2004:

Chat Ed : Hello everyone welcome to our live webchat with Derren Brown who, in his show Trick of the Mind, demonstrates his unique powers of psychological illusion, misdirection and showmanship…

Ross : Hello Derren
faux : hey Darren
Rebecca : hi
stuart-to-win-bb5 : Hey derren!!

Derren Brown : Hello everybody, this is Derren. I hope you enjoyed it tonight and didn’t prefer Friends!

Len_in_Cornwall : Hello Mr Brown!
Hen : yo
Dingwall Demon : what the hell do you say to the people who answer the phone????

Derren Brown laughs

Curiosity : fall asleep and you’ll get money!

Derren Brown : I don’t tell them that there’s £50 under the phone book and that they are on TV.

Chels : Hehe

Derren Brown : I’m round the corner on the mobile phone and am giving them a lot of confusing instructions to put them into a bewildered state. I also know that the more suggestible people, who will respond best to it, are also the sorts of people who would pick up a pay phone if they hear it ringing. Then I finally give them the instruction to sleep and it comes as such a release from the confusion that they collapse.

Maloney : you know Derren that you spell your name wrong!!

Derren Brown laughs
Derren Brown : Err… no that was the name I was born with, I grew up with a lot of people calling me Darren. But Darren Brown is a fairly shit name for someone who does what I do so then I started to insist on the proper and superior spelling of it.

dave grayson : fantastic show the other night in york, how has the tour gone?

Derren Brown : Oh that’s very sweet. It has gone very well and for anyone that’s interested I’m at the Palace Theatre in London from June 7th – thanks for the opportunity for the plug!

jay12 : hello derren, what number am I thinking of??

Derren Brown : Ha is that the answer, is it 12?! If it’s between 1 and 10 it’s probably 7. If it’s between 1 and 100 I’d guess 47?

jay12 : no 7
jonny : wow

Derren Brown : Excellent, there you go!

SevenRedCarrots : I always wondered, when negotiating with C4 for your shows do you always seem to get an extraordinarily good deal, which the c4 people don’t quite know why they offered you?

Derren Derren Brown laughs
Brown : Yes they do always look a bit bewildered and whenever I walk into the Channel 4 building clapping my hands about 12 of them start ballet dancing and making chicken noises. It’s very embarrassing for the rest of the staff.

chico nuelle : wots the seance all about?
MrMofo : Can you explain some bits of what you will do in the séance?
Lewis : What sort of things are you going to do in the Séance? Strange phenomena or actual effects?

Derren Brown : I met somebody the other day who had absolutely no idea what a séance was. I had to explain it. I don’t believe in spiritualism and I’m very sceptical of those sorts of things but I want to see to what extent the techniques used by Victorian mediums will work with a modern sceptical audience.

Laurence : can we expect the séance to work for us at home?

Derren Brown : Ideally you should get together in small groups and you will need the following items: a pen and paper, a wine glass and all the letters of the alphabet written on separate slips of paper. I don’t want to give away the content of the show… I hope people will take part in it and the success of it at home will depend on how much people are able to concentrate and how much they invest in taking part, but I think the results will be quite interesting. It will be quite a scary show I think and certainly the 12 people who will do the séance with me in the show will be taken to the edge of what they can tolerate. And that’s just my breath

Flying Nun – away : Full glass of wine?

Derren Brown : Empty wine glass, flying nun, you’ll need to invert it for the ouija board.

Tagete : Hi Derren, How do you actually do this stuff?
Matt : how did you come to learn your skills?

Derren Brown : I am slowly removing my trousers…
Derren Brown laughs
Derren Brown : What was the question?

sazzledolly : ooooh!
hannah : are you wearing blue underwear?

Derren Brown : I started off as a hypnotist at University but I thought that a career in stage hypnotism would be tacky and I didn’t fancy being a hypno-therapist and listening to people’s problems everyday.

Myself : or is it green?
DaZzIe : its green

Derren Brown : What underwear?!

Glitteryem : Rawr!

Derren Brown : Yes, so I got into close-up, slight of hand magic, but it was always the psychology of it that interested me more. Over the years I tried to combine the psychological skills associated with hypnosis with the thinking and showmanship of the magician.

adam wom : Can you tell us an impressive party trick?

Derren Brown : Oh! Good question… I refer adam back to my previous answer of 7 or 47.

meemossis : WHAT ARE TOMORROWS TRIPLE ROLLOVER NUMBERS?

Derren Brown : 31, 16, 9, 27, 48 and 3

rushreaper : lmao
SevenRedCarrots : What do you do to unwind when not astounding the masses?
Elf : Derren what is your all time favourite tearjerker movie and why?

Derren Brown : I paint to unwind, which I haven’t done for a long time but I’ve just managed to start again. Tear jerker movie…. oooh there is one I know, ohh what is it?? Oh actually the last film I can think of that was a great tear jerker was Romeo and Juliet. I don’t know if that was my favourite but it was certainly a good one. I also used to weep avidly at Sunset Beach while watching it in my dressing gown!

Darren : I love your paintings… I guess 100 is too little for me to buy one. hehe

Derren Brown : No Darren, you can have a small piece of paper that I’ve looked at, for £100.

