Finding Magic in Mistakes
Listen to the Episode Here
https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lindsey-roberts10/episodes/Finding-Magic-in-Mistakes-e2j5bhm
Topics discussed in this episode
Scott’s journey to becoming a magician
Comedy in Magic
Battle plan for preparing for mistakes
Turning failures into opportunities/comedy
Purpose and intention
Advice for up and coming magicians
Episode Summary
In our latest podcast episode, I chat with magician Scott Chamberlain about the art of embracing failures with humor and authenticity. Scott shares how magicians prepare for mishaps and transform them into engaging experiences. This conversation dives into using humor to form genuine connections and making the most of our mistakes. Tune in to learn how these magical insights can apply to everyday life and discover a beginner magic trick that could add a little fun to your routine!
References and Resources
Scott’s Website: https://www.scottchamberlain.com/
Book a Magic Show with Scott Here!
Utah School of Magic: https://www.utahschoolofmagic.com/
Transcript
Ryan Roberts (00:01.949)
Alright, welcome everyone to feel it to nail it. This is Ryan and I have with me a good friend of mine Scott Scott Chamberlain. How are you doing today? Yeah, it's good to see you. It's been a bit since we've chatted. Oh, I'm excited about this Alright Scott. So you're a magician. We actually met for the very first time when You did magic for my wedding with my wife Lindsay and that was super fun. Holy cow. Everyone loved it. We still have oh
Scott Chamberlain (00:09.022)
Hi, good. Good to see you. Yeah, yeah it has.
Scott Chamberlain (00:25.262)
Yeah. That was, yep. Oh good. Well, I'm glad I made an impression.
Ryan Roberts (00:31.843)
My parents, her parents, everyone still talks about how fun it was that we had a magician going around table to table and did a show for everyone. It was cool. Everyone was so much more relaxed and no one was really angsty and it was a really chill reception. So yeah, so that's how we met and we still kept in touch because I wanted to learn magic from you and we've done some things since then. Yeah, it was cool.
Scott Chamberlain (00:47.202)
Thank you, thank you. Yeah. Yeah, you've come out to Magic Club with us and yeah, it's been fun.
Ryan Roberts (01:01.731)
Uh huh. So I want to know a little bit more about this and we haven't really talked formally, like we've done some informal things together, but I haven't really dived deep into you, your career, your background. And so I had a couple of questions I want to go over. Okay. First, I'm a little bit curious about what your kids think of you being a magician because like for most careers, like my dad's a financial advisor and none of us wanted to touch.
Scott Chamberlain (01:17.082)
Sure.
Ryan Roberts (01:29.443)
the idea of like working with money or portfolios, right? But for you, what was that like? Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (01:30.178)
Yeah.
Yeah. You know, I still question it. Like, I still don't know what they really think. I think they enjoy it, right? They bring it up at school or with their friends, they'll bring up that, oh, my dad's a magician. But, you know, overall, it's, you know, I'll be talking about some of the stuff I do and they don't really get as interested as other kids might, right? If I have, I might have a routine that I want to...
Ryan Roberts (01:59.203)
Okay Interesting Okay, okay So I mean there's an element where they're like we've seen so many magic tricks or something where they're kind of used to that It's different than the mysticism. You might see from the other kids and their friends Okay, but much
Scott Chamberlain (02:03.43)
try out with them they're like, okay. But I think overall I think the idea of having a dad as a magician is a lot of fun for them. I think they like it.
Scott Chamberlain (02:25.406)
Yeah, yeah, yeah Yeah, well, I mean yeah, and it's like, you know the minute I show them something they go, okay, what's the trick? Yeah, they know there's more to it and they and they know I'll probably reveal it too so
Ryan Roberts (02:29.015)
more entertaining than a financial advisor parrot or they know that there's more to it and they know I mean you've done shows with your kids too. They know what's you're not going to be hard about it and be like sorry.
Scott Chamberlain (02:52.25)
Somehow I know I can't keep that away from my kids, you know, they probably need to be involved in it too, right? When I do a show they need to be helping me out. I'll figure it out. Yeah, yeah, they do. You know, they don't do a whole lot. I try to make my show a kind of a one man show where I can do it myself, where I don't need to rely on other people. So when I include them, it's usually to help clean up.
Ryan Roberts (03:00.419)
Yeah, I mean you've had some perform with you a handful of times, right?
Ryan Roberts (03:20.971)
Okay. Okay. That's helpful. It's good to know. Yeah, I'm curious. And when you leave home, like this is your career, do you leave home with like a ton of magic tricks? Or can you do it like a magic at any moment? So notice like, how many tricks do you have home with?
Scott Chamberlain (03:22.17)
keep things in order as I'm doing my show. Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (03:39.45)
It's a good question. So I don't I Don't have a lot of magic tricks that I take with me There's always one or two go -to's that I have there's certain ones that I just always have on me and it's really easy to do and it's really quick and it's I usually have something on me, but it's usually one or two tricks I have the ability to do a bunch of different things if if
the setting is right. But, you know, my go -to tricks, I usually have about, I probably have two that I always carry with me. And then multiple ones, if we wanted to pull out our phones and do a trick, or if we wanted to do, if you had time, I could do something else with you. But usually just about two that I always carry.
