"Our profession is to walk on a blade every evening": Sergey Safronov on deadly tricks and exposing tricks

- How documentary is the story shown in the film "Deadly Illusions"?

Did you borrow a lot from your shows for the tape?

- We tried to do two things in one: a cool film and a cool illusion show.

Three brilliant actors played three illusionists - Andrey Burkovsky, Pasha Chinarev and Danila Yakushev.

Shown are real illusions that we created especially for this film.

We also transferred a lot of our experiences and internal relationships to the plot.

We've been through it all one way or another.

Therefore, the film will be both believable and exciting - plus everything, it is also interesting because it shows the real relationship between the brothers.

- Do the characters in the film look like you?

- Of course, the images of the three brothers were copied from us.

And we took many common moments from life.

For example, in our country it was really impossible to meet with assistants, to build relationships within the team.

By the way, I just met my wife when she came to work as an assistant.

We carefully concealed our relationship.

-

- Oh sure.

We are the authors of the idea.

Many years ago we came up with one idea to Georgy Malkov (film producer -

).

Then she transformed several times.

And literally four months before the start of filming, Malkov calls and says: "Okay, guys, let's shoot."

We pounced on the script and the trick development.

- You didn't think to play yourself?

- We all, of course, have an acting education, and we could all play ourselves.

But still, a feature film involves fictional characters.

The story in which the heroes find themselves is such an action thriller.

We didn't want viewers to feel like they were watching a documentary or an illusion show with certain suggested circumstances.

The actors are really talented, they brilliantly coped with this story.

We have already watched the finished film.

I can say that it worked out.

- Is there computer graphics in the tape?

Or are all the numbers shown in the show - illusions?

- Of course, since this is a movie, we still resort to computer graphics.

We also use stuntmen.

No matter how an actor is eager to perform this or that trick, the film crew cannot take risks: if something goes wrong and the actor gets injured, filming may stop.

Within reasonable limits, the actors, of course, did the stunts themselves.

There was one trick where Pasha's hero is on fire.

Here they resorted to the help of a stuntman.

But Pasha himself performed several elements of this trick.

It also burned, also hung upside down in the center of the metal trap.

It was all for real.

- The heroes of the film are in serious danger during the show.

Have you ever found yourself in a situation when something did not go according to plan?

- Well, of course.

I would like to emphasize once again that there is practically nothing invented in this film.

We both burned and broke our legs - what was not there.

That trap trick that Pasha does in the film was once performed by me.

Right in front of the audience, the trap decided to slam shut three seconds earlier.

And in flight, the sharp teeth of this trap bite and tear my right hand and knock me so to the side that I carelessly land on my left hand and break it!

And this number was in the middle of the show, and I had to finish the whole show with one hand torn and the other broken.

• © Shot from the movie "Deadly Illusions" (2020)

On stage - adrenaline, I didn't feel anything.

Only after the performance did he take off his jacket and looked at all this horror.

We quickly went to the emergency room, put six stitches.

And an hour later I was again on stage, because there was a New Year's campaign, when there are three, four shows a day.

There is just such a moment in the film that the show must go on.

If it stops, everyone will die.

Therefore, the brothers are forced to get out, overcoming pain and danger, and the opportunity to reveal the secret of the trick.

- The viewer noticed that something is wrong?

Couldn't you just stop the show?

- No, they couldn't.

I felt that my fingers were moving - it means that everything is fine, you can work ... And then, going backstage, tore off our employee's jacket, put it on and finished it off.

I think the audience noticed that not everything went according to plan.

But that's why there were such ovations: they saw that everything was for real - the artist was injured and did not give up, he worked to the end.

For me it was also a kind of challenge.

I thought: why should I stop?

We know a huge number of examples when artists, after cases even worse, worked out the show to the end.

My profession is to walk on a blade every evening.

The viewer must get everything he came for.

- It's hard.

- The profession is really dangerous.

Some people think that tricks are when the illusionist walks around the stage, waves his hands, and for him all the tricks are performed by the technician and assistants.

In the film, we wanted to show that this is not always the case.

In most cases, illusionists take risks themselves and take on the most dangerous tricks.

Without risking assistants and other team members. 

- You once told that the idea of ​​this picture was born after you started receiving threats with reference to the old code of illusionists due to the disclosure of a number of secrets.

Please tell us more about this case.

- We had an order for a program on exposing tricks.

Well, remember how the one where the man in the black mask came out - "Practical Magic".

This program was very popular.

We received an order: "Let's expose something new."

We said that we were sorry to expose new secrets and began to expose old ones.

And the illusionists, who needed a reason to find fault with us, got it.

In the illusion genre, envy and jealousy have not been canceled.

I found broken razor blades in the illusion machine.

Naturally, we understand that these are not members of our team.

It's good that we always check all our illusion, all our numbers before the show.

- Tell us about your most difficult trick.

How did it appear and what is it like?

- It's just that there are no easy ones.

We considered it necessary to do tricks in our lives that have become the classic repertoire of illusionists - liberation from the straitjacket, burial alive.

This is also a tribute to the great Houdini.

We figured out how to improve this trick, to make it even more effective.

We buried Ilya without a box.

It was winter when we filmed this trick.

