Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson (sometimes) - David Blaine

Episode Date: February 12, 2025

Woody Harrelson introduces Ted Danson to his good pal, world-renowned magician David Blaine. Ted asks David how he caught the magic bug and about the stunts that have given him the most trouble. David discusses his influences, the relationship between acting and magic, and how fatherhood has changed his outlook. Bonus: David calls out Woody’s motorcycle riding skills. Watch a video about how David Blaine spent 7 days underwater, narrated by Woody.To help those affected by the Southern California wildfires, make a donation to World Central Kitchen today.Like watching your podcasts? Visit http://youtube.com/teamcoco to see full episodes.

So there's probably almost no other stunt that you're afraid of. Oh, no, there's one that I'm highly intimidated by. That'll be my final thing. Well, let's rephrase that. Let's rephrase that. Welcome back to Everybody Knows Your Name with me, Ted Danson, and Woody Harrelson, sometimes. Today, we're with a close friend of Woody's, the world-renowned magician, David Blaine.

Have you seen David's stuff? I don't need to convince you that he's one of our greatest living entertainers. For decades, he's performed some of the most unbelievable feats known to man, from his famous street magic to death-defined stunts like catching a bullet in his mouth or standing in a block of ice for days in Times Square. Still he finds new ways to amaze us. I loved meeting David through Woody. I went into this intimidated by his powers, but he just bowled me over with his humility and his warmth.

Just see for yourself, the amazing David Blaine. Well, thank you for having me, Tate and Wood. Woof, my jaw's dropping because we just watched you do a lot of your stuff in the entire studios in awe. You said you saw somebody in a train station or a subway or something when you were four doing magic? Yeah, well I grew up in Brooklyn with a single mother and she was always trying to take me to things like museums, libraries, Coney Island, and so often I would see street performers,

like guys doing rope tricks or the sword swallowers in Coney Island, and so often I would see street performers, like guys doing rope tricks or the sword swallowers in Coney Island. And I think just my fascination began early on. And then I think just having a deck of cards at the age of four or five and holding it every day. And one day a librarian walked me through a very simple, self-working mathematical trick, and I performed it to my mother and she went to this day, my favorite reaction of all time. Every time I did a trick to my mom, it was like, I decided, so I became kind of in love

with the concept of getting people to react and magic was the best way. And so slowly I tried to understand how to make it stronger and stronger and what I realized was like, less is more. The less there is of me, the more there is of the person that I'm doing magic to. I'm jumping a little bit because I also know that later on you went to the neighborhood playhouse, which is in Sandy Meisner technique,

which is a little bit of what you just said. Don't do anything until someone else makes you do it. It's about the other person. That's right. Or living truthfully in a given imaginary circumstance, which was like pasted on the wall. And my teacher, Richard Pinter, who was amazing, had me stand up on stage,

because there was no means for a close-up magician to make a living. So I was like, okay, well Orson Welles had this quote, a magician is an actor playing the part of the magician, so let me see how far I could push it. And I was doing a trick on stage and I was reading the pattern of the trick. And the pattern of the trick is ridiculous. It's like very wordy and it was like really, and the teacher, Richard said, really read

that. And I kind of stopped because I was alone on stage, and I actually read the script, and it was so silly that I started laughing hysterically. And Woody, that's something me and Woody do all the time as we laugh into tears. So I was laughing, and the more I would laugh, the more I'd try to read it, the harder I would laugh. And I had snot coming out of my nose, tears out of my eyes.

And when I finally was done, Richard said, look at everybody. And everybody was on the floor kicking their legs, laughing hysterically. And that's when I understood that like you don't need the patter and less is more and trying to be honest, which is ironic, in magic makes it that much more effective. So that was like a pivotal moment for. But I never even knew that you went to the, the, that playhouse and yeah. So you, but you were thinking to become an actor possibly. Well, there was no means for magic.

So I was like, what do I do? Entertainment is my thing. So I, I, yeah, it bought, I got lucky because I was invited at that point to go onto Jon Stewart's first pilot of his first show. And I did a magic trick and that was kind of the beginning. So it kind of paved the way for what I actually did my whole life. I didn't know that.

That's what started it. Yeah, but I would say that- And what was the trick? On Jon Stewart, I hammered it, it's terrible by the way because it was my first thing. My second thing was with Conan by the way. My second public appearance. Wow, our boss. Yeah, and and that was where it worked, but I tried to force a card. First of all, I just wanted to do the card tricks, but the producers of Jon's show said no, no, you have to do something bigger. So I was like, what could I do? So I was like, okay, I'll come up with something bigger.

And I force a card. They take the card. Uh, John took, I think the seven hearts or seven of diamonds. And then, um, I hammer a nail into my nose, which I just learned. And then when I pull it out, it starts bleeding. And then it says seven of diamonds or hearts or whatever on my shirt. So it was, it was, it was terrible, but it was the beginning of kind of mixing real things with magic tricks. And I got lucky because after that, you know, I was doing this illusion trick that I tried

to do to you 30 years ago, the levitation. And so when I put that on TV years after I did it to you, but when I put it on TV, YouTube just started exposing all of the secrets or Google. So it was immediately revealed everywhere about how the levitation trick works. And it was like an on the fly thing that I used to do. And it kind of led me towards the realization that in order to do things that are more interesting when revealed, the behind the scenes of it has to be much more compelling. So the method of something has to be more interesting than what they're seeing almost,

based on information becoming so available to everybody. And when I did the levitation too, I used to floor everybody with it unless they knew magic and I did it to Woody. He's like, I know what you did. That was the beginning of our friendship. What does Google do to you when you hold your breath or freeze yourself? No, but that's when I started. Suck on that, Google. No, but no, no, but still, it was funny because being a magician,

all of the Google, YouTube, all the outlets were revealing, saying, oh, I had secret tubes, I had this. So I was basically pushing my body to the breaking point. But because I'm a magician, nobody believed any of it. They all thought it was a trick and it started to go away. But then in reflecting back, I realized that that was a lucky thing because if it was just what it seemed,

if they were like, oh, he's holding his breath, it's not as interesting as what's the secret technique to what he's doing. So it's almost like that kind of question mark made it more entertaining. Did you play sports? Because you are incredibly athletic, obviously. No, I wasn't a good athlete, but I was good at endurance. So I did play sports.

