My Interview with The Amazing Kreskin - Catch Him On Tour in NY/NJ This March and April

Growing up in NJ, I have always been in awe of The Amazing Kreskin and his ability to read people's minds. I often saw him on television guessing what people were thinking, and it astounded me! I would sometimes try to emulate him by trying to guess what my sister or brothers or friends were thinking.

When I received some information informing me that he was going to be performing locally, here in New Jersey, I decided to send some interview questions to him to see if he would reply and to my delight, he did. Here is my interview with The Amazing Kreskin.

Q: Explain who you are to those who may not know you:

A: The title the Amazing Kreskin has become a signature throughout my career. I deal with presenting to my audiences from high school, university to senior citizens all over the world, demonstrations as a dramatic form of entertainment illustrating the tremendous potentials of the human mind, areas that we don’t really fully understand today. While I don’t consider myself a psychic in the sense that I don’t look into crystal balls, the perfect example I can give is one I often refer to in a scene in the Riviera in Las Vegas a couple of years ago. To show my ability to perceive the thoughts of members of the audience, I have a mass of people concentrating on different ideas, thoughts, addresses, friends who have passed etc.

The audiences can number anywhere from a private affair of 30 to 40 people in a corporate banquet hall or home, to 10 to 20 thousand alla the outdoor state fairs. In the scenario at the Riviera, I mentioned 2 names that kept coming to me. This elderly gentleman stood up, and I asked him how he knew these people and he explained that he and his wife are not from Vegas, they are vacationing from another part of the states and had as part of their trip planned on seeing my performance, but the 2 names mentioned were not friends of theirs but 2 dogs whom they have at home and love dearly. I said, did you not say to your wife I wonder if Kreskin can tell me my army serial number? He was standing in front of a small table that all the guests have in front of them for their drinks, and he slammed his fist down and said damn it I did, but that wasn’t even here, that was 2 hours ago at dinner, and he was having dinner at the hotel he was staying at and it was not the Riviera.

I asked him who knew his army number and he pointed out something that almost any man or woman in the armed services would similarly state and that is he never mentioned it to anyone, he never talked to his wife about it, there was no point in her learning it and he doesn’t think since he’s left the service that he’s mentioned his army number. If he didn’t know it I would not have been able to tell him the number. By looking into a crystal ball I’d certainly get a cloudy mess because I find I get headaches if I look into crystal balls. I simple told him to concentrate, step by step over each digit of the number within a few minutes I gave him all of the digits in his army serial number, and he was in World War II. I was only able to do this because he concentrated on each of the numbers.

Q: How long have you actually been performing?

A: My career has been most of my life starting even in grade school. I was experimenting on reading my classmates thoughts, especially at show and tell on Fridays, when my grade school teacher in 4^th and 6^th grade would often set aside 20 minutes of that period for me to attempt to tell my fellow students. As in one case I asked the whole class to think of different movies that they’ve seen, pointed to Gloria Palmer who was sitting in the back and said are you thinking of a movie that you haven’t seen recently, and she said yes. It turns out that she’d seen the movie months ago at Christmas time and I ended up giving her the exact name of the movie.

By the time I had left grade school and was in Jr. High I was already performing for private and small gathering in NJ and PA. Often they were clubs such as Polish/American clubs and very often they were gatherings of people put together in their homes, since word of mouth had spread about my abilities. As I explained to people wishing to get into show business, I was making big money then, $5, then it went up to $15 for the 45 minute or hour, because in those days my programs were about that length, but in show business, if anyone goes into it thinking of a $15 minimum wage, my advice is that they get out of the business, because you may have to work for nothing to prove yourself. That’s the whole history of entertainment.

Q: What was your most memorable performance?

A: As far as memorable moments in my career around the world, they are endless and could fill a book, since so far I’ve written 20 books. It’s been estimated a couple of years ago that I’ve flown a little over 3.5 million miles. I could fill a list of important memories, certainly my first appearance at Carnegie Hall was very special in my life since it has had such esteem through the decades, and walking out to a theater filled not only the orchestra but the 4 balconies was very dramatic, but you can imagine the experiences I’ve had in the 5 ½ years where intermittently I was flown by the American Oil Company to Saudi Arabia to perform in different areas of the country for the westerners, US, Canadian and English people who were living there because of their work of the oil company did not have Western entertainment that being highly restricted in the country and I was brought in to perform all over, mainly for Westerners, and did not realize it until 3 or 4 years later, that sneaking into the theater were members of the royally. The traveling in a country which wealth is a small word, since it’s so common, that was a dramatic experience.

One of the dramatic moments in my life was the day, possibly the 2^nd year I was in Saudi Arabia, that my room was called and I was told to come down to the lobby at 12 noon. This was about 10 in the morning and we did not leave until around 2 or 3 in the afternoon and then I would be driven to other parts of the country and in later years flown to other areas. So it surprised me that I was asked to come down into the lobby and they made it very clear about the time. About 5 minutes to 12 I left my hotel room, occupied by who knows how many thousands of people from all over the world because it was Westerns and Europeans who were in business in Saudi Arabia that would stay there when they visited. It was a strange experience when I got to the first floor and I was greeted with tremendous silence. The bottom line is there was no one talking, no music.

