BY ALYSSA JONES
For those of you who don’t know who Dan Sperry is, he is often described as David Copperfield meets Marilyn Manson. David Copperfield is one of the most amazing illusionists around today and Marilyn Manson is the most incredible person to ever grace the earth, so an amazing illusionist and an incredible person create an offspring and poof! You’ve got Dan Sperry.
My task was to interview a household name via Twitter and get them to answer a few questions. I could have stuck with the same old clichés: “How old were you when you first started magic?”, “How often do you practice?”, and so on and so forth. But a simple Google search could answer anything like that. Most big-time magicians started young and practised everyday to overcome a degree of shyness. So I stuck with asking questions I couldn’t find the answer for just by Googling them, and something that could be answered in 140 characters or less.
The first question answered was “what was the last song you listened to by your choice?” I was happy, and slightly lost with the answer, ‘Looking For Strange by KMFDM.’ When I YouTubed it I discovered an excellent song with accompanying video of intensive chicken farming.
Next I asked: “If you could pick any other career (for a week or forever – it doesn’t matter), no matter how outrageous what would you pick?” Sperry answered: Disney 2D animator. You could say this proves he enjoys being behind the scenes, and is excessively creative. Sperry also plays the bass guitar. Definitely one creative man.
Other than being an excellent sport and helping me out with this Twitter interview, he also favours good characteristics with his favourite people. When asked to think of one of his favourite people in the world (including himself) and to name two good and two bad qualities of theirs, he replied said that the person he was thinking of has always been supportive of him and always “tells it like it is”. Honesty and support outweighs the fact this person owes him some money andoften has bad breath!
Lastly I asked: “If you could be any animal – house pet or in the wild – what would your choice be?” His answer: a mouse. Other than just running around and eating cheese, they have the ability to adapt to nearly every environment. Good choice Mr Sperry!
Interviews can be difficult at the best of times, but when you’re limited to fewer than 140 characters per question and answer it adds another complication. I assumed there would be a degree of difficulty added, but I didn’t realise how hard this would be until I wrote out my proposal explaining who I was, what I was doing, and asking if my interviewee would be willing to take part … and it was four tweets long. I would like to thank Dan Sperry for helping me out once again!
Dan’s website: http://www.dansperry.com
Facebook official fan page: http://www.facebook.com/officialdansperryfans
Twitter: @DanSperry
Dan’s “Moonwalk”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n7Y9EA17yQ
Card Manipulation (My favourite video of all time): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY0etQfxdsw
Featured photo: facebook.com/dansperryofficial/
