Independent Lens

James Randi

Good evening. I'm a liar, a cheat, and a charlatan.

Johnny Carson

Would you welcome, please, The Amazing Randi?

Adam Savage

The life of Harry Houdini reads very similar to the life of James Randi.

Announcer

Legendary magician and escape artist James Randi has dedicated his life to debunking psychics and other supernatural frauds.

Peter Popoff

Whoo! In the name of Jesus! Randi is trying to say this is a big hoax. Duh!

Announcer

Filmmakers Justin Weinstein and Tyler Measom peer behind the curtain of Randi's mission to expose the truth...

Randi

The gimmick is so simple, you can buy it for 75 cents in a magic shop.

Announcer

and discover even a master of illusion can be fooled. If I thought that any of this would be used, I--I would abandon the film entirely. No matter how smart or well-educated you are, you can be deceived. "An Honest Liar," now only on "Independent Lens." This program is made possible in pa

Randi

Some people cannot believe that a magician can fool them in such a way that they can't figure it out... but magicians can, and magicians do. Swindlers do. Con men do all the time. They're not magicians. They're fakes. They're lying to us. They're deceiving us. It's OK to fool people as long as you're doing that to teach them a lesson which will better their knowledge of how the real world works. No matter how smart or well-educated you are, you can be deceived.

Austin Willis

Tonight "Cross-Canada Hit Parade" has challenged The Amazing Randi, the world's only challenge escape artist, to break out of a straitjacket while hanging from his feet. Are you ready, gentlemen? Yes, sir. And now here's Miss Joyce Hahn paying tribute to The Amazing Randi's magic touch.

Orchestra playing

Austin Willis

You've got The magic touch It makes me Glow so much It casts a spell It rings a bell The magic touch Oh, when I feel your charms It's like a four-alarm You make me thrill so much You've got the magic touch Here I go reeling Oh, I'm feeling the glow But where can I go From you? I didn't know too much And then I felt your touch And now I've learned I can return The magic touch

Applause

Music ends

Woman

Hello. How you doing today? Very well, thank you. Can I bring you something to, uh-- A coffee. Oh, yes, please, for me, coffee. I'll get your coffee in a minute, OK? OK. Oh, my heart just started again. That's good. That's always a good sign. See, I've always had my battle with the "psychics," the so-called, and I use that word in quotations all the time--remember that-- um, people who are stealing money from the public, cheating them, and-- and misinforming them. That's the kind of thing that I've been fighting all my life. Magicians are the most honest people in the world. They tell you they're gonna fool you, and then they do it. Wait a minute. I have to worship here. Ha ha ha! OK.

Applause

Carson

James Randi is the author of "The Faith Healers," and he's best known as an investigator of psychic and miraculous claims. Would you welcome, please, The Amazing Randi? Here he is--The Amazing Randi.

Snoring

Man

Ha ha! Would you-- would you tell us who you are? The Amazing Randi. Ta da I was born at a very early age in a log cabin I helped my father build. By the time I was 7, I was 11. I grew up very fast. I am a magician. I always have been a magician... A conjurer, a prestidigitator, legerdemainist, liar, cheat, charlatan, and fake.

Host

You're a master magician. Some people have said that you're about the greatest escape artist since Houdini.

Penn Jillette

Randi has a real, deep, natural affection for magic and this love of deception.

Randi

A good magician needs to be a little bit of a con man, I think. He needs to be sort of a criminal type, but not have enough guts to actually rob banks.

Ray Hyman

He loves magic. He spent his whole life as a performer as a magician, so he really resents anyone applying the techniques of magic for any purpose other than entertainment, especially to convince people that there's something psychic going on here. He thinks that's an abomination. Tonight on this stage, you are going to meet a man who claims he can move physical objects using only the powers of his mind.

Applause

Ray Hyman

Now, you have been touring our country debunking psychics, haven't you? I have indeed, and I think that the solution is rather simple. Now, what I have here is particles of a white plastic which will rather conclusively show that Mr. Hydrick is merely blowing on both the page and on the pencil.

Barker

James? Ready.

Richard Wiseman

Randi says, "The public is being fleeced "via trickery. "I am going to tell you what's happening, "and, more to the point, this is gonna be a crusade to try and change the world."

Randi

If there is something to the paranormal, let's find out what it is, if anything, and, on the other hand, let's not be taken in by the claptrap that is being offered us and at our expense. I just ingested 6 1/2 days' worth of homeopathic sleeping pills. Why don't they affect me?

Michael Shermer

People say, "Well, what's the harm? Why do you care about this?" and then--then I saw Randi's answer, which was, bad ideas can cause you serious damage or death.

Carson

The psychic surgeons, they operate with their bare hands and profess to remove tumors, malignant tissue without any marks at all. And, believe me, the gimmick is so simple, you can buy it for 75 cents in a magic shop. Now, what you're about to see is a bare-handed operation...

Savage

His point isn't to tell you that something isn't true. His point is to widen your scope of vision so that you will question the things that happen in front of you.

Audience groans

Savage

Oh, no. That doesn't come out.

Laughter

Wiseman

Some people think that he's very dogmatic. It's always some tired person in a shack someplace in Idaho or Iowa, some place like that, who gets picked up by extraterrestrials, and they have their genitals examined in great detail, and they can't wait to get on "Oprah" to describe it. He's a great storyteller, and like all good storytellers, well, there's probably some information and detail in there that may not be appearing in his version of events. It is, I will say, interesting that a man who's devoted his whole life to using the tools of deception to uncover real deception has at the center of his life a--a deception.

Applause

Gordon Elliott

And welcome to "To Tell The Truth." Let's meet our next team of challengers.

Announcer

One of these 3 men pretended to be possessed by an ancient spirit. Number one, what is your name, please? My name is Jose Alvarez. Number two.

Second man

My name is Jose Alvarez.

Announcer

Number three.

Third man

My name is Jose Alvarez.

Announcer

Only one of these people is the real Jose Alvarez and is the only one sworn to tell the truth.

Music and applause

Announcer

Randi,

voice-over

I first met Jose Alvarez in the Fort Lauderdale Public Library. I offered to explain something about one of the photographs he was looking at. This is the actual flower here for the cactus... Yes. the little ones, and look at this. If this is-- Yeah. This is fantastic. Look at that. Yeah. We need to spread that around. See, this is the one I cut for the-- Alvarez, We end up spending the whole afternoon talking about our mutual interest about space exploration. I remember we looked at books on telescopes, and I told him I had such a telescope at home, the--the Questar. I went back to my friends, and I said, "I just met this extraordinary man, and I would like to meet with him again."

Randi

We were able to go out at night with a tripod and see the moons of Jupiter and all kinds of good things like that, which is always very exciting to show somebody, certainly, if it's for the first time.

Alvarez

I just got very excited, and I said, "I need to-- I need to be with him more." Ha ha ha! When I first met Randi, I wasn't aware of who he was.

Randi

OK. Tomorrow don't tell me about tomorrow.