The hundreds of people who were usually in the lobby were not there, in fact, the lobby was empty. This didn’t make sense, no one behind the desk taking reservations, no workers and I saw in the middle of this gigantic lobby a table with a light standing next to it and a person sitting there. She motioned me over, gestured for me to sit down and started to talk to me in broken English, her vocabulary was somewhat limited but was obviously a very intelligent person. She asked me about her future and I explained I don’t for tell the future and I explained what I did, and we talked for about 10 to 15 minutes. I did not see anyone else, but in the distance down the hallway I saw two heads popping up every once in a while, no one else. When she said goodbye to me, I got up and went back silently to my hotel room, and did not discuss this with the people having me travel, including my guide who accompanied me each of the years through Saudi Arabia,

I never mentioned it until a year later. When I did mention it he explained to me he did not know about this, but he knew what happened, I said I don’t understand, he said there is no doubt in my mind that the person I was having this meeting with was a member of royalty and in order for her to meet with me, every single solitary human being in the hotel, workers and guest were made to leave and wait outside the hotel. The two heads I kept seeing in the distance were her body guards and until I completed my conversation with her, no one, workers, hotel staff were in the hotel because there was no doubt in his mind that I had been sitting with the daughter of the King of Saudi Arabia.

Q: Have you ever been asked by any stars to personally perform for them?

A: As far as working with celebrities and stars, I’ve worked with hundreds of them, not only in private parties that they put together but also on television. Having done 88 shows with Carson and his personal interest in my work made him very supportive of me. Before we ever met, he saw me on an appearance on the Steve Allen show ,earlier days of television. When I walked out onto the television set the lights in the 1960s were very bright and blinding. I kept looking over at the camera as I’m walking toward Steve Allen who is standing on a dais at the other end of the stage, by the time I got to the dais I tripped over it and almost fell on my face. Steve Allen who was a comedic mind but also a very serious writer didn’t ridicule me, asked if I was ok, and I said I’m fine, then he said well lets go on now and I had about 25 minutes on the show, this was early in my career.

A man was watching the show at home, he had taken over the tonight show, and it was Johnny Carson. He saw the incident of me tripping over the dais and six or seven weeks later he created a character on his show called Carnac the Magnificent. Carnac came on the show, it was Carson of course, with a dilapidated turban and as he came to the desk, he tripped over the desk and that was yours truly, he had borrowed that incident, so it became a legendary story. As far as books are concerned.

Q: Tell us about your new book

A: My last book, the 20^th, is titled “In Real Time” is now available on Kindle through Amazon.com etc. Since people are not reading hard copies, I’m very excited about the availability of the book on Kindle. It deals with my predictions of things to come around the world and in our culture, though I’m not a fortune teller, since I’ve done so many appearances reading the thoughts of audiences I have a sense how changes are going to take place in our culture. The fact that a loneliness is starting to accrue among young people in their late teens and college age etc., and sociologists are now agreeing with me, that the quality of having a close friendship has disappeared in much of young people’s culture and now I am told by sociologists could be as many as 30 percent of college students that do not feel they have a real friend. Part of the reason being that our communications systems are such that people are no longer listening to each other, confiding in each other, they are not reflecting upon remarks, so much of the communication is done through the internet, through cell phones and I’ve been quoted everywhere “show me a person who has 200 friends on the internet and I’ll show you a very lonely person.”

Communications of a deep level in breaking down in Western culture. My book deals with vast changes that are going to be taking place worldwide and in the United States, and this is not necessarily to blame a political movement and what have you, it is serious cultural changes and one of the real alarming factors is that man has literally no secrets left anymore. Information about the person can be accrued literally in a matter of minutes by people all over the world, and it is happening, China is doing it and so are other countries so we are in a different setting today.

Q: You’re on the app Starsona, where else can your fans go to find more fun and interesting ways to interact with you?

A: I’m also on the app Cameo, of course on my Facebook page and fans can email me at amazingone35@aol.com. My website: www.amazingkreskin.com has much more information about me and my performances on it.

I’m getting a kick out of the inquiries people are asking me to do on Starsona and Cameo. To wish loved ones Happy Birthday or wish certain changes in their life, to congratulate them on steps they make in their work and career and exciting experiences they’ve had. The remarks that I return to them are usually brief congratulations and you are showing signs of greater success or the way you are handling the issue you are bringing up tells me that you’re going to be able to take challenges later in life, and I often warm people who write and are frustrated that we learn more from failure that we do success in life and don’t turn your back on failure, learn to climb over it and you have a better chance on achieving unrealized advances at this time.

Q: What do you plan for the future?

A: I am now 84 years old and I’m extremely busy in my work. My last vacation was 14 years ago, but there is no question the most exciting new step in my career is one I did not foresee, plan for, or realize months ago, but almost anyone in show business can understand the tremendous thrill and excitement that this has brought to me because we have forthcoming now a motion picture on the life story of yours truly. No, this is not a documentary, it’s a movie in which actors will be playing me in my adult as well as my childhood life. The playwright who is doing the script is Patrick Coppola, and you can imagine that I am almost ecstatic.

Be sure to catch The Amazing Kreskin locally this March and April!