Vernonesque #1: Underambitious

Learn a minimalistic approach to Ambitious Card inspired by the celebrated Canadian conjurer Dai Vernon.

Greetings! This is the inaugural edition of Vernonesque, a recurring column I am authoring as a tribute to the renowned Canadian magician Dai Vernon. In each instalment, I aim to replicate Vernon’s unique style of magic by featuring a trick that either pays homage to one of his classic routines or embodies some of the essential elements that I associate with The Professor’s conjuring.

Portrait of Dai Vernon. Magician John Archer has artfully colourised the black and white original. Photo Credit: John Archer.

“Underambitious” is my minimalistic take on an Ambitious Card routine. Although the effect has been around since the late sixteenth century, and the French magician Gustav Alberti is credited with the “ambitious” presentation, it is most commonly associated with Dai Vernon, who played a significant role in popularising it. “Dai Vernon’s Ambitious Card” was published in the Stars of Magic series in 1949 (Series 5). Vernon expertly crafted the routine to engage the audience in a thrilling game of wits with the magician. His deliberate engineering of suspicious situations made onlookers question what they saw, only to be surprised when the “ambitious card” was found in an unexpected location.

Most modern renditions of the plot involve multiple phases and are relatively complex in their construction but, sadly, lack the entertainment value of Vernon’s routine. “Underambitous” takes the opposite approach and only features a limited number of phases.