I moved from Brooklyn to New Jersey, and when I was 10, I started playing baseball. And I wasn't good at the actual sport. I was born with my feet turned in, I had asthma and all that stuff. But what I started to realize is that I could endure more than everybody. So even in baseball, we'd have to run and it would be long distance run around the field when anybody would do something wrong. And that was easy for me. So I was able to kind of early on just push the extreme.

And then I would wear like a t-shirt all winter when it was really cold. And I would just, I kind of developed a resistance and an ability to endure things. Purposely? Not with a plan, but yeah, purposely. Just, you know what it was? To like toughen myself up, like to be good at something.

And what about the lack of sleep thing? When did you start? No, no, I'm terrible at that. I've been experimenting with that, but I'm terrible at it. I, you know, you've seen me, I fall asleep in the middle of meetings. Like as soon as I like I'm near bed, I'm out. But I mean, you, but you have done like, I mean, I've done like five days you stood on top of the thing for 70 something hours, and

you said you were having hallucinations. What was that called again? We got it here. Sleep deprivation. No, but the name of the vertigo. Oh, vertigo. Yeah, when I stood on the pillar and the buildings behind me started to look like animal heads and everything.

Yeah, that was crazy. But basically I think the hallucinations kick in from sleep deprivation, no food, dehydration as well. And then the hallucinations come quickly because your brain is trying to get you out of that situation. So it tries to fool you. And yeah, you came and helped me when I was in electricity, when I started to hallucinate

and you talked me through it a little bit. And that's when you need really close people that can kind of guide you or tell you it's okay. And then I wanted to do no water. And you were like, you need to take water. And you were right. Because once it starts to go bad it just gets worse. Wait, describe that moment between the two of you. I don't quite understand.

Well, you know, he does things that, you know, it's like it's a mixed bag having him as a good buddy because he does things that I really seriously worry like a mother, you like, I'm like, I can't believe you're doing this, dude. Don't do it. You know, but that one scared me because you're up there with all that. Well, you can just- I was standing with a 75 pound chain mail suit and I was standing within seven Tesla coils

that were zapping me the whole time. And what happened was the first thing is your feet start to expand, so it's edema. So they start to swell and it ripped through the chainmail and then nobody could come up there and I started to get shocked through the bottom of my openings where my ankles were. And then the catheter, I usually have a truckers tube, which I use, but that was a whole nightmare situation because of the O3 that was being released by all the Tesla coils.

They were pumping air up so I wouldn't breathe the O3 because it's a silent death, you don't even know. So every time I'd go to the bathroom, the air would do this. So I was like, okay, I'm done drinking water. I'm not going to drink anymore. But then the hallucinations became awful. And that's when Woody was there. And he was talking me through it. And he's like, you're drinking water. And so they lowered the coils enough. And my doctor came up and they kind of sealed the legs, which was good. So now I was semi-okay, but then I was drinking electrolyte water through a tube and when I spit it out, it hit a coil and the coil went right inside.

And I think it bruised my heart wall and I think it did some pretty good damage to me, actually. And your best friend here is laughing. Because he's getting damage every direction all the time. That's true. I just dislocated my shoulder again. But that's got to be a pretty serious one, you know, getting a million volts into your intestines. Yeah, that was a big one. That was a crazy one. Obviously, because you're not an idiot, you have doctors, scientists, people going, yes. Yes, maybe.

But they're always so over the top of their caution that that almost becomes the danger. So there's a balance. You know, there's one part of it that's like you need to explore very diligently, very carefully with the best team, which I always do. So I never just jump into something. First, I have to see proof of concept on some level, and then I have to see somebody do it successfully, even if it's not as far, and they say, oh, can I endure the same thing?

And then slowly I test it and have a team of experts around me. I never just do it alone in a way that like, I can suddenly kill myself. So, and that's something that's important to me. And obviously, I have a daughter, I don't want anything bad to happen. And I don't want kids to ever copy and just think, oh, he just does these things.

So I really do have have, and luckily when I do any of these things, I have the most incredible team surrounding me. Right. I saw also you trained with the Navy SEALs. So was that, cause they're all about endurance and not letting their mind tell them, oh no, it's too cold, I'm too tired. That's right. Yeah.

And that's great. All of those things where you push yourself, where you build up the ability to just keep pushing yourself a little bit further and a little bit further, all add up when you're doing a breath hold or anything. And were you David Blaine then? So they said yes? Or did, how did that come? Cause not everyone can go train with Navy SEALs. No, but I think they, once they saw that,

that I can hold my breath, then it became, you know, they were happy to help, I think. Cause I was pushing, I was doing seven plus minutes, just straight breath holding before I even started with them. So I was doing good. Yeah, you know, I was with them one time and I like, I did a thing, we were at a pool, I forget whose house it was,

and you probably don't remember this, but anyway, like I went like down and back and like maybe back again, like it was quite a feat. Yes, I believe. I came up, you know, and everybody's yeah. And he's like, listen, I bet you I could do, you know, you did a three links. I say I could do a five. Five.

