Brad Christian responds to quote in Page Six story
October 8, 2008
Brad Christian, President and founder of Ellusionist.com, is featured in a newly-released podcast from Magic Newswire.
He speaks for 30 minutes about a recent misquote in a Page Six Magazine story, gives personal thoughts on David Blaine and the recent special, “David Blaine: Dive of Death”, and speaks about the beginnings of Ellusionist and magic on the Internet.
The podcast is featured here:
Earlier this week, Page Six published the report about David Blaine and his feelings about the flubbed ending. Reporter Rachel Syme talked to Blaine, some fans and members of the magic community and wrote a story that Jonathan Bayme, CEO of Theory 11, told iTricks “was not a fair assessment at all.”
Christian was quoted in the story as saying Blaine was considered “a bit of a joke” among certain groups of magicians. His quote was used to suggest the magic industry feels betrayed by Blaine and his attention to stunts instead of magic. However, he told Justin Robert Young, of iTricks, earlier this week that he was taken completely out of context.
Today, Christian spoke at length with Magic Newswire about the story behind the story of the story. He also talks about the history of Ellusionist and more about David Blaine’s career.
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3 Responses to “Brad Christian responds to quote in Page Six story”
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This is an all too common problem with newspapers.
Take the reporter out of it, let’s say she quoted Brad correct. That leaves the line editor and the copy desk both of whom have the job of making a story as “tight” as possible. That means shaping a narrative. That means Brad’s context is MUCH less valuable and after all he DID say the words…
The problem is that newspapers don’t have a back and forth with their community so they don’t fear making a guy look like an idiot as long as they are “technically” right.
The print journalism trade only has car dealership ads between them and insolvency. Anyone up for figuring out how to sell those ads online?
I totally agree with Brad. The magic that Blaine did on the street is pretty common; anyone can do it with some practice and the right source from which to get the tricks. I also agree that Blaine really ditched the valuable close-up magic that made him who he was, and instead went into Criss Angel/bigtime stage magician territory with all the stunts. Those stunts really just don’t fit his persona. About the million-dollar special: I think that time and chance played in Blaine’s favor. Basically, he hit the media at the right time by coincidence, and BOOM!, he got a million bucks and national fame. All in all, Blaine is very talented, but he should stick with the amazing street tricks, and not try to go out on a limb with all the fancy stunts.
Whether anybody likes it or not, Im going to speak my mind. I think Brad Christian told the papers exactly what the papers said, and now that its out, and he looks like the bad guy, hes trying to cover it up. Lets be honest people, the stunt WAS a joke. It was horrid. David Blaines showmanship is terrible. Now maybe if more people were honest and didnt gasp when they heard this article, and instead said to themselves yeah it was pretty bad, then Im pretty sure that Brad Christian would be like “Oh yeah I was right” instead of apologizing. And Im pretty sure that this is going to be taken off because Brad Christian and Ellusionist are too afraid of REAL peoples actual OPINIONS. Thats just my 2 cents.