Alvarez

Then I got a real feel of the kind of, uh, impact that he was having culturally, and little by little, I started getting more and more involved in the investigation of paranormal activities, and then he asked me to play the character of a fake channeler in a project that we end up working together. This woman is JZ Knight. She's also the one they call Ramtha, a mystical, male spirit 35,000 years old who claims to be divine. Now, you must understand that the so-called channelers were claiming that they could contact long-dead spirits, now, not a few hundred years back--no, no; they were much more ambitious than that-- tens of thousands of years ago... Indeed! and they would speak in funny voices like this!

altered voice

Alvarez

God bless you, doctor people! All right! I'll say, how are you this day of your time as you create time to exist.

Randi

They were very popular. They gave talks. Huge prices for the seats.

Man

There are often so many people, the Ramtha Organization can earn up to $200,000 for a single appearance.

Merv Griffin

And you're my first 35,000-year-old guest.

Randi

It was such nonsense.

Wiseman

Lots of people believe this is something genuine because they see something on television and think, "My goodness, I mean, surely this journalist would have checked this stuff out."

Leonard Nimoy

Trauma from a past life sometimes seems to spill over into the present.

Randi

We are conditioned to believe that things that look like documentaries but are not factual must essentially be true, or it wouldn't be presented as if it were factual. Hello?

Alvarez

The Carlos Hoax started when "60 Minutes Australia" called Randi because they wanted to prove that channelers were a hoax. On that phone call, Randi told them that you couldn't prove that someone who said that they are inhabited by a spirit 40,000 years old is a false claim. What he said to them was, "What we need to do is to create one." His name is Carlos, and you've probably seen him on television or mentioned in the press. Carlos is involved in the mystical field of channeling. Carlos, if you believe him, is a spiritual messenger who occupies the body of this 19-year-old Puerto Rican artist, Jose Alvarez.

Randi

The Carlos Hoax was to show that the media would fall for most of these stunts if they sounded attractive enough, and they wouldn't really investigate too carefully. So one of the very first things we did to introduce Carlos to the public, we made up the press package that we presented to the Australian press. We even invented newspapers and magazines that never existed by announcing the appearance of the Great Carlos at such and such a theater that didn't exist, but no one in the media bothered to check up on one of these details. They could have picked up the phone and just checked, and they would have found out that they were being deceived. Hello? It didn't happen. One man who's been making a name for himself here in the United States is now doing the same in Australia. Jose Luis Alvarez is a 19-year-old channeler. By 60 hours after we had arrived, we had 8 major TV appearances, headlines in newspapers. Everyone in Australia pretty well knew that Carlos was there. Aah! It will be astronomical in nature.

Alvarez

Frankly, I was just doing it without thinking. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to do it.

Carleton

Last Sunday, the Opera House Drama Theatre was packed with a near-capacity crowd of 500, there to listen to Carlos and to have their questions passed on to him by his disciples.

Carlos

Crystals are fossils of long ago.

Man

I know he's definitely psychic. It's something that I can feel coming from him. I thought it was great, very sincere, I thought.

Carleton

Do you believe him? Yeah. I do.

Randi

The following Sunday, "60 Minutes Australia" revealed the whole hoax.

Bill O'Reilly

He billed himself as a man of the supernatural, a man who could do amazing things, and thousands believed him, making him a celebrity, but it was all an elaborate hoax.

Carleton

The most basic fact about Carlos was that he simply doesn't exist. That's the real teaching of Carlos...

Exhales

Carleton

but this doesn't even scratch the surface of just what a phony Carlos is. I am Carlos!

Randi

Though I had just a year or so before this actually met Jose Alvarez, I was very pleased at what it did for our relationship because it--it really cemented it pretty well. We decided after that that, uh, we sort of belong together. I recognized, I guess, at a very early age that, uh, my feelings were different from those around me, and it was pretty evident to me that that was heavily frowned upon. I perhaps felt like a bit of an outsider. My father only really spoke to me twice in my whole life, calling me aside, sitting me down, and having a discussion. We did that twice during my life. I was surprised both times. I was pretty well-educated on my own. The local education system in Toronto, Canada, actually allowed me to stay out of grade school, only going in there to take the tests. I was free to wander around Toronto, and I found the Casino Theatre on Queen Street. I saw The Great Blackstone advertised. I'd never seen a magician before in my whole life.

Applause

Randi

Harry Blackstone walked out on stage and did wonderful things that I had never dreamed could be done. He had this young lady walk out from the side of the stage, and he cast her into a trance till he said, "Princess Astra, rise." She floated up into the air, and I looked very carefully, and I could not see any means whereby she could be suspended in the air and caused to move in the air. That was wonderful. I was transfixed. How could the man do such a thing? I determined at that moment I was going to become a professional magician, and so at 17, I decided I wouldn't graduate from high school. I left home, and, uh, I joined the carnival. I never went home again. What was the word that you looked at in the book? Would you mind telling us? "Mackerel." I was doing, uh, well, so-called mind-reading tricks and psych--psychic tricks, so to speak. It's been in your hands all this time, right? I assume so. All right, then. We'll open the slates, and let's see what the spirits have brought us in the way of a message. Don't tell her how it was done. Randi,

voice-over

When I introduced myself as a magician, I used to say to my audience, "Good evening. "My name is The Great Randall. "I'm a liar, a cheat, and a charlatan. "I will blatantly lie to you, "but for purposes of entertainment only, of course, and those lies may not be discernible from the truth."

Jillette

Randi had this sense of trying to be bigger than life, and the easiest way to be bigger than yourself is to lie.

Randi

I was 21 years of age when I predicted the outcome of that year's World Series, and it was good for me. It moved me up a peg, but it also had some fallout. People would stop me in the street, literally, and start to ask personal questions, family questions, and such that they thought I could answer, and even offering me money to predict whether the husband that the girl had chosen was the right one. That was quite a comeuppance for me because I realized, you know, people really do believe this nonsense.

Jamy Ian Swiss

Mentalism can be a deal with the devil. It's an incredibly seductive feeling for someone to imbue you with that power. It's a very tempting thing. Then you have to make a decision. Are you the sort of person that will look someone in the eye and, even though you have got no idea what their future holds, you're prepared to tell them something that isn't true that may harm them just to move money from their wallet into yours? You do not have that influence and power as a magician. You have it the moment you deny you're a magician.

Jillette

I know that surge of power that you feel when you use a cheap trick to manipulate someone else into thinking you have powers that you don't have, and I think it's very much to the good of the world that when Randi felt that power, he backed away from it and out of that feeling of that power, uh, came a rage.

Host

I want now to introduce Uri Geller. He's been denounced by some people as a magician, and certainly, he's a--a showman. Ladies and gentlemen, Uri Geller.

Applause

Randi

He said his name was Uri Geller. The name didn't mean a thing to me. He's come to the attention of Stanford Research Institute, and the scientists there are apparently quite convinced that he has psychic powers. What I do is, um, telepathy, and that is, as everybody knows, is receiving thoughts and, uh, passing-- passing thoughts. And then I have the other power which I-- which I read that they call psychokinesis, and that is moving or--or bending or breaking of objects. It's cracking. I feel it under my fingers. Look. It's like it's becoming like plastic.

Audience laughing

Randi

And it--it's break-- it's break-- You can, if--look. It's--it is very--

Clank

Hyman

In 1972, I got a call from Colonel Austin Kibler of the Defense Department, then acting head of ARPA, as it was called--Advanced Research Projects Agency. He says, "Could you drop everything you're doing "and go to Stanford Research Institute? "There's a psychic down there, and if he can do "what they claim he can do, we ought to be involved "because the Russians have a big program now going using what they call psy warfare."