Ryan Roberts (04:19.911)
Okay, so it sounds like you too that you're bringing with you, but then there's more you can do if Okay, there are other things involved
Scott Chamberlain (04:37.85)
Yeah, yeah, if the time is right or if the group is right, right, I don't need materials for some of these tricks that I do. I can just do it with, you know, if you just pull out your phone, we can do a trick with your phone. Or if you just give me a coin, I can do a couple of tricks with a coin, right?
Ryan Roberts (04:54.707)
Okay, I was kind of division eating like you leave in the house with like a Batman utility belt of like, okay I have like a deck of cards and like sponge balls and like everything but
Scott Chamberlain (05:01.786)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (05:05.592)
I... You bring that up, but it's true. Like, sometimes I'll just pull out a deck of cards. I usually don't, but sometimes I bring it with me and I'll pull out a deck of cards and do some magic. My wife will roll her eyes or something. I know.
Ryan Roberts (05:17.107)
Yeah. Really, you're prepared. Yeah. I think I have a bag right behind me that probably has I squeeze like maybe 15 tricks in like this tiny bag. Yeah, I'm just trying to get like a ton of things in there and I try and carry with me. Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (05:27.898)
Oh really? Oh. Yeah, I mean, yeah. Yeah, I don't want to be carrying around that much all the time. But if I can, you know, if I can pull out a, you know, like a packet trick, right? Something that has just a few aces or something like that, I'll have it backwards. Then I'll just pull something out like this and do something with a kid or something.
Ryan Roberts (05:54.819)
Yeah, well, it's good to know. You know, I remember reading this book from Gene Hubert and he he was approached. I love this. He was approached by a fan and he was like, Dude, I have learned like 150 tricks because of you. How many tricks do you know? And he's like, I know about six or seven. This is a guy like in that book I was reading. He knew.
Scott Chamberlain (05:55.386)
Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (06:23.331)
over like 50, there's 50 tricks in there. So you knew more than six or seven. But I think the point you should get across is you only need to know a couple to be like to come across as a magician and to blow people's minds. And so you don't need to do a lot to entertain people and connect with people.
Scott Chamberlain (06:32.794)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, I can understand that feeling. I mean, there's, and a lot of them, you know, have the same feel. So, you know, I could do a couple of tricks, but I don't want to, I don't want to cross over. I don't want to do something and then do something else that is kind of similar, right? So if I do a card trick, I don't want to do another card trick right after that. I'd like to kind of switch it up a little bit, but, but yeah, just to wow people. Yeah. You only need to know about, you know,
or three things and then you can really get that wow factor.
Scott Chamberlain (07:12.378)
So I'd agree with that.
Ryan Roberts (07:12.451)
That's cool. Yeah, so you leave home with one or two in your set. Okay. Well, awesome. I mean, for the theme today, I want to know a little bit more about your entire background, right? I don't know really how you got into magic and really what you're doing as far as your career in magic. So tell me more about your background and how you got there today.
Scott Chamberlain (07:32.378)
Yeah, so I mean, we can go way back. My grandfather was a magician. His name was Ralph Adams. And growing up, we always just had a magic grandpa. And he would come out to, I lived in Texas. He lived in California. And he would do, he would come out and visit us, but he would always do a show whenever he came out and visited us. I remember he did a show for my kindergarten class, and then just one for our, at our home.
Ryan Roberts (07:37.667)
Oh really? Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (08:01.306)
where we just invited friends and neighbors. And so, yeah, that was my experience with magic growing up. And then as I grew up, I always did a little bit. I always did a few tricks, but nothing serious, right? It was just, if I had a college roommate or something, I'd pull out a deck of cards. And I knew a couple of tricks with a deck of cards, but nothing real serious, right? So I would just do tricks with my friends.
But what really got me started was about 10 years ago, my daughter wanted to do something for the school talent show. And she signed up and we said, well, what are you gonna do? And she says, I don't know. And we said, well, we need to figure out what you're gonna do. So at that point I was like, well, you can do a magic trick. It would be fun to do just one magic trick on stage. I'm sure we could come up with something that you could do as a -
as a magic trick on stage. So, you know, remembering something that my grandfather had done, he had some rabbits, cutout rabbits. And looking back on it, now I know what the routine is called, or I know what the trick is called. It's out there. It's called the hippity hop rabbits, right? And it's these cutout rabbits. And so I thought, well, but at the time I didn't know what they were called. I just called them my rabbits. And so, you know, I went into the...
the garage started working on cutting out these rabbits and making this whole trick. I talked to my aunt who had these rabbits. And so I just kind of made them in the fashion that she had her rabbits. And so I made this whole routine. I thought it would be really fun for my daughter to do. And then the magic show went.
