Sample OffColor Trick

Okeedokee... So you want a sample. This is one of the effects in the Redneck Book of Mentalism (obviously themed around all the stereotypes of hicks, farmers, West Virginians, and top Vegas magicians... you choose which.) Enjoy. (or don't.)

Tele-chicken-esis

"So fair a fowl I have not seen..." or something like that. The brainy bastard offers a demonstration of telekinesis--moving objects with the mind alone. In this case, a brainless, useless object is introduced: the common chicken. The entertainer suggests that using just the evil glare of his mind's eye, he can cause the chicken to move suddenly and immediately upon his mental command, without ever coming near the bird.

Having said this, the performer places the living poultry on a small table about three feet high at the center of the stage. After a few moments of demonstrating that the chicken is afraid of heights and thereby content to stay atop the table, the performer throws a brief glance to the audience, indicating that he is ready. He slowly raises his hands to his temples and, in one grotesque grimace of concentration, causes the chicken to jump squawking from the table and onto the floor. The chicken and the table are both available for examination, thus negating any suspicions of fowl play.

At last, a practical use for those horrendous joke-shock chairs. The chicken is ungaffed, and there is no invisible chicken wire or hidden axes used to scare the chicken off the table. Instead, the table is constructed in similar fashion to the electric-shock-emitting joke stools put out by Jim Karol and ripped off by many others, I'm sure. (No idea who first invented these. Nor do we particularly care, in this case.)

Due to the fact that this is based on a marketed item, though, we'll merely say that the gimmick can be somehow made from the remote and electrical workings of an automatic garage door opener. With this method, you simply need to place the chicken atop the table, triggering the remote when you feel like inflicting pain on the chicken. Purchase the gimmick, or resort to plan B.

Plan B. If you are too poor (as we and the rest of your audience are), or if you choose to be strip-searched for such remotes before this effect, you can construct your own table that will accomplish a very similar effect. Build your table with an entirely metal top (stainless steel for easy cleaning,) and have in contact with the heating coils of a hidden toaster within.

The toaster is triggered upon putting the chicken on the table, and will take several seconds to heat the metal table top to the scalding 250º that will send the chicken clucking angrily in pain.

There is more acting involved in this method, and has the drawback that you may not be able to use the same chicken twice in one night due to festering 3rd degree burns on its feet. In addition, there is also the conspicuous electrical cord from the toaster that would ordinarily signal chicanery of some kind, but considering the audience for which you are performing, I wouldn't be too terribly concerned.