Narrator

This film describes a five-week investigation conducted at Stanford Research Institute with Uri Geller, a young Israeli. Here we present a case of a double-blind experiment in which someone places an object into a can chosen at random from 10 aluminum cans. Geller's task now is to determine which of these 10 cans holds the steel ball bearing.

Randi

Now, Targ and Puthoff, the two scientists who were in residence there at the time, were quite a pair. First of all, Targ is legally blind, and, uh, he was one of the observers. Duh.

Narrator

He has made his choice. The steel ball is found.

Randi

He fooled the pants off them. It was astonishing.

Narrator

In this case, Geller guessed that a 4 was showing, and he was quite pleased to have guessed correctly.

Hyman

When I made my report to the government that Geller was a complete fraud, Targ and Puthoff realized they were not going to get the money from the government, so they took Geller on a tour to get publicity for him and to raise some private money to do their research with him.

Carson

I've been reading a lot of research on him, a lot of publicity on this gentleman whose name is Uri, U-R-I, Uri Geller, uh, and we hope we're going to see some, uh, rather astounding things tonight. Would you welcome, please, Uri Geller?

Randi

Johnny Carson was the man. Everybody watched that program on NBC. And since I had been on the program many, many times, they asked if I could come in to California to appear on the show that night, and I said, "Boy, this is rather short notice, "but I will talk to your prop man, "and I'll tell the prop man how he can prepare the props "in such and such a way that if it's real, "Geller can do it but if it's a fake, Geller won't be able to do it." Are you feeling in the mood yet? Huh? Wow. More questions? All right. Let's-- What's the capital of South Dakota? Uh, no. I don't mean to press you. Um... OK. Uh, let me see. I said, "OK. "What I would like you to do with the little aluminum "film cans is, I would like you to coat them "on the bottom with rubber cement. "Don't glue them down to the tray. "Just coat the bottoms and let them dry. When they're put on the tray, they won't skid then," I said, "because the way he does the film can thing is, he rotates the tray and he sees which ones move differently."

Geller

We start eliminating the ones that do not have the water.

Carson

Without touching them. He is really suspicious, you know? I'm having a hard time with you. But I don't mean to be, Uri. I really don't. Just--just keep looking. OK. Let me rest a little, all right? All right.

Randi

They actually shut down the set for 20 minutes or so while he hemmed and hawed and wondered how he was going to do something, Then they came back to the live audience after a big, long commercial break.

Carson

All right. We are back. U--Uri was telling me you--you don't feel, what, strong tonight? I don't feel strong.

Randi

Geller had to give the--the whole thing up. It was a real failure for him, definite failure, because Carson's people had followed the instructions that I gave them. Don't be disappointed. I won't. I'm not. OK. We thought he didn't have a future, and we were very wrong, very, very wrong. We didn't know how wrong we were. That doesn't feel very tight. Put another knot on top of that, would you, please? Just one more to make sure. I don't want it to fall off around my ankles. There we go. What did I ever do to you? Why do you hate me so much? Now, I'm gonna see if I can take this rope off. It may take me a while, but I'll see how fast I can do it. Would you time me, please? Do you have a watch there? Just look at your watch. Uh, yeah. How about you? You got a watch? I have one. It took, uh, 2 1/2 seconds. I think I deserve a large round of applause for that.

Applause

Savage

One of Randi's great heroes is Harry Houdini, and the life of Harry Houdini reads very similar to the life of James Randi. Uh, starting out as an amazing magician and escape artist. He was a great showman and debunker and dedicated his life to keeping people from being duped.

Randi

Well, the thought naturally occurred to me that I could base a good deal of my life on Harry Houdini and his adventures, perhaps do some of the things that he had done and perhaps even improve on them.

Man

"Open sesame." Try that. Open sesame.

Allen

Oh, wait a minute.

Woman

Jeez. This... The door is opening. How about that?

Randi

I wanted to break his records. I wanted to stay in a sealed metal coffin longer than he did, get out of a straitjacket faster than he did, out of chains, out of leg irons and handcuffs. I said, "If a man could make it, I could break it."

Banachek

There was nothing he couldn't get out of. or make it at least seem like he was getting out of them.

Host

The clock is still going. He has established a world's record.

Randi

In some cases, 200 feet of rope wrapped up on a chair on stage. You just hope that the theater doesn't catch fire because they're likely to leave you behind to fry...

Applause

Randi

but it's when some of the things like hanging over Niagara Falls in a straitjacket at, uh, 20 below zero, that gets your attention. Billion dollar babies Hey, billion dollar babies...

Cooper

'73 with "Billion Dollar Babies," we said, "This whole album is about extravagance. "So take it to the next level. Let's use illusion." If you're gonna get your head cut off, it can be scary and funny at the same time, but it's got to be professional, so you go to the best guy, and Amazing Randi was the best guy.

Playing "I Love the Dead"

recorded scream plays

Randi

I had never heard of Alice Cooper. I assumed it was a woman, you see. Silly me. Ha ha!

"Elected" playing

Randi

And I said, "Yeah. This just might be fun."

Swiss

He really starts to become a kind of a pop-culture figure, all the way to "Happy Days." Good afternoon, gentlemen. I'm The Amazing Randi. Hey, The Amazing Randi. Randi,

voice-over

My appearance on "Happy Days" really did a lot for my career. Fonzie... Yeah. thanks a lot. You really saved the day. Are you kidding? Whoa. Randi, This is show business, the showmanship. That's one respect in which I based a good deal of my efforts on what Houdini had done. He had done it by trial and error. I benefited from his example. This actually was invented more than half a century ago by the late, great Harry Houdini. Randi, I was asked to do a show honoring Harry Houdini... I'm going to immerse myself inside the can. My body will displace some of the water. The water will be filled right to the very top, and the lid will be locked on... Randi, And, uh, I was going to do the milk can. Now, this is rehearsal, maybe 20 minutes before airtime, and I tried to perform the escape. I couldn't get out of the milk can. Something had jammed, and I heard a crackling noise. It turned out that it was a couple of my vertebrae that had been chipped. and the pain was rather considerable, to say the least. I was in deep trouble. I knew that if I panicked, I would--I'd be dead-- that's all there is to it-- so you don't panic. I had to let myself sink back into the water, and I was in a bit of trouble. Finally, I heard the noises that they were undoing the padlocks, and I roared up out of the water, and there I was. I had been saved. It was a close call. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome The Amazing Randi. Randi, I came back from the hospital, and I was introduced down near the end of the show on a stretcher.

Randi

I have just returned from the hospital, and they tell me that I have a double compression fracture of the vertebrae, and it's not something I recommend you undertake as a hobby. Randi,

voice-over

It--it wasn't a great blow to me, and I was at the point where I thought that maybe it was time to get out of this business. Randi probably could've kept doing it for a while. I remember him saying to me, "You know, there comes a point "you just don't want to see "a little, old guy getting out of a can."

Man

I heard that this gonna be the last escape. You're gonna--you're through with it. Yes, the last straitjacket escape, certainly. I may do some jail escapes and a few things like that, but I'm gonna leave that stunt to the younger people. Oh, yeah. How old are you? I'm 55 now, and it's time to get out of that business.

