If you have practiced faithfully, and I am sure you have because the work is so fascinating, you are now ready to give a real performance. I want this -- your first public appearance as a Magician -- to be so successful that it will fire you with enthusiasm and make you realize how great are the rewards of the study of Magic.

The reason that I give you this lesson at this point is that I believe you are now ready to begin to break into public work. Of course, I expect you to make only a small beginning. You may invite some friends in for an evening and entertain them with your Magic, or you may arrange with some friend to entertain a group at his home. Then if you gain a little confidence in your ability, you may offer your services to entertain your club or lodge, or the church club. The Rotary club, The Kiwanians, The Lions, and various other organizations are constantly on the lookout for entertainers, and you may use them to get started in public work.

It might be well for you to do this first entertaining without charge to give you experience. Then when you think you are worth it, you may charge for your work. I want you to be making money with your Magic as soon as you can, and I believe that before you have finished the course you will have made up several times its cost by your performances. Now for the necessary preliminaries before I discuss with you the actual presentation of your program:

Confidence and Enthusiasm

You must have confidence in yourself, first of all, to present a program properly. Review the preceding Nine Lessons. It will do you a world of good to read over again my discussions of various subjects, such as the Power of Suggestion, the Credulity of People, etc. This will do much for you in the way of giving you confidence, for an understanding of the way in which the human mind works gives you the confidence of knowing how to deal with it.

Be sure of your tricks and you need have no fear that you will fail. Remember that you are the master -- that no one else in your audience knows the secrets of your effects -- and that they cannot help but be mystified. Start with your own family or a small group of friends in your home for your first audience. Performing before those you know will give you experience and confidence, and in time you will reach the stage where you are as much at home before a thousand people as you are before one. Forget yourself and throw yourself into your performance, with enthusiasm. If you love Magic you must bring that love, in the form of enthusiasm, into your performance. You know how contagious enthusiasm is. Your audience will catch the spark and will be alive with interest because of your enthusiasm.

Confidence in yourself and enthusiasm will, of course, do much to ward off stage fright. Absolute mastery of yourself while before an audience will, however, come only with experience. Whatever you do. Beware of stage fright remedies. I remember an instance of what a Stage Fright Chaser did many years ago. I was doing a magic show in the old town hall. One of the performers on the program bought a bottle of this Stage Fright Chaser. The directions said to take it in a dose of three to five drops in a half glass of water. To be certain of its working, this man took a tea-spoonful. Needless to say, we had a sick performer on our hands. All such remedies affect the heart and you must avoid them.

Radiate Good-Will and Pleasantness

You must start "right off the bat" with a kindly feeling for every person in your audience. You know from your own experience that when you like a person and show it, that person reciprocates your friendliness. So it is with your audience. Radiate good-will and pleasantness and you will get it in return from your audience. You will ward off antagonism. From the first moment you are before your audience you must win them over.

A performer is always sensitive to antagonism toward him in his audience and it handicaps him in his work. If by your attitude you gain the friendliness of the audience, you have half the battle won. You have put your spectators in a receptive mood and consequently your effects go over big.

Dignity — No Cheapness

You must remember, however, not to overdo in your effort to please your audience. Always keep your dignity. This does not mean that you must be stiff and aloof -- that would never do; but it means that you must never lower your standards and do something that will cause people to lose respect for you. In your bearing, in your manner, and in your speech, never resort to cheapness or undue smartness in your zeal to make a hit. A little reserve along with your pleasantness will make a hundred-fold better impression with your spectators than boisterousness.

In line with this, let me say a word about your speech. Watch your English. This is tremendously important in your success. When you are among educated people, you must be very careful not to get this reaction from them, "Yes, his tricks were good, but how he did abuse the English language!" and when you are among very ignorant people, you must be correct in your speech so that they will look up to you and admire you. Remember always to speak distinctly. In Magic the trick is the thing that you want people talking about. You must raise no counter-influences to distract their attention from your experiments, as poor English will do.

Appearance

I need not tell you the importance of appearance. Our first judgment of a person is based entirely on his appearance. If you present the wrong kind of appearance the impression you convey to the audience is very detrimental to you. If you present the right kind of appearance you open the way for yourself immediately. Always be neat. Have your clothes well pressed and your shoes shined, wear a clean collar and a good tie. Have your hair cut and be clean shaven. Wear a suit that best becomes you. A business suit is ideal for the usual magical performances. At formal affairs the tuxedo or dress suit is in order but it must fit nicely so that it will not cause comment. I will discuss dress in a future lesson when we get to stage performances.

Personality and Magnetism

You must have technique in your work -- you must be a finished performer -- BUT even above this, you must have personality and magnetism. In business, in the professions, on the stage, those people triumph who triumph on the side of personality. For instance, take a performer on the stage. You know that you have seen actors who are extremely clever and make a big hit — yet their acts are very simple and perhaps what they do almost anyone else could do. The secret lies in their emphasizing their personalities. It isn't what they do, but how they do it. Your job is to sell your personality to your audience — to make people like you. Then, regardless of what you do to entertain them, they will be pleased with your efforts. So, in the beginning, play up Personal Magnetism. Then as you perfect your technique with practice and experience, success cannot fail you.