It had come and gone, right? She never even did it. So I was like, well, I have these rabbits. This is kind of fun to do, right? And so I made up a rope trick that my grandfather would do and I put some things together and I thought, oh, this is kind of fun just to have a little, you know, 10 minute show or 15 minute show that I could just impromptu do with people, right? So I did it for my brother. I did this little, I showed him some of the things that I've been making.
Scott Chamberlain (10:25.914)
And he was intrigued by it just because our grandfather did this stuff. So for him, it was like, oh, I remember seeing this stuff that you're doing. That's something that our grandfather did. And so one day he invited me over for dinner or our family over for dinner. And he said, hey, bring some of that magic stuff with you. I'm going to invite some neighbors over and you can show them the magic stuff. So I did. It was a lot of fun.
We did some stuff that I remember my grandfather doing. And I thought that was the end of it, right? And he told my cousin who owns a mortgage company. And so my cousin called me up about a week later and said, hey, I hear you're doing magic. I said, well, I'm playing around with it a little bit. And he says, well, why don't you come out to my work and you can do a magic show for us. We have about 75 employees. We'd love to see some magic.
for our night that we're doing. And I said, I know. And looking back at it, it's like, oh, that was just, it was, yeah, it was hard to think about, you know, to do. And I said, well, yeah, how much time do I have? I think I had about six weeks. I said, okay, six weeks, I got time to prepare a magic show. I thought it would be a lot of fun. So I did it. It was difficult. I looked back at some of them, and I found some of the notes that I had.
Ryan Roberts (11:24.611)
How nerve wracking, holy cow.
Scott Chamberlain (11:52.122)
And I kind of cringe at some of those, but it was a tough thing to do. And that's a whole other question. That's a whole other discussion, I guess. But it was a tough thing to do. It was fun. I think it went better than I thought it would. But my wife was there. She could probably tell you about it. But yeah, that's kind of really where it started. I did a show for like 75 adults. And after that, I did a bunch more for kids. And I think the kids...
Ryan Roberts (11:54.755)
Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (12:22.138)
probably went over a lot better than the one for adults. And so that's how I got my feet wet into the magic.
Ryan Roberts (12:32.803)
So your daughter signed up for a talent show, not knowing what she was going to do. And you, was this Annika? Oh.
Scott Chamberlain (12:35.002)
Yeah, I don't know why I should, yeah.
Yeah, yeah. Oh, you know what and it's interesting that you brought this up because right behind you is a picture that she Painted right the the one with the arrows. Yeah
Ryan Roberts (12:48.547)
Yeah.
This one right here. Yeah. She did this blacklight painting for us. Yeah. We have a couple of friends that do different paints and she's the one that did this one for us. Yeah, we love it.
Scott Chamberlain (12:55.842)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (12:59.45)
Oh, that's great. Yeah, it's good to see it up there on the wall there. I like that. Good. Yeah, so she's really creative. I don't think she would have had a hard time finding something to do for the school talent show, but yeah, she was supposed to do a magic trick and I don't know why it never happened. It should never have happened. But it would have been good. It would have been good to see her do it.
Ryan Roberts (13:02.947)
He's been here for like three or four years now. So like three years. We love our blacklight meetings. Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (13:13.411)
Uh.
Ryan Roberts (13:21.879)
Oh, man. So that and then it was like, hey, we have the props and family got involved. And then you got neighbors and someone heard about it. And it was a big group. And it's just like, you kind of got carried up in this way that sounds like.
Scott Chamberlain (13:29.848)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (13:35.29)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (13:39.098)
Yeah, I mean, my brother would tell me, hey, you should do magic shows for people. And I was like, no. Like it never even crossed my mind, even when my brother was bringing it up, you know, even when we go went to a house for dinner, you know, it wasn't even something on my mind. It was like, oh, I've got like four tricks. I'm going to do these tricks for you. You know, but that was it. I wasn't thinking I'd do this for, you know, for pay, right? I'd do this for a living. But here I am 10 years later.
Ryan Roberts (14:06.563)
Yeah. Oh, man. I'm curious about like you hinted at this thing, like these notes that you cringe at or whatever. I don't know if that means you did poorly or if you were just nervous or what happened in that very first one.
Scott Chamberlain (14:20.154)
Well, so there was a lot of it really, I mean, we dive into like comedy, right? Where we think, hey, this actually might be funny to say, or this might be funny to do, right? And so I had notes of things that I would try out or things that I thought would be really funny. And in my mind, it was really funny, right? But then I'd get in that situation, I'd do it, and there would be no laughter.
Ryan Roberts (14:28.779)
Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (14:49.722)
Um, you know, like it would just be dead and not just like, Oh, how do I handle this? Right. And so that was the first reality check that I had where it's like, Ooh, I gotta, I gotta learn how to do this better. I gotta learn how to do comedy better, um, in these situations. Right. And, and a lot of it was just me being nervous too. Right. It's like, I had something in my mind and then I realized, okay, this doesn't really translate well for setting.