Speaks Japanese

Swiss

I think it gave him the opportunity to focus full-time on what he regarded as the bigger, better targets. In the name of Jesus, everybody with a bone disease, everybody with a back infirmity, bring them right down over here to the side. Oh, boy! Let her go. That's the power of the Holy Spirit.

Randi

During the eighties, the faith-healing racket was very, very prominent literally all over the world. I did a lot of investigation. I visited a lot of these tent shows, as we called them, and we didn't see any evidence of healing taking place whatsoever, but I was particularly obsessed with Peter Popoff.

Applause

Popoff

You've got cancer of the stomach? Are you ready for God to burn that cancer out?

Randi

A man like Reverend Peter Popoff was a very dangerous man. In my estimation, he was a--a real scoundrel because he was taking people's faith in their religion. He was taking away their security. In many cases, he was harming them physically because he was convincing them that they didn't have to go to doctors anymore, that Jesus had healed them.

Popoff

If you've got pills, as an act of faith, I want you just to throw them out in the aisles. Those of you up on the balcony, just throw them over the side. Amen. Throw them over the side. throw them over the side.

Wiseman

So you have Popoff, who's going around a congregation and just seemed to be able to hear the voice of God and know all about people, even their addresses. He would call it out. Everyone's impressed. Is that John? 3784 Archwood Road? God is burning those blood clots out of his veins, out of his arteries. Jesus! There it is.

Randi

So he was doing a mentalism act, it appeared, and we wondered how he got the information.

Banachek

So Randi was coming to town. He said, "Would you like to come see this evangelist "by the name of Peter Popoff, and, uh, he's supposedly "really well-known, and he's going to be downtown, "and he's going to be doing this whole revival thing, and thousands of people will be there." And I said, "Yeah. I'd love to come."

Applause

Banachek

Is it Ruby? Ruby Harris? So, um, I'm sitting there with Randi, and there's thousands of people. Come on up here, Ruby. Here she comes. They believe this man has a connection with their god and he can actually heal them. Yes! Yes! Thank you, Jesus! Now listen. I'm gonna tell her what's wrong with her, but I'm not gonna tell it out loud because it's confidential. How many of you believe the Holy Spirit's a gentleman? I realized at that moment something big's going on here. This is a lot more than I thought it was. Yes! Yes, yes, yes! God's going to burn them out right now. Here they go! Here they go right now, Jesus! I have to tell you, it was an-- an absolutely amazing experience because the emotions that you're feeling when there are people up there who are in tears... Right now, Jesus! Let-- Ah, hallelujah... who are shaking and--and you've got this entire energy going throughout this room, it does something to you, even as a skeptic. It truly does something to you.

Popoff

Oh, hallelujah. Get up on your feet. Let's walk! 12 years. There's no pain!

Applause

Popoff

Look at that. There he goes. There he goes. Hallelujah! Oh, praise God! How many of you know that burns the devil up?

Banachek

After a while, you know, I--I'm sitting there, and after some of the emotion had died down in me, Popoff said, "I need people to come down to collect money," for him, and basically, he had 15 buckets, and I'm supposed to go around the auditorium and collect cash. God is touching that thyroid condition right now. And these people were throwing, like, 5, 10s, 20s because one of the things Popoff always tells them, "Whatever you give you will get back tenfold." So if you put a dollar in, hey, you're gonna get 10 bucks. You put 100 bucks in, you're gonna get a lot more money back, and these people truly believed this... Here it comes, complete healing in Jesus! Whoo! You foul spirit of deafness, take your hands off this woman in Jesus' name. Lord, let these ears be open! There it is. and as I get up close, I notice in his ear that there's an earpiece. There's no ear hole. It's a little piece of plastic in there, and I come back to Randi. I says, "I think I know what's going on."

Randi

I said, "What's up?" He said, "He's wearing a hearing aid in his left ear." Now, a man who heals the deaf you wouldn't think would be wearing a hearing aid.

Popoff

Well, how do I sound now? Loud. Loud?

Randi

At that point, I realized we needed some technical help, so I enlisted, uh, the aid of a private investigator named Alec Jason.

Banachek

Stand by. And...action.

Jason

One day, Randi called me and suggested that Peter Popoff was using radio transmissions, but they couldn't really figure out how it was done, and they wanted to know if I could intercept it or detect it. I said, I certainly couldn't guarantee it, less than 50/50, maybe, you know, 25%.

Randi

We knew that Popoff had a service, as he called it, happening in San Francisco, and we figured we'd better be there.

Banachek

Do you support Peter's ministry financially? Every dime I can. Yeah. What brings you here today? Well, I'm expecting a miracle, physical healing.

Jason

The day of the event, I dressed as a security guard, complete uniform-- badge, shirt, radio, keys.

Randi

I appeared in disguise as Adam Jersin. And if you put those words together and mix them up, they spell "James Randi."

Jason

So I have my scanner going, and it's looking for new frequencies, anything new that's not there normally. Get ready. Get ready. Praise God. Suddenly on the scanner, one of the lights came on saying there's a signal, and the scanner has stopped at that frequency, and I hear what I realize are now footsteps, high-heel footsteps, on a hard surface... How many of you believe it's all right to praise the Lord? and then I hear someone coming closer and closer to the microphone, and the woman's voice said, "Hello, Petey." Elizabeth Popoff,

on radio

Hello, Petey. Can you hear me? If you can't, you're in trouble.

Jason

Yes! They were using a radio frequency. I found it.

Peter Popoff

In the name of Jesus. Elizabeth,

on radio

Jodi Dean. Jodi Dean. Is it Jodi? Jodi? Dean. Dean? Jodi Dean? No. She should be right there on your right side. Here it comes. OK. She lives at 4267 Masterson. 4267 Masterson? I can see the angels of God all around your house. Rosa? Cameer. Is it Cameer? You been taking a lot of medication? She's there with her son Kipper, and he has a lump in his chest.

Peter

Wait just a minute. Who's Kipper? He's got a lump in his chest. You want God to melt it right now? Kipper, stand up. God's gonna burn that thing out right now.

Jason

They'd filled out prayer request forms saying, "I have cancer," or, "I have..." this problem or that problem," so she's giving that information directly to Popoff, and then he's reciting that information as if he's getting it from God. Elizabeth,

on radio

Martha Zacorski. Is it Martha? Is it Za--Zacorski? Weldon Krabb. Is it Weldon... Krabb. Krabb? Peggy White. Peggy White? 1305 Celono. 1305 Celono? Turn over to the left. Hallelujah! There you go. And she's had a hysterectomy. She can't take hormones. He's got kidney and eye problems. You want God to touch your kidneys? Now let that ear open! In the name of the Lord, right now, Jesus! Power of the Holy Ghost! Here it comes. In Je-- Devil, back off! Yes. The bondage is broken! Whoo! In the name of Jesus! You foul spirit!

Jason

And I thought, "I'm getting out of here now," so I packed everything up. I--I turned the equipment off, took my bags, and I walked down the stairs, outside into the cool air.

Randi

Not only did we have the evidence we needed. We had more than what we needed. We had it.

Applause

Randi

So I went on the Johnny Carson show, and when the revelation came and you heard Mrs. Popoff's voice... Elizabeth,

on radio

Hello, Petey. Can you hear me? If you can't, you're in trouble.

