Derren Brown Quotes

Then again, what are liars if not great magicians?

When a magician lets you notice something on your own, his lie becomes impenetrable.

Drama is easy to fool people with, but you can't trick people into laughing.

If you do sleight of hand without trying to cheat someone, that's what magic is.

In my business, my job is to make people believe they are seeing something they're not seeing.

Magic has both feet planted in cheap vaudeville and childish posturing; in dishonesty and therefore not in art.

People want to be entertained. They don't want to be cheated.

Magicians are the most honest people in the world; they tell you they're gonna fool you, and then they do it.

You are always cheating for the audience.

I hate giving away tricks, you have to create an impression and not an image. You want audiences to look at certain places and not look at other places. And when you've got the help of modern-day abilities with technology, it's a much more natural look.

I'm fascinated by the similarities and differences between comedians and magicians.

For me, the most exciting thing is to create good magic that's entertaining for an audience, and it would be lovely if a magician was fooled as well.

The world loves to be deceived.

The whole world is run on bluff.

I realised how much misdirection is in stunt co-coordinating. It's similar to magic, the tricks we use to make people think the stunt is real. I also have a lifelong fascination with gambling cheats. I'm not one, but I do have a fascination with it.

In circuses, there is a lot of magic. Things become other things.

I don't think you can say something is or isn't magic. That's what was cool about Houdini, because he was a magician who had a magic show, but he was also an escape artist, and they kind of, over time, blended together. They both kind of enhance each other, I think.

When we go to play, you flip around and flash around and everything, and then they're not gonna see nothin' but what their eyes see. Forget about their ears.

Great liars are also great magicians.

I'm a con artist in that I'm an actor. I make people believe something is real when they know perfectly well it isn't.

The magician and the politician have much in common: they both have to draw our attention away from what they are really doing.

The problem with stage magic is that it looks really good, but everyone knows there's a trick box.

Magic's an art where you use slight of hand or illusion to create wonder. And I was just intrigued with that idea.

The real secret of magic lies in the performance.

To obfuscate the reconstruction of the effect - when a magician is fooled by another magician doing magic. In my career that's not been the major passion, but it's been the passion of a number of my mentors. The crowning achievement for them would be to create magic good enough to fool other magicians.