USA: Magician and illusionist David Blaine admits being 'a little bit crazy' while attempting his latest stunt.
Record ID:
784740
USA: Magician and illusionist David Blaine admits being 'a little bit crazy' while attempting his latest stunt.
- Title: USA: Magician and illusionist David Blaine admits being 'a little bit crazy' while attempting his latest stunt.
- Date: 26th November 2006
- Summary: BLAINE SPINNING IN GYROSCOPE ABOVE CROWDS
- Embargoed: 11th December 2006 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Usa
- Country: USA
- Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz
- Reuters ID: LVAEJ9EMCT67HEGBMUW4AIG4CVQI
- Story Text: It may not come as a shock to people familiar with David Blaine, but the American stuntman admitted on Tuesday he might be a little bit crazy as he began his latest act.
Blaine had himself hoisted 50 feet (15 metres) above New York's Times Square, where he will remain twisting and turning while shackled to a gyroscope for three days.
On Friday he will attempt to escape just in time to take 100 underprivileged children on a holiday shopping spree in a promotion for a large retail chain.
Asked if he had to be brave to attempt such a stunt, Blaine replied, "Or you have to be a little bit crazy."
Blaine's previous stunt in May had him live in a fish bowl near Central Park for a week with scuba gear, then attempt to hold his breath under water for nine minutes while wriggling free of chains. He came up two minutes short.
Before that, Blaine spent 44 days in a box suspended over the Thames in London, 61 hours encased in a block of ice and one week buried in a coffin.
"I always come up with them and try to create something I think will be fun and visually different," Blaine told Reuters while spinning every which way.
A crane lifted reporters to eye level with Blaine in a small parking lot in the Broadway theater district just off the main part of Times Square.
Blaine's latest stunt drew mixed reviews from New Yorkers on the streets below.
"I think he's nuts to stay up there for a few days without eating or drinking anything. It seems to me like, you know...but I guess you know it's for a great cause so you know if a hundred kids get to be put on a shopping spree than I'm all for it," said Amy Posa.
But others felt this attempt by Blaine doesn't measure up to other recent stunts he's attempted.
"Besides just spinning around in the cold weather I mean, nothing else, I don't think it's scary at all," said Marco Pinto.
"Only thing I see with this is he's going to be that he's going to be there for a couple of days and it's going to be cold. It's not that crazy to just hang there with all the harness," said Chavarlo Cohen.
For the next three days Blaine said he would battle his greatest challenge -- dizziness -- by focusing his vision on a fixed point. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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