Randi

Johnny suddenly realized what the gimmick was, and he said, "Oh,..." It turns out that God's frequency-- I didn't know He used radio-- is 39.170 megahertz, and God is a woman, obviously, and sounds exactly like Popoff's wife, Elizabeth. Has he seen this tape at all? No. He does not know about this until this very moment. Interesting. I can't imagine what it would be like to maintain a life where your living and your well-being of you and your family depends upon you lying every single day. I think that they believe that there is some way in which what they are doing is good and that there's some moral compass that they've invented that allows them to do this. A double portion of God's power! Well, we did it. We had exposed this man on probably the most popular television show of the day, and he announced bankruptcy shortly after that.

Peter

Oh, glory to God!

Carson

OK. We'll take a break. We'll be right back.

Applause

Randi

Oh, OK. I'll see what I can do. All right. Here we go. Wait. I'll do a Jackie Gleason here. Ha ha ha! Yeah. I don't know. Hmm. I'll do--I'll do a plie at the bar, OK? Ooh. Oh, no, I don't bend that way anymore.

Bill Nye

Has been said many times, when you're in love, you want to tell the world. Maybe it'll work. I don't know.

Nye

And James Randi is in love with the truth.

Applause

Nye

The so-called psychics and the other charlatans are making money at our expense, and we have to bear some of the blame for it, so let's get to work and do something about it. I'll take two 8-by-10s.

Man

The man that puts the fear of God into all those psychics-- The Amazing Randi!

Cheering and applause

Wiseman

James Randi isn't just about being skeptical of the paranormal. He is about promoting a scientific worldview.

Randi

Science has created and shaped much of the world in which we live, but constant vigilance can never be relaxed. You want people to be educated. You want to go out and shake these people and say, "Listen to me. Listen to me." The Million-Dollar Challenge is real, ladies and gentlemen. Why is there not a lineup outside this organization right now on the street? Why isn't Uri Geller here? Really pull. Come on. Make it tight. OK, I need-- I need this chair. Sir, would you take the chair and pull it up front?

Applause

Woman

I got an old one. First edition. Yes. Yeah. There we go.

Savage

The amount that he travels and the amount of people that he engages with... All right. You got it? he has genuinely changed thousands and thousands of people's lives by opening their eyes.

Sighs

Alvarez

OK, so just let me know as soon as you, uh, leave the airport. OK. Bye. Hello, James. I'm a bit tired. You know that? Oh, it's so good to be back. So good to have you back, Amazing. Good to be here after all that travel. So good to have you back, Amazing. Oh, I remember this place. Yeah. We used to live here. We are cute, aren't we? Yup. We are. Ha ha ha! It's a good picture. I love that picture. Yeah. Good picture. Mm-hmm. Alvarez,

voice-over

This is the guy that left his home at 17 to join a circus and go through all the crazy stories that he has lived. Ooh, the inside of this one is icky. Well, then take it out. No, no. There's lots that can be saved here. No, no, no, no. Yes. I'll take it out later, then. Ah, you probably will. Ha ha! Alvarez, It's quite an amazing ride, and I just feel very privileged to have been part of it.

indistinct chatter

Geller

Once more, let me hold it here gently. As I'm not even touching it, and it's-- Look. It's--it's-- You see? It's plastic.

Shermer

When Geller was on the "Tonight Show" and--and Randi had helped, uh, Johnny set it up such that he would not be able to perform his tricks, it sure looked like that was the end of Geller's career. No! Two days later, he's on the "Merv Griffin Show." And all I'm saying is bend, bend, bend. OK. Look. Can you see it? I mean, it's bent, you know? That is a very bent key. Now what happens, it's a--it's an energy that leaves my mind, nothing to do with my finger, penetrates the metal and alters the molecular structure. Now, instead of bend, I say to the broken watches, "Work!" 1, 2, 3...

All

Work!

Geller

Work! Just a second. It's working! Oh, my goodness, it's working. Your mother's watch is working. Is that like a miracle? They all started. They're working. The "I Am Not A Crook" watch. First of all, I was born with this. When I was 4 years old. I was eating soup-- and that's 4 years old-- and suddenly, the spoon started bending in my hands.

Randi

Now, Geller probably became the first superstar psychic to be apparently accepted by science and by scientists.

Host

Uri has subjected himself or has been subjected to some scientific study, what they call cheat-proof, um, under rigid controlled conditions.

Geller

I want to tell you this, that this is not a trick. These are scientists who are putting their whole life at stake in--in validating these powers.

Hyman

Randi was very upset by Geller's using trickery to deceive scientists. He thought that was very immoral, and he felt that this was a prostitution of his beloved magic. Randi, you've been going around the country, somewhat as Houdini used to in the past, trying to debunk those who say that it's psychic power. You say it's magic. This is my house key. Mm-hmm. Uri Geller took it. He went like this with it with his finger-- that's all, no pressure-- and the key bent-- you can see that-- and I've carried it around because I found that I'm a believer now. Here is my identical key. Touch it and make it bend. Would you hold the end of it very lightly in between your fingers, Barbara, and I'm just going to stroke it. Now, I'm not putting enough pressure on it to bend it? No. OK. Will you show it to the camera, please? Now, is it bent as much as this key, or not? Ohh! Are you gonna keep this key too, Barbara?

Applause

Hyman

In one way, I almost followed Geller around the country because if he appeared on some major show, I simply went on the show and did his same routine.

Geller

Bend. See?

Randi

Now, when Mr. Geller does this, he says, "Bend." I don't say that. I say, "Broccoli," because it's a simple conjuring trick that used to be on the back of the corn flake box when I was a kid. Heavens to Betsy, look at that. Would you say that key is bent? I decided to write a book about him. I wrote a book, "The Truth About Uri Geller," that hit the market when the interest in Geller was at its peak.

Geller

The psychokinetic energy melts the molecular structure. It seems to be-- Oh, my. Oh, for God's sakes. I want it to bend, I just say, "Bend." Oh, my God! Aah! Ah!

Women screaming

Hyman

Randi and Geller just went back and forth like gladiators. It was fun to watch. Can you do the spoo-- spoon-bending trick? Does Dolly Parton sleep on her back?

Laughter

Hyman

There's no heat at all. Touch it.

Geller

They wrote that I have laser beams in my buckle belt and with that, I bend keys.

Randi

Look at this. You can actually see it bending over and turning liquid right in front of your eyes. These things used to be on the back of corn flake boxes, Larry, but apparently, some scientists either don't eat corn flakes or they don't read the back of the box. This is my trademark, and you will not find it on any cereal box. How--how did you do that? Very well, I thought. It's sleight of hand. To explain the tricks to you would give you one solution, but it wouldn't give you all of the solutions... Randi,

voice-over

In many cases, if not most cases, I simply went on the show and did his same routine, but then I would get the MC sometimes saying, "Oh, yes. Well, it's all very well for magicians to do this, but Mr. Geller doesn't use magic tricks." But what about people who do come up with the cards? Do you hear about the times they don't come up with them? Do you know that Uri Geller did 100 tests with sealed envelopes? You think it's all fake? What is the difference between what I did and what Uri Geller did? Is, uh, because, uh-- Well, I guess I really don't have a--a--a real answer. Because magicians can duplicate some of these things with trickery does not mean that-- that genuine psychics do it with trickery. Anyone can imitate the "Mona Lisa," but that does not make them Leonardo da Vinci. You people remember that. Magicians say, "No. Nonsense." I duped the scientists. They say I fooled them. They always find loopholes. I challenge them and tell them, "Look. Why don't you go and do it in a laboratory the way I was tested?"

