Penn & Teller

From MagicHistorian

Penn & Teller are a two-man magic and comedy team, comprised of Penn Jillette and Teller. Penn is a raconteur; Teller (generally) does not speak while performing. The duo specializes in gory tricks, fake exposures and clever pranks, and have become associated with Las Vegas, atheism, skepticism and libertarianism. They call themselves “a couple of eccentric guys who have learned how to do a few cool things.” [1] Contents [hide]

   * 1 Career
   * 2 Tricks
   * 3 Television projects
   * 4 Movies
   * 5 Books
   * 6 Awards and recognitions
   * 7 External links

[edit]

Career

By 1985, Penn & Teller were receiving rave reviews for their Off Broadway show and Emmy award-winning PBS special, Penn & Teller Go Public. In 1987, they began the first of two successful Broadway runs. Through the late 1980s and early 1990s, the pair made numerous television appearances on Late Night with David Letterman and Saturday Night Live, as well as The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, The Today Show, and many others.

Penn & Teller had national tours throughout the 1990s, gaining critical praise. They have also made television guest appearances on Babylon 5 [2] (as a comedy team Rebo and Zooty), The Drew Carey Show, Hollywood Squares, The Bernie Mac Show, Fear Factor, Home Improvement, and The Simpsons. They also appeared as scam artists in the music video for "It's Tricky" by Run-DMC in 1987.

Their cable television show Bullshit! takes a skeptical look at psychics, religion, the pseudoscientific, and paranormal frauds. It has also featured segments on astrology, Feng Shui, environmental issues, PETA, weight loss and the war on drugs. Some have praised the show for its libertarian atheist perspective. Others have criticized it for the same reason, and alleged that it sometimes employs the same brand of fallacious reasoning which the show ostensibly opposes.

The pair has written several books about magic, including Penn & Teller's Cruel Tricks For Dear Friends, Penn & Teller's How to Play with Your Food, and Penn & Teller's How to Play in Traffic.

Since 2001, Penn & Teller perform 6 nights a week in Las Vegas at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino. (Before that, they toured from time to time.) [edit]

Tricks

Their tricks include Teller hanging upside-down over a bed of spikes in a straitjacket, Teller drowning in a huge container of water, Teller being run over by an 18-wheel tractor-trailer, Teller swinging over bear-traps on a trapeze, and knives going through Penn's hands. Many of their effects rely heavily on shock appeal and violence, although presented in a humorous manner. Often, the pair will claim to reveal a secret of how a magic trick is done, but those tricks are usually invented by the duo for the sole reason of exposing them, and therefore designed with more spectacular and weird methods than would have been necessary, had it just been a "proper" magic trick. Penn and Teller perform their own adaptation of the famous bullet catch illusion. Both simultaneously fire a gun at the other and then catch the respective bullets in their mouths.

In one of their more thoughtful and politically charged tricks, they make a U.S. flag seem to disappear by wrapping it in a copy of the United States Bill of Rights, and apparently setting the flag on fire, so that "the flag is gone but the Bill of Rights remains." They normally end the routine by restoring the unscathed flag to its starting place on the flagpole; however, on a TV guest appearance on The West Wing [3] , this final part was omitted for dramatic reasons. [edit]

Television projects

   * Penn & Teller Go Public for PBS (1985)
   * Penn & Teller's Sin City Spectacular for FX (1998)
   * Penn & Teller’s Home Invasion
   * Behind The scenes for PBS (1992)
   * Don’t Try This at Home for NBC (1990)
   * The Unpleasant World of Penn & Teller series for Channel 4 (1994)
   * Phobophilia for Channel 4 (1995)
   * Magic and Mystery Tour
   * Bullshit! (2003 - )
   * Penn & Teller Off The Deep End for NBC (2005)

[edit]

Movies

   * My Chauffeur
   * Penn & Teller’s Invisible Thread for Showtime (1987)
   * Penn & Teller's Cruel Tricks for Dear Friends (1987)
   * Penn & Teller Get Killed (1989)
   * Car 54, Where Are You?
   * The Aristocrats (2005), a documentary film written and co-directed by Penn
   * Penn & Teller: Off the Deep End (2005)

[edit]

Books

   * Penn & Teller's Cruel Tricks for Dear Friends (1989, ISBN 0394753518)
   * Penn & Teller's How to Play with Your Food (1992, ISBN 0679743111)
   * Penn & Teller's How to Play in Traffic (1997, ISBN 1572972939)

[edit]

Awards and recognitions

   * Visiting Scholars of MIT
   * Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award, 2001
   * Richard Dawkins Award, 2005

[edit]

External links Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Penn & Teller

   * Penn & Teller's official website
   * Magic and Mystery Tour at The Internet Movie Database