I first saw "cold reading" demonstrated in Derren Brown's Séance, which is also well worth a watch. (Of course, Derren Brown being Derren Brown, I may only think I saw it demonstrated.) As described by Welles to David Frost below, it is "a fraudulent technique used by mediums in the Victorian times" whereby you "warm up the sucker" with facts about themselves that could apply to anyone – I have a scar on my knee! – until they're so convinced by your psychic powers, they start unwittingly volunteering infomation about themselves.
That's the theory. And Welles practised. According to various accounts – and a scene in Love Goddess (tickets available here) – he even practised on his future wife Rita Hayworth at their first meeting. It's never made explicit in our show that's what he's doing, but very little in our show is made explicit, which is one of the reasons I love it so much. And to Welles' credit – and unlike those who began it, or most famously practice it now – he only ever claimed to have "mind-reading capabilities", rather than the ability to speak to the dead. It was a more innocent time. There was a war on.
I took it as that, like a good storyteller, Welles was using what he already knew about Hayworth, and then what he was observing first-hand, to do an impromptu character analysis, which he was framing as 'psychic' for entertainment purposes but is fundamentally just deduction. I suppose that's basically what cold reading is, but approached from a narrative/acting perspective rather than an occult (or faux-occult) one. It was a very effective scene, anyway!
ReplyDeleteThanks! "But you think all the time" is a great catch-all character reading.
DeleteI've definitely met some people who don't, though!
DeleteThat said ... that is definitely not something I'd tell them to their face if I were trying to impress them, even if I *had* observed it ...
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