Magician Performs Body Split Magic Trick | Penn & Teller: Fool Us | The CW

So we find ourselves at a historic moment for magic. In 1921, almost exactly 100 years ago, one of the most famous magic tricks of all times was invented by a man named P.T. Selbit. You probably don't know his name, but I guarantee you, you know his trick. He was the first person to saw a woman in half. There he is now, the first. Now, this trick has changed throughout the years, but one thing remains pretty consistent, and that's the fact that it is almost always a woman who gets inside the box, but it's mostly a man who ends up taking the bow. I'm here to tell you that tonight, I'm actually not the real magician when it comes to this trick. Instead, there is someone else who deserves all your applause. So with that, please help me welcome back to the stage, Naomi. Many magicians do sleight of hand, but I'm doing something a little bit different. I guess you could call it sleight of body. It requires lots of skill, incredible patience, but most importantly, it demands complete focus. From the theaters of vaudeville to the stages of Las Vegas, millions of people have seen a woman get cut in half. But tonight, without any boxes or blades, you get to see something even more remarkable. You get to see it from the inside. Take a look. Now, of course, a little privacy does feel courteous. So you'll need to use your imaginations to fill in the specific details. But with this light, you'll be able to see the center of Naomi, right where this sleight of body needs to occur. Now watch carefully, because it happens in just a single breath. Breathe out... and in. But see, that right there is just the minimum required to safely pass the saw blade right through the center, and that's just the start of the process. Take a look. Breathe out... because with a little extra focus, Naomi can actually amplify the effect. Watch. Breathe in. But tomorrow you might think that's a trick of the light, an optical deception. Of course, Naomi is far more skilled than that. So it feels time to finally give credit right where credits do. Take a look. Now we're only going to ask her to hold this for a few moments longer, because as much as Naomi can make it look effortless... Removing most of your body is not as easy as you might think. That's true. So get one last good look, because we're going to let her relax again. And watch carefully. She comes back just as quickly. Take a look. Breathe in. How do you come up with your ideas? Both of you, or...? Yeah, we definitely work together. I'd say my background's in engineering and design, so for me, half the fun, once we have an idea, is going into the shop and building it and figuring out how to make it real. And then getting on stage together, we rehearse it, figure it out. We have a whole team of folks, too, that helps out. Wow. It's a lot of fun. He has a long background in magic. I'm more from theatre and circus, so with his magic expertise and my sort of outside, different viewpoints, it makes a nice team. Nice. And how long have you guys been working together? Three years? Three years, four years? Nice. See, I feel like, for me, I would wait at least five years before I allowed someone to saw me in half. We rush things a little bit. Yeah, you're kind of rushing into it. All right, should we talk to those guys over there? Let's talk to those guys. Hi, guys! Remember Ross? I do. Well, I think we should maybe talk to Naomi, because you said she's the big cheese on this. She did the slide of body, which is absolutely true. It does take a great deal of control of the body. It also takes other stuff. And you mentioned Selvitt, who did start, but you kind of left out the Bamberg family, which was Akito and Fu Manchu, who also did a version of this principle much inferior to what you've done. You've really done the best version, really gorgeous. It's a really hard trick to do, because everybody knows what you have to do to accomplish it, and you've got to accomplish that in a way that fools people. And I think you did, and if we hadn't taken this great submarine ride, Tony and I took a submarine ride, and we were cruising around on the submarine, and I bet you love that submarine too, don't you? I do. I think we probably both love submarines. I will say, when I think of some of those submarines you may have been riding in, I'm thinking of ones from, like, way, way back when. Before electronics. Pretty different from those submarines. I have no idea what any of you are talking about. So, do we have a verdict, everyone? I think we'll let the submarine captains decide. Why don't we go to the judges? They are in Alice's ear. So what's happened here is they've gone to the judges, and the judges have made a decision. Got it. And the final decision from the judges is... you did not fool them. But you entertained us all. Thank you so much. When I came here two years ago, the audience at the Penn & Teller Theater was the largest audience I'd ever performed for. That was nuts. My show in San Francisco used to be a very underground experience. Now we do shows far more often, and in a real venue, significantly more legal. San Francisco is the perfect place to do magic. You get audiences from the world of technology who are all about understanding how things work, so when they see something that they can't figure out, they actually love being pushed out of that comfort zone. The illusion we're doing tonight is a reimagining of maybe the most classic plot in magic. We're actually really celebrating the fact that women on stage make this trick possible. The fact that we're performing for Penn & Teller, for me, is more exciting than anxiety-inducing. It's something new. I don't think they've seen this. I hope they get as excited about this trick as I am.