Randi

My opinion has always been that parapsychologists, no matter how well-funded, would not be able to properly judge where someone has set out to purposely deceive them, and I had come to the conclusion that the only way to show them would be to perpetrate an outright hoax by introducing some tricksters into the laboratory that I knew I could trust.

Steve Shaw

I read Randi's book "The Truth About Uri Geller," and, um, from that book, I was able to put methods together for bending objects myself, and I created many of my own methods to the point to where kids in high school were stealing silverware and-- and bringing it to me to bend. And I got so good at it that I'm not sure why, but I wrote Randi a letter, and I said, "Look. "If you ever need a kid to try to fool scientists, I'd be happy to do so." After I read "The Magic Of Uri Geller" and got to be pretty proficient as a "psychic metal bender" myself, I took it upon myself to reach out to James Randi.

Man

Oh, Michael, you must be a psychic. I'm causing that to twist 180 degrees just like that.

Randi

Very shortly after, a very substantial amount of money had been offered to a university to do parapsychological tests.

Wiseman

MacLab was funded by James McDonnell, and he said, "Go out and find me uh, some--some star subjects," and that job fell to a scientist called Peter Phillips.

Edwards

We were told that there were 300 applicants, and the MacLab ended up focusing on only two subjects-- myself and Steve Shaw.

Randi

At that point, Project Alpha was ready to take off.

Shaw

I fly into St. Louis, and we didn't know what we were getting into. We didn't know if they were going to have one-way mirrors with cameras hidden behind them. We had absolutely no clue what it was we were getting into.

Edwards

I was 17 years old. It was my first semester as a senior in high school. I'm about to pull some basic magic on some people that should be very well-skilled and could very likely see through this quickly. I might have just stepped in a little bit over my head at that time.

Phillips

I'm Peter Phillips, and here with me is Mark Shafer. The tape that you're about to see consists of a series of episodes suggestive of psychokinesis. The subjects in these experiments are two men of about 21-- M.E. and S.S. They presented themselves to us originally as psychic metal benders...

Randi

I wrote to Professor Phillips in order to advise him on how he should observe the Alpha kids. As a matter of fact, I sent him a list of 11 rules in order to keep control of an experiment.

Edwards

Don't allow the subjects to alter the rules established for the tests. Don't accept excuses like, "The vibrations aren't right," or, "I don't feel right," and above all...

Randi

You need a professional magician to keep you straightened out on what might be trickery. It was very quickly, though, that Steve and I tried to, almost line by line, get them to violate every one of those caveats in one way, shape, or form.

Shafer

Mike, sitting to your right and dressed in white, has just picked up a spoon that he will attempt to influence.

Edwards

One of Randi's caveats was, mark every item with, uh, an indelible mark or a scratch that couldn't be replicated, something that was permanent and it was something that we couldn't duplicate on the spot. The parapsychologists, in their infinite wisdom, decided that they would simply use paper tags with string. Can we get this tag off here?

Mike

Sure, sure. Just slide it off.

Edwards

We took these paper hanging tags off of the spoons to make them easier to work with. As everybody was focusing on one spoon, it was a simple matter to lean on the control spoon and later switch those two tags so the control spoon looked like the experimental spoon. Yeah. It's markedly different. Of course it is. It just went down instead of up. But it didn't feel like it. I didn't feel anything at all, but there it is. I mean, that's OK.

Shaw

We truly believed that if scientists went in with a pro-biased opinion-- and the majority of the parapsychologists were doing just that-- they would not use proper science. And if we could replicate what Geller and SRI had done, in essence, in terms of established scientific protocol on testing a psychic, we could undermine Geller's claims of being deemed legitimate by scientists.

Shafer

We have been working, first of all, to establish the range of abilities that Mike and Steve have because these have apparently included being able to move small, solid objects across a tabletop, influencing a variety of metal objects, such as keys and metal bars and metal rods, sometimes touching and sometimes at a distance, and also influencing photographic film.

Edwards

We were trying to get the parapsychologists to break their own rules. We were then informing Randi of the ways that we were beating the tests. Randi, in turn, was then communicating it back to the MacLab how to safeguard their tests so that we couldn't beat them any longer. Needless to say, it got very complicated as we were forced to become more and more resourceful.

Shafer

Another device designed to elicit PK in a visible manner was a lightweight rotor that was mounted atop a thin, metal spindle under a glass dome.

Edwards

One of the tests was a spindle with a small rotor on top that had a glass dome that fit over the top of this to protect it. Our jobs were to try to move that rotor without, obviously, removing the glass dome. I thought that was a pretty good test.

Shaw

Hey, man, it's connected to the base real well.

Edwards

I really was stumped. Then I look over to the side of the room, and Steve was concentrating on the rotor, and the rotor starts to move.

Shafer

Here you see Steve influencing the rotor. He's causing it to rotate clockwise.

Shaw

And they said, "Well, to make sure there's "no air currents or anything like that, can you make it move to the right?" So I start concentrating, and slowly it starts reversing, and it goes to the right.

Edwards

I had no idea how he was getting this to work.

Shafer

And if you look carefully, the rotor is moving counterclockwise.

Shaw

So Mike turns to me, and he says, "Hey, would you like to go get a drink at the machine?" Now, I know what he wants. I know he wants to know how I just did this, so I go with him down there, and he says, "Steve," he says, "how the heck did you just do that?" and I said, "Mike, after all these hours of sitting "in that room and concentrating, I just found out that I'm-- I'm really a psychic!" I think I promptly threw him up against the wall at that point and wanted to know, and it turned out it was a very simple deception. Shortly after that hallway conversation, both of us could magically make the rotor move any direction that we wanted to, and the MacLab personnel never caught on. I don't believe they're tricking us, especially based on the research that we've done in the last year where we have exerted as tight a control condition as we could think of, even in consultation with magicians, uh, to see if the influence holds up, and we have found evidence that it does, not as strongly under these controlled conditions. It's as if somehow, the extra controls seem to, uh, inhibit it, but still, an effect persists. Over the course of Alpha, the controls did get significantly tougher. And the tighter the controls got, the lower the results got, but their faith in us never diminished. It was over a 4-year period. It was about 180 hours total that we were at the MacLab, and after all those years of convincing people that I was a genuine psychic, I had a huge doubt about what we were doing and how it was gonna affect these people, and it came about when there was a BBC producer, a guy by the name of Tony Edwards, who said he wanted to capture our abilities on tape. We had taken him from a point where he was an utter skeptic. We had then gotten him, by getting to know him and demonstrating our abilities off camera, to become a believer. Randi gave him the same 11 caveats that he had given the MacLab. The difference was, Tony took a look at those and said, "OK. I'm gonna follow these "because I want to convince Randi. If I can convince Randi, I can convince the rest of the world."

Tony Edwards

We were all trying to record that elusive bend as witnesses, a conjurer, two metallurgists, and 3 simultaneously recording TV cameras, conditions the benders were happy to accept. After 6 hours recording, nothing. Damn it.

