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I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

- Derren Brown
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Derren Brown
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It used to frustrate me when I'd get celebrities on my shows and I had to meet them as this ludicrous magician character rather than as myself.

You have to realise that hypnosis doesn't exist: it just works on people's natural suggestibility, their expectations and capacity to unconsciously role play. You can't make someone do anything they don't want to do.

I have a couple of dogs and I live with my partner. We just like to sit and read and I'm generally quite quiet.

I am a movie geek, yes!

The joy of doing the TV or something like 'Sacrifice' isn't really the process of doing it; the joy is going through this real-life experience.

I'm very interested in how we take ownership of our own stories and our own lives.

Magic, whether it's mind magic or conjuring, is about the cheapest and quickest way of impressing people, and I think if you don't grow out of that as a magician then it shows, and people get a bit sick of that after a while, because it starts to feel like posturing. So I grew out of it.

As a performer you often feel that you're the child and everyone else is a grown-up.

In recent years there's been a lot of philosophical theorising about how important magic is, and how it takes us back to a childlike state of astonishment. I think all this is just nonsense. Magic isn't meaningful or important other than how you're performing it in that moment.

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I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.