By, Zach Waldman
After you've landed your first restaurant gig, the real work begins. You have to get up the nerve to approach people at tables and then you have to get them to love you in a matter of seconds.
Assuming you do a good job as a restaurant magician, you'll start to book a lot of private parties. These are easier, but you still have to approach strange groups of people and dazzle them.
There are tons of ideas and theories on opening sets. Here, I'll share a few thoughts on the subject as well as telling you the best way (in my opinion) to handle this.
I get asked all of the time, "Zach, how do I start once I walk over to the table?"
Personally, I learned to effectively open sets by doing it thousands of times. Here are some typical things you'll hear from magicians on the subject:
1. Ask the people at the table if they lost an item and then do something magical with the "lost" item. For instance, take a big wooden hanger out of a tiny purse, do the color changing knives, or have fire come out of your wallet. For the record, I think this type of opening is kind of cheesy but it does work for some people. It's just not what I do.
2. Start with a stock opening line. Gene Perret, one of the best comedy writers of all time, believes anything other than entertainment right off the bat is a waste of time. For example, Mr. Perret thinks it's a waste when a stand up comedian comes out and asks how the audience is doing as opposed to delivering a funny line right away.
3. Introduce yourself like a normal human being and then begin. Personally, this is the method I use. It's a good thing to take a moment to connect with your audience. That connection enables you to be more conversational with your comedy. By being yourself and really communicating with your audience, funny things naturally happen. As a matter of fact, some of these things happen so often that your reactions to them become memorized lines that you can use as surefire jokes. The fact that they came about naturally means they'll sound conversational when you repeat them as opposed to being scripted.
Using gimmicks or canned openings are crutches you can use until you learn to be yourself. In the beginning, if you need to walk up to a table and ask if they lost your fire wallet, go ahead.
However, your goal should always be to learn to be yourself. Once you find your voice, you won't need any ploys to approach people. You'll be able to walk over and say, "Hello, I'm [name], how are you today?" From that simple opening, you'll learn to quickly turn on the charm. Excitement and fun will build organically instead of robotically.
As always, your comments are welcome.
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