Ryan Roberts (14:53.603)
been there before. Yep. Hell, man.
Scott Chamberlain (15:18.682)
So yeah, that was just a big learning process for me. How do I make this fun and funny? So.
Ryan Roberts (15:27.191)
Oh, man. By the time you did our wedding, how long, what was the time gap between like your first magic show with that corporation and by the time you did it for us, because it seems like everything was so polished, and you're freaking hilarious and everyone loved it. And so it seemed like there's a ton of experience, but by the time you worked on this, it seemed like that was a short time though.
Scott Chamberlain (15:37.178)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (15:40.954)
Hahaha
Scott Chamberlain (15:45.004)
Oh.
Yeah, yeah, it was about a week after. I'm joking, I'm joking. I really don't know. So the question I would ask you, like how long ago was it that you got married? I guess I could do it from like a backtrack to that date. I really don't remember.
Ryan Roberts (15:50.573)
Are you serious? I was gonna say, no way!
Ryan Roberts (16:02.965)
Yeah. Man, that would be like seven years now. Sheesh. So a long time. Okay. Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (16:08.762)
Okay, so maybe I've been doing it about three years.
So yeah, yeah. And even after three years, you start, even after that first one, right, you really start figuring out, oh man, what worked and what didn't, right? And so every show after that, you're figuring out what really works and what doesn't work. And then not only that, what works for certain audiences, right? I did those rabbits for the adults, the rabbits that I talk about, and that one flopped. It just was not good.
Ryan Roberts (16:40.131)
They didn't like it. Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (16:41.53)
It's the whole premise of the trick is you're trying to get kids to call you out on something that you're doing, that you're doing something and you want the kids to call you out and tell you, oh, turn them around, do something different because it's kind of obvious how it works to them at least. And in my mind, I thought the adults would do that too and they did not do that. Nobody wants to call you out. They're just watching it. And so it's like, I'm sitting there thinking, how do I?
Ryan Roberts (16:58.307)
Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (17:03.389)
They just watched.
Scott Chamberlain (17:10.158)
force this, how do I, you know, and I think I muddled through it, I did something to make it work and I kind of just moved on to the next routine. So yeah, yeah, you learn quickly when you perform in front of people and especially when you perform in front of adults, you learn very quickly what works and what doesn't.
Ryan Roberts (17:29.507)
Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (17:32.899)
What's your battle plan in that kind of situation where you do mess up on stage? And I'm sure some of our listeners are interested in this type of topic, particularly like magic, right? Or maybe even art, singing, whatever, but with magic, what do you do when you mess up?
Scott Chamberlain (17:43.226)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (17:48.506)
So there's a term in magic. We call it outs. And so magicians always have to plan outs for what they're doing. And there's two different types, I guess you could talk, as far as I understand it, right? There's an out in magic where it's like, I have three different ways that this trick could go, and I have to be prepared for every different way it could go.
But then there's the other out where it's like, what if I mess up at this point, right? There might be four different points in a trick and point number two is really difficult or it might be slightly difficult. And I need to understand if that messes up, what's my out? What do I do at this point? Right. And so the idea is to plan those outs. Notice where those critical points are and then know what you're going to do to address those.
you know, critical points. So yeah, that's what I have to do. I have to make sure that, you know, for every routine that I have an out, that I have something that I can plan differently or that I can say, or how I can recover from something that goes wrong.
Ryan Roberts (19:07.299)
I sometimes run into like coaches for dance that were like, hey, you know, you should never plan on messing up because then you then you have in your mind it's okay to mess up. And I've had the other side where they're like, oh, you should be able to plan on what happens if you mess up on A, B, C, D all the way through Z. And I'm sure there's an error on being too extreme on both sides. How do you find that balance of like,
Scott Chamberlain (19:12.282)
Hmm.
Scott Chamberlain (19:28.858)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (19:35.706)
Yeah, I would say, I mean, first off, don't plan to fail, right? We shouldn't be planning on, hey, I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to definitely mess up at this point, right? We shouldn't be planning to fail, but we should definitely have a plan in case we do fail. Right. And so I have to understand, I have to run through my mind, Hey, if I'm doing this. So for example, I have a, I have a book routine where I hand out a book and somebody picks out a word.
Ryan Roberts (19:40.899)
Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (20:04.922)
And I do a bunch of stuff in between. But in the end, I reveal their word that they have. And so I need to have a plan where, hey, if that goes wrong, if I say a word and that's not their word, how do I recover from that? And that's a very real thing. That's something that can happen. That's something that has happened. And so I need to plan that, hey, if that happens,
What do I do? How do I recover from that? Right. And so fortunately for me, I use a lot of comedy throughout the show. Um, and then I also laugh at myself for things that I do, um, that are dumb or, or silly, you know? And so I kind of give the audience permission to laugh at me for those things as well. Right. I give them permission to, to, um, to see my mistakes. Right. Uh, and, and, and then we all can laugh about it. So.
it for me, it's a little bit easier because I'm trying to be authentic, right, with them that if something really goes wrong, it really goes wrong. And we move on from that. And I think, you know, a true audience, you know, people that are really seeking to be entertained are able to forgive you for those things, right? As long as you're being authentic with them, as long as you're being honest with them, right? An audience member, sometimes they enjoy those moments even more than
if everything went right. Because those can be memorable, right? It's kind of like when you watch, I like watching like Saturday Night Live, right? And some of the best skits are the ones that everybody just messes up the whole time, right? And they, because they're laughing so much or, and those are memorable, you know? So for me, it's like, well, what is the audience getting out of this? And I want to make sure that the audience is enjoying the experience as much as I am. And if I'm...
