Paul Gertner Returns to Penn & Teller: Fool Us Season 4 // Cups and Steel Balls

[Music] and in teller just got fooled will they get fooled again let's meet our next act and find out these cards become I'm so excited to be back did I pan and this last time from the show the experience was very nerve-wracking I mean it was tense it says partner you fool unfortunately the trick did not fail but this time it's gonna take a little more than that one of the techniques I use to come up with solutions is what I call dream storming it's the plant and the problem in your head as you go to sleep and your subconscious works on it it's basically dreaming up solutions [Music] when you wake up ideas come up that you didn't have before dreams Normie historian next magician foolish virgins let me introduce you to Paul Gartner [Applause] well Penn & Teller is a pleasure to be back again on fullest and I'm very excited to be here this year because I get to bring my favorite magic illusion the cups and balls now I know you're very familiar with this trick because you perform it but for those in the audience that are not let me explain it's based on an old gambling scam known as the three shell game now part of the game is that the ball is soft it's made of sponge and the cup is solid it's made of brass metal so whenever that ball is under the cup you can't see it and when the magician mixes them around you can't hear it and at any given time the magician can make that ball disappear now of course well Penn & Teller already know the secret to this trick the secret to this trick is you use an extra ball and you always hide the extra ball underneath the cup on your right so I'm going to perform the trick but I'm going to do it a little differently because I grew up in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania and in Pittsburgh we manufacture steel and when I was a kid I was looking for a ball to do the trick with I found one in my dad's toolbox it was a steel ball bearing you see my dad was a steel worker in Pittsburgh in fact my favorite childhood memory that is the day he and I shared a drink after work together it happened in our kitchen I was practicing this trick all day long and dad came home from work hot tired and thirsty and I said dad would you watch my new trick and he says oh ok ok but first I need a drink and he went to the refrigerator and he poured himself a cold beer and then he set a glass in front of me and he poured me a coke and once dad and I had our refreshments well I got a chance to show him this trick but I was a kid I didn't know you were supposed to do the trip with a little sponge ball and I put dad's steel ball under the cup and I fixed him around and I said dad where's the ball of course he knew immediately and pretty soon I figured it out that you can't fool anyone with a steel ball and a metal cup because of the element of sound unless unless you could cause the sound and the ball to disappear and travel over here inside your pocket now that's what it looked like the first time I'll do that again this time Alison I'll let you take a guess if you watch the ball take a guess which cup do you think I just slipped that ball under which one well no look I'll explain Alice and remember you always hide the extra ball underneath the coupling on your right but of course Allison in my book no matter what you choose you're a winner you're a winner three cups three balls [Music] now if you watch the ball right here whenever I give it a little push okay it will actually penetrate right through the top balanced on the edge I'll do that again this type of ball will go right through the top of not one but actually two cups like this balanced on the edge but I want everyone to know exactly where the balls are so whenever I place a ball under a cup I'll give it a little shake and you'll hear it under the couple King here we go ball number one under cup number one ball number two under cup number two and ball number three under cup number three and if I take two of them invisibly and I set them on the middle and I give them a little tap you see now these two are empty because they've all come together in the center thank you but you know it is the end of the trip and when I do this at tradeshow exhibits this is the part that gathers the biggest crowds so watch closely you see I actually take the ball out from under the cup and I say to somebody watch I'll remove one ball from the game like this and then I put it in my pocket and then I say look if I if I remove another ball from the cop pen how many would that leave underneath the center cup one just one I think yeah just one but if there's one there you see there's another over there and I'll show you how the trick is done you see I never really put the ball in the hand I never put it in the pocket but while everyone's watching the pocket I actually can slip the ball under the cup and it looks like it was there all the while but if I really get rid of it Allison this time take one last guess how many balls do you think are underneath the center cup one two or three for you for you Alison I did all three but you know you can't do this trick with just three balls you need an extra an Alison where did I say we always hide the extra ball exactly exactly underneath the cup on the right over there they're both pretty big and they're both solid and pretty heavy but underneath the center cup is the biggest one of all because there is no that's not that's the biggest one but I can't figure out where it comes from thank you [Applause] [Music] [Applause] and Tyler I said I told you this trick was inspired by my dad which is why I can't help but think of him every time I do which is why in this Cup I always keep dad's balls and in this Cup in honor of dad I always keep a can of coke remember you always hide the extra ball underneath the cup upon your right [Music] so dad wherever you are here's to you [Applause] just things like okay I fooled and then tell her I'm done but like so you just have to try to try it twice well I bet well this was my favorite trick and and and I it's just a treat to come and just do the cups and balls for them and I just couldn't do just the cups and balls I had to throw a little kicker in so yeah you seem to specialize in kickers yeah well I think I'm all magic should have that I mean that's what Magic's all about is about having that little moment at the end where someone thinks the end is there and then all of a sudden boom get him one more time Wow okay time to see if they got it pen teller what do you think we first heard about you Paul doing the the cups and balls and it's not fair to say that you're just doing the cups and balls cuz for hundreds of years maybe thousands people have done the cups and balls and it's always been a visual trick and your genius is making it also an audio trick and that is something that from the first moment I saw you do it absolutely blew my mind having that sound to do at the same time but what people don't know who don't know how the trick is done don't know is that you found special slights and special handlings just to deal with the sound because you were to write a book on this which I imagine you will some days it's so brilliant you will have to have a whole separate thing on how you make the sounds come from a different place than they actually are and absolutely be beautiful like that also in magic you know that certain things are just compressible we all know sponge balls compressibility indeed almost everything else used and every magic act is compressible we all know how to make all sorts of things look solid that are actually compressible you cannot do that with ball bearings and some people would say when they know how the trick is done that that makes the that makes the glass happen half-empty but I think we know how trick is done and makes the glass half-full you know that they know what we're talking about how you did it I think so I think they yeah we're talking okay listen right it's now a tie you get us last time we get you this time season five kick our asses [Applause] so we can give you time to think and blink more fullest when we return [Applause] you

Channel: Paul Gertner

Views: 1,561,423

Rating: 4.9267755 out of 5

Keywords: Trick, magic, Penn & Teller, Fool Us, Penn and Teller, Penn and Teller Fool Us, Paul Gertner, Gertner, magician, cups and balls, cups & balls, steel balls, Paul Gertner returns, Unshuffled, Faro Shuffle

Id: gx3spZi1FjM

Length: 10min 28sec (628 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 14 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/PaulGertner]

Thanks for sharing!

[u/MrMiyamoto]

Honestly this trick choked me up throughout. Paul is definitely one of the great magicians of our time and every single move was just so beautiful. With Penn and Teller just handing out "fools" left and right this season to tricks that obviously didn't deserve them, I was a little sad that they didn't give him an "FU" trophy for this simply stunning performance.

[u/Symphonydude]

I kind of teared up at this one! I when all of the red balls come out at the end. Beautiful!