Supershells

Supershells

A benchmark Three Shell Routine by Gary Ouellet, released in 1979 as Volume 1, #2 in the Camirand Academy's Masters of Magic series. The routine is framed by a presentation in which the spectators share in the magic, rather than being victims of it (i.e., "suckers"). Sleights taught include The Pinky Pinch, The Sidesteal Sequence and The Pinky Acquitment, and the routine features Ouellet's now-classic "challenge ending," wherein a spectator places a shell over the pea, then covers the shell with an overturned flower-pot saucer, and finally covers the saucer with an inverted glass bowl. Another empty shell is then covered with an overturned (clear) glass, and even though two spectators pin both the bowl and glass down with their forefingers, the pea still transposes from one shell to the other.

Supershells has been reprinted twice since its initial release, and variations by other magicians have been published, including Marc DeSouza's "Shell-Act," from DeSouza's DeCeptions (Acer, 2001).

Here's a video clip of Ouellet performing Supershells, from The Very Best of Gary Ouellet, Volume 3 (L & L Publishing, 2003)