality. Since we could not find any actors with enough courage to undertake this, I decided to do it. The time frame from when Robin and I first talked about the corpse until its final execution (pun intended) was about two months. Here's how it would appear: You and your friends would be walking down a busy street in New York City on a Friday or Saturday night or Sunday afternoon. This could be West Fourth Street, Broadway, Houston or Astor Place. Suddenly, usually at a corner you would come upon a body on the sidewalk with a sword in its back. After your initial shock, one of three people would quickly hand you a flyer to the show and you took it, because you were curious.

This stunt got our flyers into the hands of thousands of people who in a different scenario would not have taken them. It worked better than anything we did to shock the jaded New Yorker with the end result being that every show was either sold-out or close to it. Below is a picture of me lying on the very busy corner of Houston and Broadway on a Friday night in the SoHo District of Manhattan.


The 'look' and mechanics were carefully crafted. I wore black pants, comfortable black boots and a blue, sometimes red sweatshirt. The back of the sweatshirt had a small hole cut in the center. Under the sweatshirt, strapped with Velcro to my body was a large iron plate. Welded to the plate was a half cut sword sticking upward perpendicular to the plate. The handle came off of the blade so that once the plate was strapped to my chest and the blade was fed through the hole in my sweatshirt, the handle could be placed on. I also carried a very small pillow that my girlfriend at the time had made for me. It was about three inches by three inches and was packed tightly with foam. I would place this under my head on the street and it would be concealed in my long hair which fell around the sides of it.

I had three people watching over me. My girlfriend, Francesca, her friend, Craig and our stage manager, John Graffeo. You are very vulnerable when you lay on the street and I depended wholeheartedly on these three individuals to prevent people from stepping on me, shining light into my eyes, pulling my hair, kicking me, trying to grab the sword, etc., etc. In fact, if you look at the above picture closely, you will see I have curled my fingers under my hand. I did this after having them intentionally stepped on so many times before. As for Francesca, Craig and John Graffeo, I could NOT have done this without them. They were the ones who did the real work while I just laid there . . . usually for 90 minutes while the three of them 'watched my back' and gave out thousands of flyers.

To do this effectively, I entered a Zen-like mediation concentrating on only this moment in time. Since I am not that good at complete meditation, I could hear and was aware of the boisterous reactions of people on the street who encountered my 'lifeless' body. Occasionally, people got down on the ground at eye level with me to try and make me blink. My modus operandi was to blink when others were not looking at my face. When people were staring at me, I stopped blinking. With my side view of the street I saw their footsteps inches from my face. I learned to recognize the shoes of my helpers and it gave me great comfort to see those shoes near me as I knew they were watching over me. I remember one girl getting down on the pavement next to me and putting her face so close to mine, I could feel her breath. She wanted to see if I was real. I did not blink and kept my eyes wide open until she gave in and stood up.

I had people trying to step on me and grab the sword. Most of this I was unaware until told about it later. Sometimes I would hear Craig or Francesca or John arguing with people who were trying to touch me. It was quite a surreal scene and I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall of the Crate and Barrel on the corner observing. One time, as I was lying there, I heard a police siren. Francesca ran out into the street to talk to the police. Apparently they had asked her "if I was all right." She informed them that it was a publicity stunt and they laughed and let it go. This was Houston and Broadway in SoHo. Our dealings with the NYPD in Times Square however would not be so friendly.

One time, I decided to perform the 'corpse' as we later called it on Astor Place. The only person working with me this night was my stage manager, John Graffeo. I laid down on the corner at Astor Place and Lafayette and left it up to John to hand out flyers and keep people from touching me. Well, that proved extremely difficult. John had to protect every side of me and it was a daunting job. I remember a group of kids riding their skateboards very close to me trying to run over my hands. John would shoo them away and they would come back with more friends on skateboards. Some kids even showed up on bikes. Pretty soon, they started jumping over me. I could hear the wheels on the pavement and feel the wind as they moved over me. It was the longest 90 minutes of my life and was probably the same for John.

In Times Square, things were considerably different. On one 'corpse' night I was laying there when a police officer walked over and kicked me. Francesca and Craig who were working with me this night screamed at the officer. He kicked me again and then I moved. This time, the NYPD did not take kindly to the stunt. After all, tourists were there and 'what would they think of a dead body lying in the street, with a knife in its back' no less. This was the new Times Square, the amusement park Times Square. Didn't want to scare the tourists.

So, we abandoned the 'corpse' stunt for the short run we had in Times Square, but brought it back when we moved back down to SoHo and the Village. All told, over the three year run, excepting the seven months we were on 48th Street in Times Square, I performed the 'corpse' stunt more than a hundred times and due to the excellent work of Francesca, Craig and John Graffeo, I can fondly remember this difficult event enough . . . to recall it here.