Shaw

We sat there all day with Tony. Nothing happened. Absolutely nothing happened during the day. The moment the cameras went off at the end of the day, we bent everything in the laboratory, absolutely everything. He had the--the holy grail in his fingertips, and he let it drop. Tony Edwards lost it, started screaming, started crying, ranting, raving. "Randi's the devil! It's Randi's fault that I couldn't get this on this tape." The man had a mental breakdown. It was scary for two young kids to realize that we had hurt somebody like that. And it was at that point I think Steve and I realized, "We can't do this anymore." And Randi said, "It's just a couple more months. "We have this TV show coming up, and that's when we want to tell the world that you're not real."

Swiss

Randi, he's really the general. You know, the general's rarely on the front lines, anyway, and sometimes he's sending his minions to do his good works but always at a distance. He's the one at the strategy table. He's got the vision for what will come.

Shaw

The big day comes, the one that Mike and I have been waiting for, where we're going to reveal that everything is a hoax. I'm going to ask these two gentlemen a very simple, direct question. Can you tell us how do you do it?

Edwards

As I walked up to the microphone, I said, "It's very simple." Well, to be quite honest, we cheat.

Audience gasps

Edwards

Flashbulbs started going off, and the murmurs started up inside of the audience, and Steve and I actually then at that point admitted that Project Alpha and us as psychics was nothing more than a bit of illusion. Magician Amazing Randi. You have him now on the phone. Go ahead. You have the last word.

Man on phone

But I was wondering what he thought about the claims that, uh, this was sort of an unethical way of carrying out this experiment and whether or not, uh, it's gonna affect the scientific community and the parapsychologists negatively. I'm happy to say that the, uh, president of the Parapsychological Association described it as a magnificent experiment that needed to be done and from which the results of may benefit everybody, and I think that's what we headed out to do. We also should point out that the director of that program thought it was a very lousy thing to do. He was quoted as saying that you've probably set back the study of it and that it... If Philip said that, then my answer to-- my having set back the study of parapsychology is no, they tried to set it back. I brought it into the 20th century.

Shaw

I felt really bad. They truly believed in these things, and I felt that if they realized they had been fooled by somebody, that they'd be more cautious in the future. But I felt bad that I had fooled them.

Applause

Shaw

So you dropped out kind of like in the mid-seventies, huh, and just resurfaced lately. What have you been doing? At that time, I wanted to become rich, and I met a very important man who was the chairman of the largest mining company in England, and he showed me how to use my talents, my abilities to look for oil, gold, and mineral, but I'm still controversial, and a lot of people think that I'm a fake and a magician, but all those people I love, because they

indistinct

Shaw

free publicity for me. Let's try to do the drawing. OK, now, I...

Geller

Do you know how many times the skeptics tried to shoot me down? Do you know how many times Randi tried to ruin my career? But they failed miserably. Pick up the "National Enquirer" or any other paper and you'll find a billion psychics. Look at the movies that Hollywood produces about UFOs and the psychic powers and paranormal activity. Are you kidding me? It's much bigger than ever.

Man

You are negative, you are setting up your own standards, and what you're not understanding is that the key to realizing any kind of psychic phenomena is first believing in it, not the other way around. Once you believe, it will happen. It will happen. Even you, sir, The not-so-amazing Randi, are psychic, whether or not you want to be.

Woman

Millions and millions of people upon this planet who have other ways of intuiting and sensing...

Randi

I have never said these things have not happened.

Different woman

Why don't you read the papers and correct yourself?

Swiss

People think they believe what they choose to believe. We don't. We mostly believe what we need to believe. You say Uri Geller's a fake. You came here and you've given everybody a lot of lip service, and you haven't done anything. We're going for a commercial break, and you can piss off. We'll be back with Diana... Randi,

voice-over

The public really doesn't listen when they are being told straightforward facts. They would rather accept what some charismatic character tells them than really think about what the truth might be. I'll tell you, from now on, you're going to have a song of victory in your heart!

Geller

A billion people believe in God. You can't touch that.

Peter Popoff

There she goes! Peter,

voice-over

This is what Randi is trying to do. He's trying to say this is a big hoax and so, everything else is a hoax, too. He's trying to say that nothing divine is being spoken. But actually, our ratings are up.

Jason

And the thing is, Popoff got back in the business. All he changed was he doesn't use a radio anymore. He doesn't need to. He just does dumber stuff that people accept anyway. This is water from the pool that the Lord himself led the Christians to during the horrible Chernobyl nuclear accident. Tens of thousands died, and yet every Christian was miraculously spared... Randi and I once talked about it. And I said, "You know, "maybe we're in the wrong end of the business. "We should be on that side. "I mean, he's making, like, a million dollars a month or more, and I'm not making a million dollars a month." Um, and with--Randi and I got together, we--we had come up with some really nifty tricks that would fool people. Con people.

Alvarez

OK, 1, 2, 3.

Guests

Happy birthday, dear Randi Happy birthday to you

People cheering

Woman

Let 'er rip. Let 'er rip. Let 'er rip.

Applause

Alvarez

Happy birthday, Amazing.

Shaw

In the early days, I think Randi sort of hid his true relationship with Jose, but I don't think Randi hid it for any bad reason. I think it was just a thing that people would use against him, and I think it took Randi a long time to understand in this day and age, you don't have to hide those things anymore. Alvarez,

voice-over

I remember when Randi came out. It was in 2010, at the age of 81. I said, "Are you sure, are you sure?" But it was just a gesture of complete honesty out there. And, morally, having built a life around the fact of telling truth, he needed to come out publicly. Thank you so much, thank you so much for, for coming to Randi's birthday and, uh, for being our friends, for being supportive of both of us. And that's it. That's all I got to say.

Randi

All righty. OK. OK.

Applause

Randi

Alvarez,

voice-over

Before, it was all about becoming invisible. Now it should be exactly the opposite.

Randi

I was here in the house, and, uh, I looked out the window and I saw a uniformed officer outside. They were all over the place. U.S. Marshals and FBI personnel, as well, circling around, trying to prevent anyone from escaping. I was terrified. I had no idea why they were there. I heard rapid knocking at the door. I went to the door, and, uh, they pushed their way in and said, "Where is Jose Alvarez?" And, uh, they put handcuffs on him and marched him out the door. I just saw him put in a car and driven out the driveway. What a situation. What a situation. It's so...very disturbing. When the police showed up and arrested my partner and took him away in handcuffs, I was desperate. I just... I was standing at the edge of the dock and there were no ships around, and I was about to fall into the water. I didn't know what to do. No matter what his name is, I know who he is, and I know what he is as well. And he's my partner. And he's very, very important to me. Ahh. For the last 25 years, everybody have know me as, uh, Jose Alvarez. Um... but, in reality, my real name is Deyvi Orangel Pena Arteaga. I was born in Venezuela. I was raised in Caracas. And in Venezuela, to be gay is, uh, the most despicable thing that you can be. You knew that everybody that was your friend or your loved one or whatever, they would turn against you. That's for sure. I just knew that I should hide it. When I was 16 years old, I was at a--at a party. And, um, 3 guys came and grabbed me from behind, and one of them put a gun to my head and started just yelling all kinds of things. "The little faggot," and so on and so on. I said, "I have to get out of here or I will be killed." And, um...I came here to study art and I started seeing like, wow. I don't have to be like, you know, "Who is looking at me?," like, "I have to hide." But still it stays in your brain, that in order to survive, I needed to pretend. But I just didn't have any way to stay in this country. And then I met, um, Randi. So, uh, I actually found someone who got a name for me... and, uh, they told me that this person was deceased and that this name, um, didn't belong to anyone. So, I--I wrestled with that situation for quite a while, whether to go ahead with this. But I just didn't have any choice. So, I decided to do it, to take the name. But I wasn't really that aware of what I was doing, you know. The thing snowballed.