And then I'm looking at him like this fucking guy. He says, I bet I can do six. And I'm like, geez, is he out of his mind? Seven. He says I can do six. And I'm like, jeez, is he out of his mind? Seven, he says, I could do eight. I remember that. And I'm like, no, I'm not doing the bet. I'm not doing the bet. But of course, you know, I didn't,

at that time I didn't even know that you could do the breath hold. You'd never brought it up or shown it or anything. You must be Woody's most frustrating friend because you are competitive Woody. Well, he wanted to try to. Yeah, we can compete. What do you owe me? $200,000 from the backgabbing?

Oh, you also owe me like $600,000. No way, dude. So, so when I, one time I was with Woody and and he said, I gotta do this jump off of this cliff. And he says, I gotta go do this jump. So I'm like, okay, great. So I was training for Vertigo at the time. I saw I was jumping into cardboard boxes repetitively. And I watched him do a, I think a two and a half, right?

Or it was a brand, I think it was a brandy. No, it was one and a half with a full twist. Right, one and a half with a full twist. And he landed straight on his face. If I'd had another foot, I'm good. You would have been. I'd been good. Yeah, that's probably true,

but he landed right on his face. Both eyes bulged out. Blood was coming out of his nose. It looked like, I mean, it was so disturbing. So I'm like, I ran and got ice and I'm putting ice on him. And everybody comes like, we're going to call a doctor. He's like, I'm not doing a doctor. I'm going to fix this myself, right?

No, no, by the way, sorry. One eye was bulged out. the other was just black and blue. So what he did is he is he's trying to fix out he blows through his nose and the other eye just bulges out. Now both eyes are like this and he can't see he's like looking through this little slit and and I'm sitting with him because I'm just like disturbed, but also trying to take care of him. And I just got whiplash from a jump. So I was sitting there and he says this to me,

looks up, he can't see, he's like, because I gotta fucking do it again. And he can't see, he has no eyes, and he climbs back up to the top, and does the fucking flip, and lands it perfectly. And he's like, if I didn't do it, I'd be afraid of it. So I had to do it. And then he was fine.

Then we iced, and you know, his eyes were sealed shut, probably for a while. But that's when I realized that, no, he's insane. I would wait, I would do it again, but like three months later. Yeah. You were in ice for 63 hours, that 2000 special, frozen in time. Now, what inspired you to do that? This is pretty like nobody had ever heard of, uh, you know, well, no, I was buried alive before that.

So I was in a coffin for a week, but that was really easy to do. And then I went on a, uh, a vacation kind of like a work thing. And I remember I saw a bug in a piece of amber. And I think that's when I was like, oh, that looks beautiful. What if I'm an ice? And that was the beginning of it. But I also spent winters walking with just a t-shirt

and I was really good at, and I would always get into really cold ice baths and things like that. So I was really good at that. And I really liked it because I could push it. I was really good at that and I really liked it because I could push it. I was so- Can I ask without taking away the magic, the combination real and magic,

that what it allows the human body to be able to do that? No, no, the ice wasn't pressed against me. It was carved out a little bit. It was basically like an igloo. So it was really standing up the whole time with the cold air just radiating against my skin. But it happened to be a warm November. So it was the end of November, it was supposed to be cold.

And because it was so warm, it kept dripping on me and it was like torture because the ice kept dripping. But at the same time, the air that was blowing through was 68 degrees or so. So it made it semi-bearable. And then the turning point happened at about hour 55 and just lights switched off and I was tripping out of my mind and it became the most horrific. Endeavor to this day, basically more difficult than 44 days with just water,

which when I did that, he also did the same fast. He had vegetable juice and things like that, but he did it with me. So I did 44 days and, uh, and I think you did exactly 44 or more. Yeah. Well, not like you. I didn't do 44 days water. Remember I was trying to get you, I was saying, well, why don't you just take a little bit of a, you know, like something.

Yeah. Like, like a blue green algae or something to just kind of sustain you. No, you would not do that. I'm not taking any other. That was just for the purity of it. But luckily I think the fact that I just had pure H2O with nothing, no minerals, nothing, my body went into starvation mode and I think that's probably what allowed me to recover, I think fully for the most part. So I feel

like if I would have cheated and my doctor who was one of the top starvation experts in London, he thought I was cheating the whole time even though they were collecting my urine and doing all that stuff. And when I came out and went to the hospital, he put me on the IV and my phosphate levels went crazy, like that. And I almost went into shock and could have died. Then he was like, oh, this is all real.

And so they started to collect real data, blood samples, everything. And then he published a paper on the refeeding syndrome, which is after long starvation, when people are refed, that's the part where they can suddenly go into shock and die. Wait, it's 44? 44.

You can die during the fast as well, but I'm saying the refeeding part is the most delicate part, I think. Wow. I never thought. But is 44 days like a record of on water? I just like the number 44. No, there's a lot.

Bobby Sands, lots of hunger strikers and people had done 66. Yeah, but he died. Yeah, but he went 66 days 66. Yeah, but he died. Yeah, but he went 66 days, I believe, until he died. But I used a lot of their data. I mean, you get the record, but there's a downside. I also had a physiologist who used to work at NASA, and they searched real records and he found documented examples of people surviving 43

days to full recovery on just water. So I was thinking if I bulk up, which I did, which messed me up to this day, and then come in and have serious fat reserves, then that should help significantly. And if I isolated my movements and I did it publicly, I've always been obsessed with fasting because every stunt was a fast. The Buried Alive was a seven day fast, but I had to fast before that for a week so I wouldn't go to the bathroom. And I started to love fasting like you do.

And I started to realize that the reason monks and gurus and everybody does fast is not to harm themselves. I don't recommend it for anybody, but they do it because it does bring a different state of mind that's incredible. It changes your outlook. And it cleanses the body. Exactly. Me and Joe are on a cleanse now, day 10 juice.

