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Community Corner

The Tricks Behind Mindreading

David Levitan, a magician and mindreader, discusses how he performs some of his tricks like the ones at Temple Tikvah.

As the lights were dimmed at last Saturday, you could feel the sense of apprehension as crowds gathered to see whether or not David Levitan, world-renowned mentalist, would really live up to the hype surrounding him.

Levitan as a specialty act under Trademark Special Events travels not only throughout the United States, but also Canada and Europe as well, to perform magical acts and to predict or foretell what audiences are thinking.

"A mentalist specializes in reading people's thoughts through their eyes," Levitan said. Easing over skeptical audiences with a few smoothly sarcastic quips, the red-haired comedian/magician took the stage and immediately went into his performance. 

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Entertaining the crowd of 100 or so people on a late Saturday evening, Levitan used a bit of magic to warm over the crowd but then went directly into the feature of the night  - mindreading.

“In your mind, the first picture you’re drawing – try to draw the picture in the air,” Levitan started. Asking the participant to pick up his drawing, the participant was asked to share it with the audience. Holding up his picture, Levitan then took his clipboard and holding up a picture, audiences were marveled by the fact that the image was the same. Erupting into applause, audiences were shocked to see that Levitan really did predict the same mental image the audience member drew.

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In other marvelous events, Levitan predicted a number of mental feats for the crowd. In the dimly lit room, he predicted one man’s random numerical codes; in a past performance, Levitan after asking a woman to stand and asked if she would soon be undergoing a significantly life changing event. A little startled, she muttered, “yes.” Continuing forward, left her speechless as he said, “does this have to do with moving? Are you moving?” After a brief pause, when the woman came out of her shocked state, she screamed, “Yes! Yes I am,” to the crowd.

So how does he do it?

“I mean, I’ve spent a lot of time studying this, mind to mind communication,” Levitan said in a statement. “The thought just comes to me. Some people may call it a vision…but I don’t know what I’d call it. I like to get the entire audience involved and really make it a personal event. I don’t want to personally engage with 10 or so people, and have the other 90 sitting there bored. So, I try to make sure that everyone is entertained and that everyone is having fun,” he said. 

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