Announcer

One of these 3 men pretended to be possessed. Number two, what is your name, please? My name is Jose Alvarez. Only one of these people is the real Jose Alvarez and is the only one sworn to tell the truth.

Deyvi

Trying to escape such a terrible situation, I kind of got jailed in a different one. With the Jose Alvarez identity, I applied for a passport under that name and then I went to Australia to play the Carlos Hoax.

Randi

And I just set off to train him to be a so-called channeler.

Deyvi

I have lived through many reincarnations. My last one was in Venezuela.

Randi

Also keep very wide, keep very wide, 'cause you're going to be on a big stage. Randi,

voice-over

He learned fast, and, uh, we were using the Peter Popoff method.

Host

I've heard you described as a fraud and a charlatan.

Randi

That's a very rude comment. Well, that is a very rude comment. Randi,

voice-over

He did a wonderful job, but, after all, that's the kind of thing he does well. I am using this body-- Jose Alvarez. He is an artist in the United States. Deyvi, The whole thing was totally against my persona. I knew that I was playing this fictitious character. I just felt--I just felt like a phony. You know, but I have to go on with it.

Speaking Spanish

Indistinct

voice-over

No! No!

Speaking Spanish

voice-over

Deyvi, It turned out that there was a real person named Jose Alvarez... and he decided to apply for a passport after 25 years of me living with this identity.

Elliott

The moment of truth is about to arrive. Will the real Jose Alvarez please stand up?

Cheering and applause

Shaw

The problem is, once you start to tell people that you're genuine, it's really hard to step away from that because you've lied to people. You've--you've lied to their face. It was extremely difficult when I was fooling the scientists. You know, at first I saw them as the enemy. It was me against the enemy. Um... but over time, they become your friends.

Edwards

Were we violating laws? Probably. Was it fraud in some cases? Most definitely. Did we look at it that way at the time? I don't think any of us did, because we thought the ends justified the means.

Geller

Deception has so many layers. I mean, you have the zenith of deception, and people go to jail for that. But then you have magicians. They manipulate the truth. They are in the business of deceiving people.

Swiss

Alpha and Carlos and Popoff, these-- these incredible revelations of deception, they're actually sort of giant cons in their own sense, right? But they're cons on the right side. This is what it means to be an honest liar. It's the difference between using deception to conceal the truth and using deception to reveal the truth.

Interviewer

Up until now, you haven't really said anything about Jose being Deyvi. Here's where I'd like to start. OK. I think it would be good if--if you said something like, "I feel I should come clean." No, no, no, no. That admits guilt. OK. I should make something clear. That's much better. Are you--are you afraid of the ramifications? I have all kinds of-- of fear of that, yes. Fear of what? I'm not clear. If I don't have to say, "Yes, I knew "that he had a false identity and he perpetrated it... on the American nation"-- I don't want to say that! Look at what he was going through. He was going through hell. If he went back to Venezuela, he would... well, he would be constantly victimized and abused and attacked. No, I couldn't see that. I... I had to accept what I saw happening. Now, none of this must be used. I mean, really. I, uh... if I thought that any of this would be used, I--I would abandon the film entirely. No, no, no, no. But I'm being honest with you. Now, I'm being taped at the same time and I have to trust you. OK, well... And I will and I do. But we had discussed this. I'm willing to say the story that I--that I gave you on this camera. That's fine, OK. I'm not asking you to do anything else. But I want the rest of it to vanish, please. This last part? Yes, understood, understood. No worries. I trust you or I wouldn't be doing this. Thank you.

Wiseman

We all spin personal narratives. And so when an event happens that doesn't fit this idea that he's this amazing truth-teller and so on, then something has to happen to that event and, like everyone, he may well change a few facts around or rub it out completely.

Geller

In entertainment, there is a kind of, um, acceptability to deceive. It's like when there are two Picasso paintings on the wall. One is a fake, and the other one is real, but they look the same. There's no harm in that. At the end of the day, there's nothing to reveal. Because what I do is real. What you do is real.

Randi

Today, officially, we'll find out what the judge has to say. It's got to be the right thing. Or I don't know what--what I'm going to do or what... what Jose is going to do. He's specifically an immigration judge, and he apparently likes to...

sigh

Randi

suggest removal. That would be the end of him. The end of him and the end of us automatically. His life literally hangs in the balance. And I feel somehow that I've got to come out with some rabbit out of the hat to try to get him back here where he belongs and not behind bars.

Deyvi

I--I was just in a state of total suspension, you know, and just waiting for him to say what the sentence was. It was something I had hoped for, that we'd all hoped for. We won. We won this one. People were really beautiful talking. I'm not one person. I've got a partner. For the last quarter of a century, I've had this partner. We're one element. And I have never hesitated to reach out to help him in every possible way.

indistinct conversation

Deyvi

I know Randi. He has a mission out there in the world, as The Amazing Randi. But his compassion... people don't know how much he cares when he sees someone in distress. And it's not just on a social level but also on a personal level. And I include myself specifically in that equation, that he... he will do what is necessary to--to save somebody. Don't worry about it, yeah. OK. Am I over here? Yeah. No, a little bit further, over here.

Randi

Here? OK. OK... OK. Great. What do you think? No? Yeah?

Shaw

Randi said years ago, "There is nothing that a man can't make that I can't get out of." That line is actually a Houdini line. And the difference was-- is that Houdini, you know, if somebody ever did bring something, like a pair of handcuffs that no way he could get out, Houdini's guys, his goons, would take the guy out back and beat the crap out of the guy and the audience never saw the guy again. But I bet you anything, Randi truly believed there was nothing he couldn't get out of. Or make it at least seem like he was getting out of them.

Swiss

And I'll quote him directly. "I'm a magician. "I know how to deceive people, and I know how to recognize when people are being deceived." "I can cheat you countless different ways "and you won't know. You won't catch me."

Randi

Some people cannot believe that a magician can fool them in such a way that they can't figure it out. But magicians can and magicians do. Don't be too sure of yourself. No matter how smart or well-educated you are, you can be deceived.

Woman

You've got the magic touch It makes me glow so much It casts a spell, it rings a bell...

Shaw

OK, that's weird. This is all that I'm getting. I have no clue what this is.

Woman

Oh, when I feel your charm It's like a four-alarm...

Laughs

Woman

You make me thrill so much You've got The magic touch

Geller

My jewelry are a catalyst to the powers of your mind. It's all in the mind.

Woman

I'm feeling the glow But where Can I go from you? I didn't know too much And then I felt your touch And now I've learned I can return The magic touch

Applause

Man

Some people Are made of plastic

Woman

You know some people Are made of wood

Man

Some people Have hearts of stone Some people Are up to no good Ah, but baby, I'm for real I'm as real as real can get