Really? Yeah, juice and fruit. Adding the fruit really helps. I need to do that, obviously. It's great, because I never did that before. I've always been too extreme. But now I add the fruit and you just juice it in your mouth. Back in whatever the early 1900s,

they called it fleturizing. But you just juice it in your mouth so it becomes just completely liquid. Oh, so you mean you're still chewing it? Yeah, I'm chewing fruit. Yeah, that's great, because then your saliva, the enzymes help break it down more efficiently. That's great.

That's great. But it works just as effectively. Yeah, the same. That's great. So anyone out there who's thinking of doing a juice fast, think about adding the fruit. And chewing it well. Yeah, you got to really... And also, it's a multiple reasons why it's good because the fruit actually goes through your body and helps bring debris out.

So it's helping with the cleanse itself. It's also getting you used to the concept of every time I want a, this is a concept I want you to imbibe every time that I need a snack, let it be fruit. You know? That's good. You know, and so anyway, that's good. It's kind of changes the mindset. Yeah.

Yeah, that's great. I should be asking both of you this, but I'm asking you, David, do you think that you will know when, oh, maybe I shouldn't do this, this extreme anymore, or are you an addict? You know, do you? So, it's funny you ask that. I always looked at my cutoff point,

is I'm very superstitious, which is part of the 44 days. The 44 was, from a ridiculous point of view, it was my birthday is 4-4. So I've always been obsessed with four four, which is eight. But anyway, so Harry Houdini, who's always been my favorite

and my big inspiration for so many things, he died when he was 52 and he kept pushing his body and he stayed very fit. He was just always, he was rock solid. And he had done the water tank collapsed on stage because he didn't want to disappoint the audience even though he had a severe stomach pains and then was rushed to the hospital and died. So I always, I always thought 52 should be, that should be kind of the mark of you don't want to keep pushing to the point that you break. So I was thinking of a few more years of pushing

and then I'm gonna shift to probably what people like. See we do more, which is just magic and bringing it to hospitals and kids in hospitals and all that stuff, which I love doing and you get the best reactions and you feel the best after. So, but I love the push. So I love pushing myself, but I don't wanna push myself to the point where you actually break.

What's the stunt you wanted to do, but you just haven't done, or you just thought was too extreme? Well, that one that I was unable to do was sleep deprivation. Oh, I was saying, sorry, I was saying that the idea of fasting was that started with buried alive, and it changed my brain in such an

incredible way. And then I did the ice, which was more fasting and then every stunt had fasting secretly as part of it. And I was like, Oh, I'm going to do something just about fasting. But the other thing that the stunts had was sleep deprivation, extreme sleep deprivation, because if you fell asleep in the ice and your face goes against the ice, your face would freeze and you'd get frostbite,

it'd be really bad. And then when you peel it off, it's like, whoosh. Yeah, then it's no good. Half your face peels off. But so, sleep deprivation I started to play with. But that one is, That's a tough one.

That's a tough one. And that's why they do that when they torture people, try to get secrets out of them. That's right. And they don't recover. The ones that were tortured in North Korea, the Americans that came back, it was a sleep deprivation that they could... Because when the brain is slipped, that's the scariest thing to me. And, um, and yeah, like you said, it's, it's, it is the most effective form of torture, I think.

Yeah. So, so I wanted to do sleep deprivation. I was obsessed with it. And the, the doctor who's the head of Stanford, who's like the top expert, his name ironically is doctor de ment. And the guy, and, and, and the guy who tried to do it that was a radio DJ, his name was Peter Tripp. And at the end of a week of sleep deprivation,

his brain didn't fully recover, apparently. Yeah. I don't think there's any upside to that particular stunt, because, you know, first of all, people are like, oh, well, that's pretty cool. Oh, he's gone seven days, really cool. And then you never come back. Yeah, then you're gone.

But what I did like about it was there was a guy named Randy Gardner, who Dr. Dement documented, I think in the late 60s or mid 60s. And I don't think anybody's broken it since, but it was about 11 plus days of sleep deprivation. And then when you think about 11 point, I forget what the exact numbers, but about 11 and a half days, I believe is a million seconds. So I got obsessed with the idea of a million seconds without sleeping because that's just like a cool. And then

when I spoke to Dr. Deming, he said, yeah, but we're going to check for micro sleeps. And I was like, okay, there's no way I'm going to do it because that's a cool, and then when I spoke to Dr. Deming, said, yeah, but we're gonna check for microsleeps. And I was like, okay, there's no way I'm gonna do it. Cause that's a microsleep and you fail. So it's really hard to- Wait, describe, I don't know what you mean by microsleep. Like as soon as you do that, your brain goes out, that's a microsleep. As soon as you, if your eyes just one second,

yeah, if your brain's not active, I guess. So, and plus it's not active, I guess. And plus, it's not worth the repercussions. That's the one that I, the big one that I was into that I kept trying and just couldn't get there. And so there's probably almost no other stunt that you're afraid of. Oh, no, there's one that I'm highly intimidated by, but I'm working diligently on putting it together. It'll be my final thing, secretive.

Well, let's rephrase that. Let's rephrase that. There's one that's a culmination of everything that I've ever done that I'm obsessed with, but it's a pretty over-the-top, ambitious idea. So I'm trying to put it together and it'll be my last one. Before you move on to card tricks. That's right. Yeah. Not my last one. I'm going to die. My last one before I do move on to card tricks. That's right. Not my last one, I'm

gonna die. My last one before I do the... We blame it on irony. Yeah, in his podcast he said it. I wanted to ask you about, you know, like of all the things that you've pulled off that most people thought impossible, the one thing I thought might be impossible for you to pull off, fatherhood. I knew this was coming. I knew he was gonna go there. And you are the best father of all time. You're such a great dad.