The frozen ground turned into blocks of ice.

And when he (Ilya Safronova. -

) fell asleep and tractors drove on top of this land, thereby tamping it down, we already understood that Ilya would not get out of there.

Moreover, we were afraid that he had already suffered.

In general, I had to worry about 15 minutes. That's when my whole life flashed before my eyes.

• © From the personal archive of the Safronov brothers

- How do you come up with such dangerous things?

How does that come to your mind?

- To be honest, when I had my third child, I said: that's it, it's enough to invent.

Give cards, handkerchiefs, strings, birds.

All the most harmless.

Joke.

The desire to overcome oneself is born in films, in reading books, in music.

This is the desire to prove to the viewer by the example of such tricks that nothing is impossible.

That all our favorite superheroes were ordinary people who demonstrated super-endurance, invulnerability ...

Our task is to show on stage a blockbuster with superheroes - with people who can incredible.

Since I dreamed of flying, it means that on the stage I can fly.

The more difficult the trick, the more interesting it is to perform it.

- We know that you and your brothers are preparing a new show for the New Year holidays.

Can you already tell us what unusual tricks will be included there?

- We plan to make the show even more unique.

The stunts will become bigger, more dangerous.

This year, due to the coronavirus, we decided to use innovative technologies and invite the viewer to visit our show not only in person, but also in the virtual space.

Moreover, we are introducing such unique technologies that the viewer watching the show online will feel the effect of presence.

To be honest, it is very difficult, no one in our country has done this before us.

But difficulties do not frighten us.

On the contrary, there is the excitement to do this and give the viewer a good mood and magic on New Year's holidays.

I will not name the exact dates of the online broadcasts yet.

We plan that online broadcasts of the show will take place in early January.

Soon the information will appear on our website and in official groups in social networks.

- Back to the code of the illusionists.

Does it really exist?

What is spelled out in it?

What, according to this code, threatens the disclosure of professional secrets?

- This is an unspoken code.

If you are an illusionist, then you have no right to expose other people's tricks.

Only their own.

Otherwise, there may be consequences.

There were cases when illusionists were killed.

There is a version that Houdini was removed because he wanted to expose psychics (extrasensory perception is one of the varieties of the illusion genre, as a skeptic I am telling you about this. And Houdini believed the same).

Psychics were a kind of layer of illusionists.

They just didn't admit it.

Houdini declared war on them.

- Do viewers often solve secrets?

Does this happen on your shows?

- Surprisingly, adults start to dig, come up with some new technologies, how could we do this or that trick.

Children are the most attentive spectator.

Children between the ages of seven and 14 are very difficult to cheat.

And adults seem to want to deceive themselves.

If the viewer wants to be deceived, he will be deceived.

If the viewer comes to expose, he will expose.

It doesn't even matter if he was right or not.

It's still just his guess.

He was not behind the scenes.

And I will never take him backstage.

- It turns out that the success of a trick depends not only on the preparation and talent of the illusionist, but also on the viewer's willingness to believe in magic?

- Yes, for one and a half to two hours, we, together with the audience, plunge into this world.

I begin not to play, but to live like a magician.

The main miracle does not happen on stage.

The main miracle happens in the minds of the audience.

The viewer thinks out, does not pay attention to something, because his consciousness is already working on the perception of a miracle, and not a focus.

If he tuned in to it - he will enjoy it.

If he came to expose - he will also enjoy.

-

- I can say that until the 1990s (maybe up to the 2000s) in Hollywood a lot of special effects were built using the illusion genre.

Watch the movie "Maze" with David Bowie.

Every stage there is an illusionary trick.

Now, let's face it, the film industry differs from any other entertainment industry in the presence of computer graphics.

Today it is not something that can be used - it must be used.

I understand that all the special effects are so safe, easy, the illusion genre will not do it.

• © From the personal archive of the Safronov brothers

But today in the cinema it is cheaper and safer to do the trick in the old fashioned way: do not draw a flying hero on the greenery, but ask the stuntman to jump himself.

Really blow up a car in flight and so on.

Despite the fact that the graphics are popular and are needed so that no one gets hurt, in most cases, stuntmen, stunt doubles are still used ... Just those whose help we resort to in the illusion genre.

Therefore, our genres go side by side.

The task of deceiving the camera and the task of deceiving the audience are one and the same.

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“These are The Illusion of Deception, The Prestige, The Illusionist, The Deadly Stunt, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone with Jim Carrey.

Perhaps that's all.

There are not so many of them, but each of them is good in its own way.

Now Deadly Illusions will be added to the list!

- I have one last question for you.

- There is no specialized education in our business.

The circus school does not teach this.

But in principle, mastering the secrets of the illusion craft is only the first step out of a hundred that must be passed.

After all, sometimes it is not the focus itself that is impressive, but the personality that shows it.

Therefore, you need to be an artist with a capital letter to interest the viewer, hook him, make him empathize.

You need to have acting skills, and directing skills, and a subtle musical flair, and knowledge of choreography ...

Importantly, an illusionist is also a carpenter.

He develops all illusions himself.

No one will ever invent anything for him.

Therefore, we cover a wide variety of specialties.

So the secret is just the beginning.