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Telemental
- (Click the name of the product to visit the product page)
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Another “mental mousetrap” from
the fertile mind of Ray Piatt! ESP cards are used and openly
displayed, studying them one at a time. A spectator commits one
of the cards to memory. The cards are well mixed and held up
with the backs showing to the spectator, one at a time. She is
to concentrate on the symbol of her choice. As the cards are
shown (backs to her), she is to say stop at anytime. When she
does say stop, BOOM, it is exactly the one symbol that she has
been concentrating on! Yes sir...that’s right! This is an
excellent effect to perform from the stage with the spectator in
the audience. Telemental is a different stage effect that will
play well in the middle of your program!
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$87.50
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SM:
So you don’t have a list of products?
Ray:
What we used to do if somebody would call is send them a bunch of
brochures and things like that. We’d send them out for free. Now if
somebody calls, I tell them what I’m working on and I’ll explain it
and they’ll say, wow, I gotta have that and they’ll order a few.
They’ll send me a cashier’s check.
SM:
What are you working on?
Ray:
I was a member of the PEA for twenty years. We have a good
clientele with the PEA members. There are about two hundred and fifty of
them. A lot of them we met in person. The word is if you put out good
stuff, the guys are pretty fussy about what they get.
SM:
Describe the kind of wallet you make.
Ray:
If we make anything. If it’s made of leather, and the spectator
has to be able to handle it as if it was their own.
There can’t be a window here and a secret pocket here and a
zipper there… It has to look like you bought it in a leather
accessory store. “Trick wallets” for tricks are exactly that.
I wouldn’t give you a nickel for a Himber wallet, regardless of
what you can do with it.
SM:
I have one that I bought from Paul Diamond years ago. I only use
it for gags, changing one thing for another.
Ray:
It’s a magician’s wallet. Richard Himber didn’t invent it
anyway. It was invented in Spain over a hundred years ago. The first one
was made out of a certain kind of paper they had over there.
SM:
I’d really like to become more familiar with your products.
I’m wondering how you would suggest I do that.
Ray:
Well, I could send you whatever we’re running. You could look
through Joe’s catalog or access his website.
If you do a search for, “Piatt” several items will come up
there. Some of the stuff we
might still make and some we might have in stock. We run out of a
certain item and they say they need two-dozen, well; we do a run of that
item but nothing less then a couple dozen.
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Centurian
(The Magpad) (Large)
- (Click the name of the product to visit the product page)
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From Ray & Lisa Piatt. The
performer hands an ordinary yellow pad to a spectator and asks
her to write a number, the name of a fruit, a pet’s name,
color, etc. and then pass it to someone else to do likewise. All
this is done while the performer turns his back. After several
people have written on the pad, the performer takes it, studies
the list and asks one spectator to concentrate on her written
item. The performer concentrates too and then places a checkmark
next to one of the items. As soon as the spectator calls out her
item, the performer immediately turns the pad to the audience
showing where he check marked the exact same item! This is
repeated until only one-item remains. He circles it, tears off
the sheet and hands it to the last spectator as a souvenir. This
is so effective; it appears to be the “real thing” in pure
psychic entertainment! Large is 8.5 x 11.75-inches. “Joe, this
is the best mental “mouse trap” that Lisa and I have ever
produced for the mentalist’s world.” --Ray Piatt “I told
Ray that his “Magpad” might become, not only a real classic,
but one of the best psychic items of this century. That’s why
we changed its name to ‘Centurian!’” --Joe Stevens
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$135.00
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SM:
So Ray Piatt products are hard to get? Once you’ve got them
hang on to them because they might not make any more?
Ray:
What’s this online thing? I forget what they call it--Ebay. Now
I’ve never been to Ebay. I don’t know how to get to Ebay, but a guy
will Email me and say I saw an item of mine on Ebay and by the time he
got to it, it was already sold. Some guys are really hanging on to my
products.
SM:
I guess some of your things are really collectible. Some guy’s
buy every coin trick and book whether they do magic or not. They just
love to own things. They buy everything that comes out.
Ray:
There was a thing we produced in the late seventies called TFM, Transfermental,
a fantastic piece; the late Jack London used it. Al Mann was supposed to
show it on Johnny Carson when he moved to California. He went out there
with Billy Dunninger, Joe Dunninger’s widow. They were going to do a
show-- nothing but magic. But Johnny wasn’t there and there was
another guy—Gabe Kaplan, who did a show called Welcome Back Kotter…
Gabe Kaplan didn’t want the magic and Al never did the show. So
my piece never got on Carson. I told everybody to watch it.
SM:
What’s the basic effect?
Ray:
I came out with the very first one. It was called Transfemental.
It was a clipboard. It was for stealing information. It was like
nothing that had been done before. I could loan you one. You could get
information right underneath their nose. Jack London got a hold of it
and he did a hypnosis routine called Wide Awake Hypnosis.
Bascom Jones did a routine with it called Mind
Reading In Motion. I
understand that Kreskin did it on Larry King. It was called Add A
Number.
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Piatt
Envelope
- (Click the name of the product to visit the product page)
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This is one of the most devious and
ordinary-looking props a magician and mentalist can use. These
are standard-looking coin and invitation envelops. Just open the
flap and dump out the correct prediction. No fumbling. No extra
handling. Use for multiple outs, to switch a card or message.
Complete with two specially manufactured and assembled envelopes
plus photo-illustrated instructions.
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$18.50
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SM:
That’s something I think our readers would like to know--if
Kreskin ever used any thing of yours.
Ray:
That one, yes. All I know is what I hear. I’ve never seen one
of his shows. I used to tape him when he was on a lot of these different
talk shows. He would get away with murder. But I never saw him do
anything that I didn’t know what he was doing.
SM:
One thing I saw Kreskin do on Carson was a card stab under a
newspaper. He saw the card and then went to a person holding another
deck. The reversed card in the deck matched the stabbed card. What was
interesting was the marked deck was the clock type and the markings were
so big you could see them from across the room on TV.
You could see it from a mile away.
Ray:
My own personal library I sold twenty years ago. The guy who
bought it was a PEA member.
SM:
What does PEA stand for?
Ray:
Psychic Entertainers Association.
I got so involved with them that they thought I was a member, but
I wasn’t. They made me an honorary member and I stayed with them for
about twenty years. They bypassed their strict intros and simply made me
a member.
SM:
Well, I’ve kept you for longer than I think you wanted and
you’ve been more than generous with your time…
Ray:
Well, you got me going. Same way with the keyboard, I type
forever and I talk forever. Not all my products are hard-core mentalism.
I do some fun items too. Certain kind of people you can’t do the hard
mentalism. We have a bar downstairs and I do some entertaining. I’ll
bring something out and Lisa will say, “oh not that again!”
SM:
That’s the problem with wives—they’ve seen everything five
times.
Ray:
Yeah, that’s how it is.
SM:
I’m interested to know who’s using your effects.
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