I just love how you are with Des. It makes me so freaking happy to see you guys together. I'm very lucky, she's my best friend in the world and yeah, it's the greatest gift in life and it's funny because when everybody shows you their kid pictures until you have a kid you don't understand. But when you have a kid you're like, look! Like every screensaver on your phone, everything, that's it. My greatest achievement is anything that she does.

Yeah. You want to see magic? Look! Well, I mean, just watching, because earlier we watched a performance of Dessa that she did with her father in Vegas, and to see his pride over it at Raft afterward and hugging her, I mean, I started bawling. It's so beautiful. First off, just astounding what's her talent and how beautiful and, you know, out of the blue, during COVID, she learned how to do this.

But by having a daughter, I learned something that I'd never realized, which is the female brain versus the male brain. So overall, there's no way that I could ever focus like she does. She'll do four hours of training, but no breaks. If I'm watching, I have to beg her to take a sip of water. If somebody walks in, it doesn't matter.

She's just like this. And that's something that I think I could never, I could never ever, ever, if my phone, but I'm like, wait a second, I'll be right here. You know, if somebody walks in, that's like a 10 minute, but, but, but when she trains and she just started training during COVID, it, for her, it's just to see so when she Decided that she would would like to do something. Yeah, it's a highlight. It was a highlight of my career Period and you know the audience and in the turn, but there's nothing that I was more proud of ever When it's me, I'm like, oh, why'd I do that? That's like that was terrible. But with her I'm like it's me, I'm like, oh, why'd I do that? That sucked, that was terrible.

But with her, I'm like, ah! I was like, what? Is there anything that you go, oh shoot, I need to handle this in my life? I just, you know, to me, you're like Superman. I'm listening to all these things and the self-control. No, no, that's specific to like, that's the thing is people say, oh, you could do this.

No, I'm good if like I have a specific thing and there's a window to it. So if I'm like, oh, I'm gonna go 44 days with just water. Then I understand the beginning and the end and then it becomes numbers. And I can relate to that. Or if it's I'm gonna hold my breath for, the record is this number,

I'm gonna hold it for this length, then it's numbers and it's a numbers game. And I break it down, I first do half. And then so if I'm holding to hold it for this length, then it's numbers. And it's a numbers game. And I break it down. I first do half. And then, so if I'm holding my breath, let's say I was going for, my actual record was 20 minutes and two seconds. But, so first I go for like, okay, let me get to 10 minutes. Then when I get to 10 minutes, I'm like, okay, this is a starting point. And then I start from there.

And then I start counting seconds and breaking it all down. So I think it's a slow training and long process, but eventually it becomes the numbers. But you really have to, because when I've done breath holds, which I started doing those Wim Hof things in the morning, obviously much shorter breath holds, but for me, long, like a minute and a half,

two minutes is a long breath for most people. I saw you do four minutes or 345 or something. I think, yeah, around three maybe. No, in Hawaii. Was it? Anyway, I don't know. But the point is, like, you know, you have this thing. In fact, I had it in Hawaii.

I got, I was out surfing with Matthew's son, who's a great surfer by the way, at Livingston, and, or Levi rather, and I got, you know, I shouldn't have even been out there. They were big waves onshore. We were out at a reef and it was huge. Anyway, I got eaten by the wave and I'm down what felt like forever. And so when I'm down there, I'm just like, I needed a breath because the way it happened is

I was trying to get over the lip of the wave because it kind of a rogue wave came and didn't make it. The guy next to me just got over. I just didn't make it. And I'm just like, you know, you're like, and then suddenly no breath. Like your breath was coming every millisecond, you had another breath, and now suddenly no breath, and I start fighting, like I need to get that next breath, so now I'm fighting, burning more, which is worse.

You need to let go. But anyway, the point is that when you're doing these breath holds, there's something, there's shit going on in your brain that is just demanding another breath, right? Yeah. And you have to be able to still your mind. That's right.

But what is the technique of just saying, oh, it's just pure bliss, you know? How do you do that? Well, I mean, that starts, I think, with training. So it's a slow process. So it's not like you can just hold your breath all of a sudden, you have to understand like what's going on. So you have to understand that the CO2 buildup

is the reason that you need to breathe. It's the pain that it's trying to trigger you and give you the signal that you need oxygen. But really, the O2 is there and it'll shunt, it'll rush towards your vital organs and protect you for much longer than you think. So once you learn that it's a CO2 buildup that's making you feel like you urgently need to breathe,

then you can learn how to build up a resistance to CO2, which is, I mean, that's making you feel like you urgently need to breathe, then you can learn how to build up a resistance to CO2, which is, I mean, that's the main first step. Your brain resistant? You mean resistant to the... Yes, CO2 resistant. Your body can endure much more efficiently. Like when you go into an ice bath, the first time you go in you can sit for a minute. The next time you can push it and go to two minutes and you can go three minutes. You know, and they used to say bite the bullet, right? Cause when they would do the, you have your arm blown off from a cannon and they had

to use a hot rod to seal everything. Yeah. They would give you a bite the bullet or breathe. So you can't breathe when you're holding your breath, but it's the same principle. It's like acceptance and then focus on what you're doing. And then, you know, know that you have the ability to push much longer than you think. The opposite is panic.

So if you panic, suddenly it makes it much more difficult and you'll black out quicker. And is there a physiological thing that happens with panic, like more CO2 or? Yeah, everything. You're not efficient... Yeah, everything. You're not efficient. The most efficient way is to just be calm and wait.

