Smart Ass

THE BLURB:
You place a jumbo card face down on a chair without
revealing it's identity.

A participant is invited to sit down on the mystery card and
is shown a deck of shuffled playing cards. You explain that
they will use their subconscious to deduce the identity of
the jumbo card they are sitting on. The spectator cuts the
deck into two piles and places them in either hand. They are
asked to toss one half away and keep the other. After they
do this they cut the remaining cards into two piles, holding
one in each hand and they once again toss one pile away and
keep the other. Down to the last few cards, the participant
chooses one card, having the opportunity to change their
mind several times. They make a final selection. With their
final choice in hand the spectator stands and picks up the
jumbo card, to find it matches their selection EXACTLY!

SMART ASS Considerations:

Perform SMART ASS close-up and surrounded.
Perform SMART ASS for large audiences.
SMART ASS packs small and plays big.
SMART ASS happens in their hands.
SMART ASS takes seconds to reset.
Perform SMART ASS naked (if you need to).
SMART ASS can be suitable for all ages.
SMART ASS uses no equivoque or magician’s choice.
SMART ASS uses no switch of the jumbo card, deck or final
selection.
SMART ASS uses any borrowed chair.
SMART ASS Package Includes:

Deck of specially constructed Bicycle brand playing cards.
Jumbo Card for final revelation.
A DVD that features...
Performance of the routine.
In-depth instruction of the routine and method.
Professional scripts in PDF format that can be accessed by
any PC or Mac.

MY COMMENTS:
The Card In Seat effect is one of my favorite stage card
effects because it plays big, has great participant
interaction, and provides some great humor. However, it's a
magic effect. So is this, mind you, but it certainly can be
done as a mental effect because the card does not magically
vanish and appear underneath someone's seat. The performer
openly puts it there at the beginning. You can do this
seriously as you cause the participant to choose their own
card, or you can do it comedically as a
"you-be-the-performer" effect as Card-In-Seat effects
usually are.

Here's what I saw in this effect that I like: It plays big
(and the sight of having someone throw cards up in the air
to eliminate them is very visual), it packs small, and can
be done surrounded. After the routines ends, it's pretty
much just a matter of picking up the cards to re-set.

The one thought that occured to me while I watched the DVD
instructions was whether I could do this without the
supplied gimmicked deck. You could, but it wouldn't be as
clean. With this deck, you can show all the cards to be
different. When the cards are thrown up in the air (one of
the key advantages to this version), the cards can be seen
to be different.

The only drawback is that Bill Abbott is choosing to keep
secret the construction of the deck. In throwing the deck
around, there is no danger of the gimmicked deck being
discovered, but there is very real concern of the cards
wearing out pretty quickly and the deck will have to be
replaced with continued use. It would be nice to know how
to easily construct a new deck.

Along with the gimmicked deck and jumbo card, there is an
instructional DVD which contains a performance, plus some
PDF files of different presentations to get your creativity
flowing on how to use this. If you're looking for something
fun to add to your repertoire, and you don't mind using
cards, I recommend looking into this.