Ryan Roberts (21:47.331)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (22:00.96)
If I mess up and I can laugh about it, hopefully they can laugh about that too. They can enjoy that experience, that flub, at the same time that I am.
Ryan Roberts (22:13.443)
When I think of this comedy group Studio C, the moment that sounds out the most to me is this moment in the skit where someone says the wrong line and these two people are just staring at each other trying not to laugh. And they're just staring and then they can continue on, but they're just, they're trying not to break character. And that's what comes to mind for me.
Scott Chamberlain (22:16.09)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (22:23.962)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (22:32.228)
Yeah, yeah Yeah, so I mean I give myself permission to do that If it happens, right? I don't try to plan for it, but I'll give myself permission To do that and and that and honestly, that's my out, you know That's 90 % of the time. Those are my outs right is hey if this goes wrong, what do you do? Well, if I'm holding a deck of cards, I throw them up in the air, you know, whatever like I have an out for that, right?
I have a plan for, hey, if this goes wrong, I just toss them, you know, or something like that, you know. So those are all planned outs. You have something goofy or funny that you can do. And depending on the audience, right? I might do something different than with kids than I would do with adults, you know, for a different routine. And those are your planned outs, right? But I wouldn't, I hear what you're saying where sometimes people say don't have any.
visit don't have any plan for failure, right? Like in a dance routine. But there's a lot of other industries, I think that plan for those failures, right? Like, I worked in the software industry, and we always had plans for, hey, what are we going to do if this happens? What are we going to do if this happens? Like, we always had to plan for what failures can happen and how.
from those, right? We always had to plan for those things. So I think, you know, coming into Magic, this just came to me naturally through my previous jobs, right? Where it's like, hey, where are my failure points and how do I recover from those? How do I plan for that, for those things to go out? Haywire, which sometimes they do, right? Sometimes I'll do a show and things just don't go the way I expected it to. And so I, you know, I have to recover from those and I have to...
Ryan Roberts (24:08.355)
you
Scott Chamberlain (24:20.186)
If I have a plan, then that recovery just works a lot better.
Ryan Roberts (24:25.251)
I think about some of the clients I'm working with and I imagine some of them are really struggling with this principle because in order for you to give the audience permission to laugh at you, you do have to have some level of being comfortable with shortcomings and recognizing that your worth or value, your social acceptedness is not contingent on if this trick works or not. And some people can really struggle with that.
Scott Chamberlain (24:53.178)
Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (24:53.283)
I struggle you get that emotional reaction of like crap this fails and our brain says oh No, like you did something wrong and we can we can panic internally and some people like so my clients and it's not necessarily just magic tricks, but they're like I don't want to Stream playing video games because what if I am bad at it? Like I know it's gonna happen and people are not gonna like me or watch my stream or whatever It may be they have this hurdle of they can't accept those
Scott Chamberlain (25:00.728)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (25:04.218)
Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (25:21.635)
failures or shortcomings themselves. And so if other people see that, then they're inadequate. It is tough. How did you overcome that? How are you? What is it about you that makes it easy to be able to laugh at yourself, be comfortable so other people can do that too?
Scott Chamberlain (25:30.074)
Yeah. Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (25:38.842)
Well, I think that was a process. But at the same time, I think that's just naturally who I am. I've always kind of been someone.
But it's still like, I had to learn that even within magic. I had to learn that, hey, when you mess up, right? Or when you do something wrong or something goes haywire, I just learned to fall on my comedy or fall on humor, right? And...
Ryan Roberts (26:03.637)
you
Scott Chamberlain (26:09.188)
as my backup for that. Now, in order to do that though, there's things that I have to become myself, right? We didn't touch on this, but I also teach magic for kids, for kids ages seven through 12.
and it's called the Utah School of Magic. I teach it as an after -school program, summer camp program. The principles that they have or that we teach within the magic class are that a true magician is respectful, prepared, enthusiastic, confident, humble, creative, authentic, and giving. I started doing this about four years ago.
And those are like some principles that really helped me. So I would say even in the last four years, my magic has gotten better in that I learned as a magician, I got to be humble about this. I can't think that everything's going to go right. And...
and that everything's gonna be perfect, right? I am gonna mess up, right? So that humility and then being authentic as well, right? Where I can be honest with the audience and just say, hey, that did not go as planned. But I definitely have more for you, but we're gonna scrap that. Here, let me just throw that aside. So part of, you know, those principles that I teach in the Utah School of Magic, when I start applying those to my shows, like everything goes better.