Showmanship

To become a Master of Showmanship you must be inspired with the spirit of being a Magician. Do not merely play at the part, but use the power of suggestion on yourself to make you really feel and fill the part. Dress the part -- act the part -- do everything to create personal magnetism and a favorable impression -- avoid all disturbing elements -- and study showmanship. Now, let us analyze this tremendous factor in Magic -- Showmanship. It means the ability to put romance, mystery, the element of suspense, interest, emotional feeling, and effectiveness into your performance.

The more power you have to build these elements into your work, the greater will be your rewards. Take your example from the playwright. He puts into his plays the same principle of showmanship which you must use. He creates interest in his audience, arouses their emotions, and builds up from lesser effect to greater until he reaches a climax. And you must work in the same way. The Showman makes a masterpiece of a commonplace trick. He clothes it properly, he studies his presentation, he stirs up his audience with interest and suspense, he puts reality into the part he is playing, he works the whole thing up to a climax.

In every-day life we find many, many instances of Showmanship. The salesman who understands Showmanship is the one who gets the orders. He knows just what to say and how to say it, what to do and how to do it to get the greatest effect. See how the advertising man plays up a commonplace article with his Showmanship and makes you hunger for it. See how a poor piece of farm land is turned into a subdivision. How the bands play! How the salesmen use their Showmanship! And how people rush to buy the wonderful property.

What Showmanship can do was brought home very forcibly to me at one time. A party of about twelve Magicians, myself included, went to see the play, "The Charlatan." Frederick Tiden was playing the part of Cagliostro, the magician, in it. We sat there delighted at the magic and illusions which he presented. When he produced a rosebush from a seed which he had planted in a glass flower-pot, we were completely mystified. Here truly was a great magician whom we had hitherto missed. After the show we met Tiden. The Cagliostro on the stage and the Tiden in the theater lobby were two different men. In the play he was a rather large, dignified elderly man of great poise and mastership. Before us he was smaller, thinner — Tiden, the artist. We went out for a bite to eat and, as usual, some of the boys performed tricks. Then Tiden was called on to perform.

"Why, boys, I'm no magician," he said. "I do not do tricks. You have me all wrong. I am just an actor."

"Oh. no," said we, "you are a magician. Didn't we see the wonderful magic you did tonight at the theater.

It was marvelous. You had us gasping. Where did you get the flowers from?"

He leaned back and laughed. "Do you mean to say those tricks fooled you?" he asked.

"We admit it," the boys said.

Then Tiden gave us an excellent talk. He said that as he had been chosen to play the part of the great magician, Cagliostro, he determined to make himself feel like a great magician and really act the part. He studied what he thought Cagliostro would do in the emergencies which the play brought forth. He succeeded so
remarkably in getting his effects and making the illusions seem real because of his Showmanship. He decided that things should be produced and vanished from places which an audience would least suspect. In this instance the man who appeared most innocent of helping him was the villain. So then, Tiden thought, his best helper would be the disturbing lawyer who opposed Cagliostro at almost every move, a skeptic who sought every way possible to undo the magician. In the eyes of the audience this lawyer and the magician were bitter enemies. In reality the lawyer in looking into the flower-pot to see that Cagliostro was not putting anything over on him, put the flowers in himself. And Tiden in his mastery of Showmanship put his effects over as if he were the greatest magician in the world.

Play Up Your Individuality

There is no one in all the world just exactly like you. If each of us would only realise this and capitalize on it, how successful we would be. We would give full play to our individuality instead of trying to be like other people, and we would build on our own originality. In Magic you have the opportunity to an extent which you have in no other field to use your originality and your own individuality.

Always play up yourself as your better self. Bring out the strongest and best sides of your personality and emphasize those things which makes you a little different from other people. Be Original, do not be an imitator. The imitator gets little credit for his work. He is known everywhere as the man who uses someone's else stuff, and whether he is good or not, he is known as an imitator. You know that an original painting is a hundred times more valuable than a copy. So it is in Magic.

Originality does not mean that you must build up elaborate effects. On the contrary, the great masters work in the simplest manner. What you must do is to use Showmanship with even the simplest effects to give them the stamp of your own individuality. Do not try to imitate the feature effects of your brother magicians. You will only bungle them and make yourself ridiculous. They have years of study and experience back of their effects and you cannot hope in such a short time to compete with them. Each of the masters has his original effects which suit his individuality.

These effects, however, may not suit your individuality. So because LeRoy vanishes from a box high in the air and suddenly appears with a hat and overcoat on and burning cigarette in his mouth on the piano in the orchestra, this does not mean that you should try to do this. Because Houdini gets out of seventeen pairs of handcuffs is not a reason for your trying to imitate him. Thurston, Blackstone, Laurant, Downs, Manual — all do their feature performances in their own inimitable way. A real master does not attempt to imitate the other. He realizes that his success lies in his own individuality and originality, not in those of another man.

So perfect yourself in those things which are best adapted to you and let those who will, try to imitate. They will never get very far, while you will be building a reputation for originality. In the beginning perform each effect exactly as I teach it to you in the course. Then as you master more and more of the principles and gain experience, you can change and add to these effects and originate new ones.