If you're connected to something, if you're trapped on a coral or something, you have to release yourself, then that's different. You do need to panic and get out of the situation. But if you're just under, you can just wait. And if you wait, it'll be much more efficient. When I was a kid learning how to hold my breath, I was like five years old at the YMCA. And like I said, I was born, my feet turned in, so I couldn't swim efficiently and I would lose all the time. But what I started to do is just not breathe. And then the older kids

would come to watch and I would just hold the ladder and stand or water. And then what I realized is I could hold my breath much longer because they would have to go up and down to get their breaths, but that's not efficient. Going back down is not as good as just holding and being patient and just waiting. So I learned young how to just hold, wait, and be patient. And I think that related to everything that I did. So I think early on I kind of learned that lesson

and then it's even friends that I grew up with, they all remember that like, if we were wrestling and I was like under a mattress, I would just stay there. If I was covered and I couldn't breathe, I would just relax and wait. Then I'd pull it off and they would all be claustrophobic, but I understood from just early on breath holding, you just wait, you be patient, and things will change. But at this time, like when you were a kid doing those kind of things, did that bring

ridicule from the other kids or did that bring respect? No, no, no. That made the older kids come watch and think that was really good that they couldn't beat me. Yeah, because I couldn't swim. I wasn't good at the other, the swim races, but I was good at holding my breath, which made me better at swimming, but which really made me better at a skill that was unique. And I think that's kind of been like the arc of my entire life.

Now what about, because you're living now mostly in Paris. Yeah, about half the year in Paris. Which is frustrating because it used to be every time I'm in New York, I can look you up, we have the best time, but now a lot of times you're in Paris. So what do you think? New York, Paris, which do you like better? Well, I love both cities. I'm not particular about places, but my daughter's in school in Paris, so I love to be there

because I'm with her, but I'm, I'm pretty happy. And I've never been specific to which city is, which came first, your daughter went there or sorry. And well, my daughter was, was born in New York and her mom is French. So when, when that's, it was three, we decided first of all, and I agree, like there was a great school that she would be able to, I think, you know, get into and it's academically incredible. I had friends who, their kids went there and so she started early and went to this incredible school which gives this amazing education And yeah, and I love France.

But I also love New York. I also love every state in the US I've been to. So I'm not particular about location. I kind of think like wherever I am, I'm pretty happy. But you also didn't want to go on the record saying, yeah, I like Paris better than New York. You didn't want to say that. I mean, you got to say the architecture.

How's the architecture better? The architecture is spectacular. Okay. Yeah, but come on, New York's alive 24 seven. It has so many incredible museums, parks, adventures, every now, come on, both cities are amazing. Hey, I'm not saying, look, New York has great things to offer.

You went with New York, sorry Paris. No, no, I have to say, I love both equally. I'm not even joking. It's not like a political, but it's just actually I love both equally. It's true. I do love that you can walk everywhere in both cities. That's also pretty incredible.

In LA, you cannot walk, but I have a motorcycle here to get around, which is pretty amazing. And in California, you're allowed to like to... Yeah. Yeah, like they let you go through the... You drove here, right? That was your bike? Yeah, yeah.

Electric. He takes my motorcycle, and the first thing he does is like... Boom! Puts it down? Yes! Right away! Well, yeah, I did have a little... Because it was much smaller than I... Twice!

One time... remember that time, I borrowed his bike. I came and got it and I was working in upstate New York just a couple years ago. And like he gives me pieces of the bike back. You know, I'm not kidding. He'll take my bike and be like, oh, here's your mirror. It fell off and I dropped the bike and here's your taillight. It also fell off. I'll have pieces. I have pieces of a bike.

I take pictures and send them to him years later. I said, do you want to borrow anything else of mine? He backed out of our gate up in Ojai, took it right off the track. You know, it was days before I could get the fence work. Yeah, yeah. Sorry, I had to ride off the track, you know, it was days before I could get the fence work. Yeah, yeah. Sorry, I had to bring it up. Or one time he stayed at my apartment in the city

and I don't have many things. I have like a few pieces of clothing. They're all identical and sometimes there's just one and it's like then therefore it's my favorite thing, but also I like one dressy coat. And I come back and I had to go do a gig, so I need this coat. I'm looking at work and then I find a note and it's in, it's in some rolled up

dirty coat, I think it was a hemp coat, but it was like all ripped and I think it was crazy and in the pocket it said, uh, Hey, I left you this. I was thinking, I took one of yours, but I left you this. This is my favorite jacket. So I'm so happy to leave it with you. And I had a gig. It's true. That's a true story.

I have that. That's a true story. Was there just one second of, fuck that guy. Just one second. No, no matter what, you always just let it. No, I have fucked that guy every other day. Then you read the letter and you're laughing and it's hilarious and yeah, I show up without a coat

so that means I have no pocket. So normally to do magic, you need lots of pockets. Yeah. You know, if the pockets are kind of like, it limits the amount of magic, but it's fine. I improvise. It was okay. That's a true story.

I do sound kind of bad, isn't it? No, by the way, I never saw that coat again either. Yeah. Neither did I. No. No. No. No.

No. So he says, I owe him all that money. It's like, here, we're good. That coat, that motorcycle, we're equal. Oh my God. So you're spending a lot of time in LA because you have to be on this coast. Well, no, I'm with Desim. We've been here for the whole month.

And yeah, we've been looking at what we can do. And she's been training and I've been working on magic and been working. We went to Rio together where we're shooting this episode for NetGeo where I'm trying to find people that do really difficult, crazy, almost magical type things. And then the idea is if something is done by one, it could be done by others. So I find people around the world

that have these unique abilities that have been passed down from centuries or generations and basically convince them to share their secrets with me. And Dessa came and I lit myself on fire and jumped off a bridge and of course re-messed, dislocated my shoulder, but it was fine, broke a rib, but it's okay. But it's okay.

How's Dessa when you come up and she can see you going, eek, eek, eek. Well, I kind of don't show it too much. That's when you come up and she can see you going. Well, I kind of don't show it too much. I think I'm lucky with that. Yeah, but I don't show it anyway too much. I kind of laugh it off. It's the old stunt man thing. You okay? You okay?