And so it's kind of giving myself permission to fail, but that I look for ways to handle those. And then I always have the out of just being authentic with people. And in the end, I think people, they respect that, right? That if you're just honest with them, people are usually respectful about that. I'm confident enough in my show that I know that...
Scott Chamberlain (28:10.938)
that I know I have a good show, I have good routines, I have good magic. And so I don't really let it get me down. Although, at the very beginning, it's tough to build that confidence, right?
Ryan Roberts (28:25.379)
I might ask you to be vulnerable and authentic then. Can you tell me about a very specific moment? I know you've kind of like talked about those ideas then, but has there been a specific time that you're willing to share where you did mess up and that you've had to recover from and connect with an audience in that way?
Scott Chamberlain (28:42.234)
Yeah, I mean, I guess there's, I mean, there's a lot that I could probably bring up. I'm trying to think of a little, like something that has, so I talked earlier about.
Ryan Roberts (28:46.403)
Okay. Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (28:58.106)
why are we available? I guess I could talk about that. And it has happened. So I'll bring up somebody, I'll give them a choice of three different books, it can be any book. And they'll pick out a word. And so after they pick out a word, they remember it. I've had times where, because I'll let some time pass, right? I'll even do other routines in between the time that they had their word. We'll come back to it and I'll say, so what was your word?
and I'll write down a word and they'll say.
say what was your word and it'll be something completely different, right?
Ryan Roberts (29:45.283)
Okay, time out. Did I freeze for you?
Scott Chamberlain (29:48.538)
Yep, I saw that. Yeah, I did.
Ryan Roberts (29:51.523)
Okay, I'm going to ask the question again. I'll pause for a few seconds of silence and I'll ask again.
Scott Chamberlain (29:55.898)
Okay, but you're still frozen on my side. Okay, here we go, here we go. Yeah, let's do it again.
Ryan Roberts (29:59.555)
Okay, it looks like we're good. Okay, I'll wait for a second and then ask.
Ryan Roberts (30:07.459)
Okay, Scott, I'm going to ask you to be vulnerable and authentic then because I'm curious about if there's been a I want to hear about a specific moment in magic scenario. Like who are you with? Who is the audience? Like what was the trick that you failed with that actually ultimately led to some growth, some personal growth or professional growth?
Scott Chamberlain (30:28.954)
Yeah, yeah. You know, I think everything leads to personal growth, right, and professional growth. I don't think I can point to one that's like an awe -inspiring, hey, here's how I do it. But I have, I mentioned the books at the beginning, right, where somebody picks out a word and then I reveal their word, right? I've had that go wrong and not just once or twice. I've had it go wrong three or four times.
and it's not fun, right? How do you recover from something like that? But every time I've had that happen, I've learned something from it. I've learned how to recover from that, right? And how to do it in the future to make it better. So for example, there was one time where I had somebody pick out a book, pick out a word, and then he just remembered that word. And later on,
I write down his word, I had it turned around. I said, what was your word? Again, in front of an audience of maybe about 50 or 60 people. And he gives me a word that's completely different than what I expected. And what did not match my word? And I said, you know, and I think at that time I kind of had an out where I just said, you know, magic just doesn't work for, you know, it doesn't always work.
Ryan Roberts (31:38.339)
Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (31:50.97)
In fact, I had a different word that I thought it was going to be and I showed the different word. I said, you didn't actually think I was be able to read your mind, did you? I said, that would be crazy. But this I can do. And then I rolled into a different routine, right? But I made it look like I didn't even plan on really getting the word. I kind of used it as kind of a comedy, you know, oh yeah, yeah, I thought it might be this, but we just, it didn't work. So we just move on. And so I don't think people really understood like.
that I really did mess up. And it wasn't really me messing up. He gave me a completely different word. And what's funny is at the end of the show, he came to me and he said, you know what? That actually was my word. And I said, no way. I said, why didn't you say something? He's like, I don't know, but that actually was, he said, I forgot my word. So I just came up with a new word. I said, that doesn't help. That does not help.
Ryan Roberts (32:45.859)
had that happen to where people like, it's the three of hearts, because I couldn't remember my card. Yeah. Yes.
Scott Chamberlain (32:46.734)
It was crazy. It was, yeah, yeah. Like I'm just going to change my card because I couldn't remember what my old card was. So how do I learn from that? And so in this instance, I learned that, hey, if I'm going to do this routine, I need to make sure multiple people know what this original word was, whatever this person picks. And so I've changed the routine where I look for multiple people.
And so there's little things within every routine that as you do it, any point that you make a mistake, you learn from that and you go, man, I am never making that mistake again. And so that's the fun thing about magic is no matter how many mistakes you make, it's very rare that I'll make that mistake again. Because I put in place as little safeguards to make sure that that does not happen again.