Joe! : lol! Smooth
kate16 : bargain
M Williams : I want to know about the stopping people trick

Derren Brown : Aah! What do you want to know?

Spoc : that was incredible
M Williams : how you did it!
charlie : how do you do it?

Derren Brown chuckles
Derren Brown : I can’t remember it was such a long time ago.

Abi : So can you tell us about the vinegar then? Did you influence him, or did he influence you in the choice?

Derren Brown : I influenced him. If you watch the trick back a couple of times you’ll see how I’m doing it.

deegg : has any of your tricks for money ever lost you anything/??
MattWhitby : The vinegar was easy.. you said ‘Salt and… ‘ and then the brain finished the sentence and remembered it.
darkskiez : Salt and errr crisps
Skullz : I know the answer to that one
Big Stuff : salt and ‘ cough ‘

Derren Brown : Yes, the first night of the tour that I’ve just finished (but will be reprising in the West End from June 7th at the Palace Theatre!!) lost me £500 when a very nice lady chose the wrong envelope!

ChristopherCroydon : That’s not to say that mapping out his route wasn’t impressive of course!

Derren Brown : You’ll have to come and see the show in the West End from June 7th to understand what that means!

red : Are you deliberately controversial or do you just aim for something interesting to watch?

Derren Brown : That’s a lovely question. I absolutely aim to produce something that I would want to sit and watch myself. I think that my desire has always been to create ‘magic’ which isn’t patronising, appeals to one’s intelligence and has a maximum impact, hence the sometimes controversial premises of the stunts.

DeeDoubleU : what was going through your head at the end of Russian roulette?

Derren Brown : Russian roulette – ‘Can’t wait to read the papers tomorrow!’
Derren Brown chuckles
Derren Brown : And enormous exhilaration and relief.

jordan : do you consider the vast majority of people susceptible to your techniques?

Derren Brown : It’s more about my flexibility than anyone’s susceptibility. I have to change what I do to work with whatever a person is giving me , but some of the routines where I’m not doing what I say I’m doing are obviously a lot easier. My methods and approaches vary widely from one routine to another.

Elessar : Why haven’t MI5 hired you yet?

Derren Brown grins
Derren Brown : I do get asked by police groups, private detectives (for some reason) and business management seminars to talk on what I do but because what I do is a mixture of genuine psychological technique and the art of showmanship and trickery I would feel awkward trying to give a serious talk on it as if it was some sort of science which it’s not – it’s all in the performance, so I tend to only perform it rather than lecture on it.

Julia : If you ruled the world what would you do first?!!

Derren Brown : Erm… I would order a re-run of Sunset Beach!

blackdog5 : ha ha
Klink : yay! sunset beach rox!

Derren Brown : And I would order Robert Kilroy-Silk to apologise for himself to the nation. And that’s all I can think of.

naughtynurse : can we mind control you to shave the beard off?
hjs : nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Derren Brown : Ohh, I grew the beard when I was hypnotising students, when I myself was also a student and I needed to look a bit older so as to be more credible.

dark6 : The beard must stay!!!

Derren Brown : I shaved it off for a brief period of 2 weeks late last year but I found it so hysterical that I didn’t get any work done.

Atari : Are you planning another tour next year? will you come back to Ipswich?
Chels : Parrots are lovely
caz : come to Aberdeen

Derren Brown : Oh God yes! I am planning a tour for next year. And of course Ipswich people are the warmest, most delightful and sexually attractive people in the country and you couldn’t keep me away.

Ken : Will you be my best friend?
Ken : Could you kick Blaine’s ass?

Derren Brown laughs
Derren Brown : I would love to be your best friend and I’ll kick Blaine’s ass next time I see him.

Katy Whyte : Hi Derren….your show amazes me! Id really appreciate it if you could tell me if any harm is going to come to me and my friends on Monday for this séance. I’ve never done one before!

Derren Brown : No harm will come to you Katy although you should be careful not to bump into anything if you turn your lights out.

jws : have you ever had any psychological tricks pulled on you by someone else?

Derren Brown : I got stopped in the street by somebody asking for charity pledges – the type where you give them your bank details and they take so much a month… unfortunately the girl recognised me and came over to say how much of a fan she was and after 20 minutes of excited flattery gave me the spiel about the charity. I never give to charity as I am resolutely unpleasant as regards that sort of thing, but, was embarrassed and cowardly enough to pledge £50 a month for …I don’t quite remember what.

nibbs : rapport got you… nice
parrots_are_lovely : aww

Derren Brown : I’m now wondering how long I can decently leave that before cancelling the standing order. It’s a very difficult situation now to avoid.

Georga : 5 months
monkeybradders : Sunday?

Chat Ed : That’s it! Thanks for coming and talking to us Derren!

Simon57 : awww
Kaz : noooooooooooo!
Craigd : c u derren
faux : Bye Darren. Peace, Love n’ Skullduggery.
Kesker : cya amigo
Donna : bye!!!!!!!

Derren Brown : It’s time for you all to go to bed and prepare your séance kits and I must go and have a nice long…

JJ : give me the power

Derren Brown : relaxing…

joyceness : xxx
chico nuelle : bye

Derren Brown : poo.

Daniel Pickering : xxx

Derren Brown giggles

Lazzle : thanks dereen

Derren Brown : Night night.

Derren Brown leaves the room