Sure. Walks around the corner, steps into an ambulance and goes to the hospital. Oh yeah, what was that? Oh, that was, was that Houdini, some magic movie where the guy does this trick, swallows poison or something, and then just walks out,

gets into an ambulance or something? Not Houdini. The one you just said. Wasn't Houdini, it was. I don't know. Anyway, some magician movie. Well, nevermind, if no one knows about it. I just remember that scene.

Hey, let me ask you. Not, obviously you love what you're doing, but what is the best gift you get out of your fame, your, you know. I think I'm so lucky because as a magician, you can just do magic everywhere, anywhere that you go to anybody. But why does that delight you, besides you're good do magic everywhere, anywhere that you go to anybody.

But why does that delight you besides you're good at? Oh, it's my favorite. Besides being with my daughter, that's my favorite thing. It turns people into children. Yeah. The joy of a child. You get to see the best of everybody. You do magic and everybody lightens up and it doesn't matter where, what's the truth.

I mean, I'm so into it that if I see two people fighting, like in Paris recently, I'm so like, I'm so into it that like, if I see two people fighting, like in Paris recently I saw a guy get into a fight with a delivery guy on a bike and a guy delivering packs and the guy has his bike lock in his hand. So this is up and there's a whole line of cars. And by the way, I had like my ankles all messed up. So I can not very functional at the moment. So you hobble over.

Hobble right in the middle and they're about to go at it and I just pull out my deck of cars and I'm like, pensez en carte. And the two guys look at me and they're so confused that the fight is over. And I do that often. But any time that I can do magic, and by the way, the reason I'm often late is because if somebody asks me to do magic, it's very difficult for me to say no. But by the way, I also look at it as like it's a constant, you can always be practicing. And every time

I do something I learn something and I change it and I tweak it and I add to it so you know you're not trying to be good but you're always trying to be better and better has no ceiling so you can always keep doing a little bit to always get better better and and and I think that's part of the joy of being a magician I think that's the highlight of being a magician. For me at least, you know. But you go and you like, you go to like burn wards and the hole in the log. Hospitals, underage prisons, everywhere, yeah.

That must be really gratifying. The most, the most, beyond it. And now I have Dessa doing it as well and she's performing and she's way better than me of course. But anyway yeah that that is the most gratifying thing. It's just when you when you when you can distract somebody who's dealing with a lot and kind of break that difficulty and make them smile make them laugh. That is the highlight of being a, for me,

of being a close-up magician. You know, I was, we were watching you out before we started the podcast. You were entertaining the troops here. And one of the things that struck me is like, we're so used to being thinking we're in control, thinking we've got life figured out, and to be so fucking delighted when we sit

there and watch you and have, I mean watch you like our nose was two inches away from the cards and be just stupefied to have no idea is that's also a gift to people. Go, you don't know everything and enjoy this moment because I'm gonna startle you. But even when it's a skeptic, when you have somebody that's like trying to figure it, that's also good because it adds another little shift into the performance, you know? So it's like any reaction for me is amazing.

Like even the non-reaction, the thinking reaction, the skeptic reaction, or the great big reaction, like all of, every reaction to me is just incredible. And- Thank you, Sandy Meisner. Yeah. That is Sandy Meisner, neighborhood class. Yeah, yeah.

Richard Pinter was the guy that walked me through it and it was amazing. And even when I was working on my stage show, I would get all of his feedback and I think that really helped. Yeah. I think- So feedback and I think that really helped. Yeah. I think that... So cool.

I think that... Looking... I think reactions are truthful. And when I shoot my shows, my TV shows, for me it's like I'll work for a year to make one hour and it's because if I don't believe the reaction and that all came from neighborhood playhouse or just listen and react, but if I don't believe the reaction, then I don't use the footage. So no matter who it is or what it is, if I don't like and don't believe that it's a full honest reaction, then I don't use it.

And when I first started, people weren't, you know, the cameras, they would kind of act up for them. So I had to learn how to break the ice carefully with the camera far away and start by doing something that would like engage them and then slowly have the camera go. Because I wanted that truthful reaction. And even when we did Magic with Kanye, I knew that he was gonna be really tricky. And so I knew if I took the ice pick and shoved it through my hand,

it would like then break the ice, literally. And then you could do the other magic because you've already said- And then he's like, don't bleed on my- Yeah, dude. I was like, I don't know if I'm gonna bleed or not. I was like, I have no idea, which made it more, you know, scary, I guess. But, um, but, but...

Don't do this at home. No, but do not do any of it. That's for sure. But I think part of the reason that I shifted over to doing those things that are pushing the body or doing things that are a little, you know, I think like threatening to see or, or scary or into is because now that people are so used to the whole magic and reaction thing, it's almost like to get the reaction, you have to really break their sense of disbelief.

You have to make you, so you have to do something that's so visceral and so real and so believable that then you can apply magic to it once you take that defense layer down so that, you know, so it's, it's been a constant and, and, and, and my stage show, I was trying to figure out for years, how do you, how do you bring those reactions to a stage? Because when people on stage, they can often act up or so it's like, oh, if I, you know, eat their ring and then put a hanger down my throat and pull their ring out, you can't deny it.

So I started to search for magic that no matter how skeptical you are, if you're watching up close, you have to believe it and then therefore you'll get a real reaction. I haven't heard a word you said after hanger retrieving the ring, I'm going, wait what? It's a wild one. What? It's a real reaction. I haven't heard a word you said after Hanger retrieving the ring. I'm going, wait, what? It's a wild one. It's a wild one.