And so for me, I don't know how this translates to other things outside of magic. I'm sure it does. I'm sure there's a lot that, hey, we make mistakes within life or within magic. And usually once we make that mistake, we usually put in safeguards. We usually put in ways that we say, hey, I'm not going to make that mistake again. I want to do this right next time.
Ryan Roberts (34:06.787)
So yeah, when you mentioned you didn't experience this aha moment, it's not like, hey, I had this experience and now this trick is perfect for forever. It really is this series of steps where it's like, hey, I needed to experience this failure to fix this particular problem. And then I'm set generally. And it's like, I run into these roadblocks over and over and over. And it always gets better and better and better. And that is just the lifespan of a magician. That's what it sounds like.
Scott Chamberlain (34:34.49)
Yeah, yeah, no, it really is. I mean, I'm sure every other magician goes through that same process that I do, right? Where you have something that messes up and then you just go, man, how do I make sure that that does not happen again, right? So you'll notice that, well, I notice it as a magician, but there's a lot that we say within a show that might seem impromptu.
But there's a lot of reasons why we do every little thing within a show, right? Even down to, hey, I'm turning left here to go grab something. Why is it on my left -hand side? Well, there might be a reason for that, right? There.
coughing at this point, I'm just throwing things out. But there's like very little nuance things that I might do that are part of the show. And people would think that that's just me just being me, but there's a lot of reasons that I would do a lot of those little things. And a lot of it is because of mistakes that I may have made, right? And then I go, I'm not making that mistake again, I'm gonna do this a little bit different.
Ryan Roberts (35:48.675)
There are times I've changed pattern, not for the audience, but to remind me that I'm supposed to like do something because I forget. Yeah, exactly.
Scott Chamberlain (35:55.674)
Yeah, and sometimes the things you say get different types of reactions. So you have to watch how you say things.
Ryan Roberts (36:07.171)
Well, let's do this. I want to hear a couple things as we wrap up then. I want to hear a little bit about for those who want to be magicians specifically, and I'm sure some of the principles will translate to other fields, but if people are like, man, I want to be a magician, what would you say would be a good starting place? How do we get people's foot in the door?
Scott Chamberlain (36:27.578)
Well, don't do it for a cousin that has 75 employees. Definitely do not do that. I know that was a rough start.
Ryan Roberts (36:30.697)
Okay. Okay. Oh, that's a rough start. Oh, man. My first start was a scout troop of like eight. It was a great starting place and not a huge company.
Scott Chamberlain (36:40.698)
Hey, there you go. Yeah. That's probably a good starting. I think so. You know, after I did that, I opened up a Facebook page and I called it Great Scott Magic, right? And I don't go by that name anymore. I use Scott Chamberlain Magic. But I open up a Facebook page and and then just put it in some of the neighborhood like I advertised it in some of the neighborhood groups and some of the city groups. Right. Just said, hey, I'm doing magic.
Ryan Roberts (36:46.083)
Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (37:08.826)
you know, and I talked a little bit about what I did and what I'm doing and that I was for hire for kids shows, right? So, you know, sometimes the best thing is, you know, what I would recommend come to come out to club meetings. We have the Society of American Magicians chapter in Orem, but there's chapters all over the nation, right? So you can join a club and then just kind of go from there. You can.
talk to people and say, hey, what do I do? How do I get started in your neighborhood or your area on how to get started on doing magic? So yeah, a lot of it, I'm willing to bet a lot of schools, if you're going into a classroom, I can almost guarantee you any teacher, if you just went to your kid's teacher and said, hey, I've got a little magic show I'd love to do for the kids for your class, the teacher would take you home. And in fact, that's what I did when I first started doing magic. I was like,
And let's do it for the kids classrooms, right? So I just go to a classroom of 30 kids and do a show, right? And just try out some of the stuff that I was doing. That's a great point to start on. But then as far as advertising, you can do Google if you really want to get into it, right? You can put your name out on Google Maps, right? So that people can really contact you when they're doing a search on magicians near me. But even if you want to just open up a Facebook,
page or an Instagram page and say, here's me, I'm doing magic. Maybe put out a few, you know, some little content talking about yourself and, uh, and, and then get within your neighborhood just to say, Hey, I'm doing magic. If, if, if I have some friends or some family that would love to do magic, here's where they can reach me.
Ryan Roberts (38:56.867)
it sounds like the mentality is just get in front of people like wherever you can find people like whatever it is you're willing to do big groups small groups friends family communities get in front of people and just do magic you know
Scott Chamberlain (39:01.848)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (39:08.61)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (39:12.954)
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I had my full time job when I started doing this. So, you know, it's never really anything that was like, hey, I need to get this started now and I need to get running on this. For me, it was just like, you know, however it comes up or however, however many gigs I get, you know, in a month is whatever I get started on. I wasn't really looking to push it. But then after a while, it kind of got serious, right? Especially when I, you know, it was...
