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Wednesday, February 18, 2009

WITH PERMISSION FROM TONY I RESUBMIT THIS ARTICLE "MONKEY SEE MONKEY DO"

This article was submitted by Tony Borders, first three lines are mine.
IF YOU WORK WITH CHILDREN AND ONE OF YOUR TOPICS IS ANTI SMOKING YOU MIGHT WANT TO READ THIS THANK YOU FOR THIS WONDERFUL ENTRY TONY

I have been enjoying doing a "Monkey See, Monkey Do" routine with fake cigarettes for anti-tobacco school shows. I have a magic hat or sand bucket sitting on my vent stand then carry out the monkey with his hand around my neck. (A second stand would be even better.) I am palming one cigarette as I talk about trainers who used to teach a monkey to smoke before they knew the dangers of tobacco. I talk about the saying, "Monkey see, monkey do" then as I put the fake cigarette in my mouth and take it back out the monkey leans over and uses his mouth to take it out of my hand. The palming of the second cigarette is done by putting the filtered tip (fake cigarette) against the middle finger with the opposite end stuck in the palm. As you reach for the cigarette in the monkey's mouth you slip the end of the second one in. The monkey squeals and resists (you don't even have to be a vent!) but you take it away for health reasons and pretend to dump it into the magic hat or sand bucket, but secretly palm the new cigarette. The one you had palmed before is now in the monkey's mouth! This can be done repeatedly, thus talking about chain smoking, nicotine, addiction, etc. while the monkey keeps making cigarettes appear!

SECOND TRICK: After that I put the monkey away and bring out a trick by JAM Magic called the NO Camera. It works great and has a wonderful anti-drug routine already written (By Ron Connely I believe). But the picture you take of a student volunteer ends up being the picture of a monkey. Thus, you say, "My hairy friend must have been playing around with the camera!" The flow of the routine is great and kids really enjoy the monkey!
Tony Borders

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