Your first special, and I assume the one that launched you into fame was, yeah, the Street Magic. What a... Well, that one, no. That one, not a lot of people saw that. Really? Yeah, it was when I buried myself alive, which was after that, that suddenly

Everybody knew you. Yeah, people took notice and then, yeah, and then. And what was that evolution like from, you know, anonymity to just suddenly everybody knows you and of course they're also all wanting to test you and wanting you to... Well, it made it a little... The one difficulty was as an unknown magician, when I would walk up and kind of play that character of a magician

who's doing these weird things, people would really react. But as they started to know me, they knew I was a magician, which means then therefore, oh, he's making a TV show. So it made it more difficult actually. Like when I'm in another country and I'm doing magic and people don't know me, it's incredible because I could really push that, you know, I could play with that line of like, oh wait, what's going on here? And I could really, you know, blur the line of what's, you know, what's real,

what's not, and then the magic to me is that much stronger. Sounds like it doesn't hassle you then, your fame. No. Yeah, that's great. No. Will people let you play serious card games? I think that's Ricky Jason. I think it's a catch-22.

If you win as a magician, they say that you cheated, and if you lose, they say you're a bad magician, so I just avoid. But I'll play back Evan with him and get really serious and we have friends that we play with. But no, I would never cheat to win. It's not fun. It would not be interesting. I one time when I was young, I showed my friend that was like doing a college game. I was like, I'm going to take everybody's money, but then I'm going to return it. And then I showed, I beat was doing a college game. I was like, I'm gonna take everybody's money, but then I'm gonna return it.

And then I showed, I beat everybody dealing with cards, and I was like, by the way guys, here's what I did. I cheated you all. And then I, but I just wanted to see if I could pull it off. And it was very easy to pull off. And they were a little alarmed and then cool about it. No, no, no, yeah, yeah. They were like, that's crazy.

You really just did that? Yeah. And a magician could easily cheat at cards, for sure. Yeah, yeah, they were like, that's crazy. You really just did that? Yeah. Yeah. And a magician could easily cheat at cards, like for sure. It would be very easy to mark a deck or rig a deck or set a deck up in a secret way and then put it into play. Yeah. Yeah, my dad was quite a card shark

and that's how he used to make a lot of money doing that. And it's like, and so me and my brother one time says, well, so how do you do it? And he goes, I cheat. Wow. That's amazing. That is amazing. That is amazing. So that's why you were so like, like skeptical when I was first doing magic to you a long time ago.

Not skeptical, but you were like, you were on it, but then what would happen is he would be in on it. So when I would be doing magic to other people, he would act like he didn't know and he would kind of egg the outcome on. So it would like, and he'd be like, ah! LAUGHS

But it still delights me. Even tricks I've seen, you know, a million times. It delights me because, you know, just their delight, their joy, it's really one of the great things you can do for people is magic. Because it brings them back to that childhood simplicity and love and excitement and all the pure things that we kind of lose as we get older.

So I love how you can just turn a whole gaggle full of felons into like joyous children. You know what I mean? What's also funny is, I know he was a magician, but were you a magician ever? No, no, never. Lots of our friends, lots of people that we know when they were young were magicians. So it's like there's a lot of people that did magic here and there.

So it's like there is some sort of, and I think magic, it's one of those things that, it's logic, it's performance, it's math, it's science, it's estimation, it's so many fun things to combine. And what I lock onto immediately is the connection to acting. I mean, when I see a performance, I don't wanna see what's coming in advance.

What delights me when I see a performance is, whoa, I did not see that coming. That is amazing. And that's all you do is delight people. Thank you. Yeah, this has been the best, best hour. But I want to say one, I want to go back in time. One more second.

So I just, so you were saying, what stunt would you not do? And I said, the one I couldn't do is sleep deprivation. He won't bring me to plays anymore because I always Yeah, so you don't want to bring him to a play But the other thing is just the amount of time that we spent laughing into hysterics just Just on the ground rolling around I can see the crying with laughter The other thing is just the amount of time that we spent laughing into hysterics.

Just on the ground rolling around, crying with laughter so many times. I really, you've given me more laughter, I think, than anybody I know. So thank you for that as well. Thank you. But thanks for coming, buddy. I really do appreciate it. Thank you. It's been a great hour.

It's been a privilege. It truly has. It was an honor. Thank you. Really been a great hour. It was an honor. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That was the magnificent David Blaine. It was so surreal to experience his magic in person. And thank you, Woody.

Thank you for sharing him with me. It was kind of funny. I said goodbye to David after we were recording and I went and washed my hands and got my stuff and was gonna leave. And this was like about 15 minutes later, he was still, David was still in the building entertaining about 20 people doing sleight of hand for about 20 minutes.

He cannot not perform. It was amazing. I wanna mention David's new documentary adventure series coming soon. It's called David Blaine Do Not Attempt, produced by Brian Grazer and Ron Howard. On the show, David visits remote communities across the world, looking for local practitioners of magic.

The show premieres March 23rd on National Geographic and streams the next day on Disney+, and Hulu. Don't miss it. That's it for our show this week. Special thanks to our friends at Team Coco. If you enjoyed this episode, please send it to someone you love. Be sure and find us on YouTube where you can watch full-length episodes. As always, subscribe on your favorite podcast app and give us a great rating and review

on Apple Podcasts if you have some time. We'll have more for you next week where everybody knows your name. You've been listening to Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson, Woody Harrelson, sometimes. The show is produced by me, Nick Leal. Executive producers are Adam Sachs, Colin Anderson, Jeff Ross and myself. Sarah Federovich is our supervising producer. Our senior producer is Matt Apodaca.

Engineering and mixing by Joanna Samuel with support from Eduardo Perez. Research by Alissa Graal. Talent booking by Paula Davis and Gina Bautista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Antony Genn, Mary Steenburgen, and John Osborne. Special thanks to Willie Nathering. We'll have more for you next time, where everybody knows your name.