Ryan Roberts (39:20.469)
you
Scott Chamberlain (39:41.364)
Apparently after three years when I did your gig, right, or did it for not your wedding, but your reception, right? Just a little bit of walk around. Yeah, it just started blowing up for me, which I like to attribute it to, you know, that my show is actually really good. So yeah, make sure that you have a good personality. Make sure that you have a good material too.
So, but you can only find that out by practicing it and working it with, you know, groups like the Society of American Magicians or there's the IBM, it's International Brotherhood of Magicians. But if you find a club, they're all very forgiving. So you can, like honestly, I try out new stuff with them. So, and I mess up all the time with those clubs just because I have permission to do it.
So I'll go out there, I'll mess something up, I'll say, hold on, let me start over. And then I start over, right? With them, I can do it.
Scott Chamberlain (40:43.898)
If you're new to magic, yeah, go out there and do it.
Ryan Roberts (40:48.163)
Okay. Well, thank you, Scott. Then to wrap up, I'll have you think about maybe a big takeaway point and it could be something from during this session or in your preparation for the podcast. And I'm going to cheat cause I'm going to do two takeaway points that came up for me. But one of them is this aspect of failure throughout every single process of just doing magic is, is a building block.
And in some fields and with other people have interviewed, it's almost like, Hey, we encounter failure and it solves like a lot of problems. It's like, I have one big failure. And it's like, I've learned a ton of things from it, but here it's like, we've got to pay attention to all these different things that could go wrong. And we treasure them. It's like, Oh man, this is super beneficial. And maybe we learn one thing from it. You can learn a lot, but we look at a lot of these things, which is pretty cool. But if I had to pick a second one.
Scott Chamberlain (41:35.514)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (41:43.962)
Yeah.
Ryan Roberts (41:47.363)
Actually, there's a couple that I think would be really great to talk about, but probably the other biggest takeaway point would be...
this authentic self. Probably it's my mental health counselor side, the sympathy side that I really like, but I'm thinking about a lot of the listeners for this podcast and the people that get really excited about this podcast. And I think a lot of them and myself included would really attach themselves to this idea of, man, just being able to be comfortable with ourselves and laugh along with like,
shortcomings, have humor with it, and have other people be okay with that and see that and they're comfortable with it too. I think that aspect is something that a lot of us could benefit and learn from you on. I think if everyone could do that, like man, a lot of anxiety would go down. Holy cow, love, my clients are struggling with that. That would help a ton for so many people. So that's probably the other big takeaway point for me. I'll probably leave it at those two for now. What about for you?
Scott Chamberlain (42:36.986)
Yeah.
Scott Chamberlain (42:49.754)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, you have to be humble enough to understand that, you know, this is a process for me, right? And, but I enjoy the process. One thing that always kind of comes to mind is for me, whenever I try to think about, I try to ponder about, hey, where do I need to go with this, with my career and everything? And the one thing that always comes to my mind is to enjoy the process, right?
And so I take that even into my shows, I take that idea or that mindset that, hey, I'm just going to enjoy this process that I'm doing. The process is going to be full of small failures. And I like that you mentioned that. It's a building block thing, right? So there's going to be some moments of small failures. And I just learn from those and then just improve on that, right? It's not like I don't have to beat myself up over any of these failures.
but I move forward with each one of those. And as long as I can be humble enough to accept that, hey, I'm not perfect at this, and then be authentic with my audience, that I can laugh at myself or I can make fun of myself for things that I do. But I also give the audience permission to make fun of me for those same things, that they can laugh along with me and enjoy that process with me. Even when I make a mistake that they can...
we can turn that into something positive for him.
Ryan Roberts (44:21.923)
I love it. Okay, thank you, Scott. If people want to learn more about you and the work you do or get connected on social media with you, like how can they learn more about you?
Scott Chamberlain (44:23.61)
Thank you. Yeah, of course.
Scott Chamberlain (44:32.282)
Yeah, so if you just Google magician near me and you look for my bald head, I'm sure you can't miss me. And look up Scott. Yeah, in Utah, in Utah, yeah. But I have done, you know, I've done some events outside of Utah, you know, Colorado, Wyoming. I just got back from Wyoming a couple of weeks ago. I'm doing an event up there. So I do travel outside as well. But yeah, people wanna look for me. It's scott chamberlain.com. Or.
Ryan Roberts (44:37.379)
That's it for there in Utah at least, right? Okay.
Scott Chamberlain (45:01.58)
Also, I talked a little bit about the Utah School of Magic. That's just the Utah School of Magic .com, www .utahschoolofmagic .com, all one word, or just scottchamberlain.com and they can find.
Ryan Roberts (45:16.533)
Okay, awesome. We'll put that information in the show notes as well down below. Otherwise we should be set. Okay, it was awesome talking to you. I loved it. Thank you, Scott. Absolutely. All right, take care of yourself. See ya, bye.
Scott Chamberlain (45:20.026)
Yeah. Thank you.
Scott Chamberlain (45:25.306)
Yeah, thanks.
