Hypnotist David Days tripped over a participant's leg and fell unconscious during a performance on Friday. Three people were "asleep" onstage at the time; when Days couldn't be roused after a few minutes, the audience was asked to leave. Though he came around a short time later and "woke up" the hypnotized volunteers, the incident was a little weird. Days's team claims he really did trip; the theater manager insists it was all part of the show.
An audience member talked to BBC about the show, insisting that it initially seemed to be a joke, but when Days was pulled backstage and someone ran to find a first-aid kit, they realized it wasn't.
Though nothing like this has ever been reported, Days does keep a back-up hypnotist and a recording on-hand to bring volunteers out of hypnosis in case of emergency.
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The hypnotist later wrote on his Facebook page: "I would just like to let my fans know that I am completely fine.
"A little bruised, but that's all. Thanks for your support tonight, it was a great show with some great volunteers."
However, Alan Coman, treasurer of the Royal Manor Theatre, has disputed Mr Days' claims that he passed out and said the episode was "only a joke".
"It was part of a project for students who were filming the whole thing... but they (the people on stage being hypnotised) weren't pretending because they didn't get up to help.
"The audience didn't know (that it was part of the act) but it was purely to test hypnotism," he said.
But Mr Days' manager, Tara Nix, insisted it was not part of the show.
An audience member talked to BBC about the show, insisting that it initially seemed to be a joke, but when Days was pulled backstage and someone ran to find a first-aid kit, they realized it wasn't.
"At first the audience, including us, found it very funny and thought it was part of the act, but as time went on we began to realise that it was not part of the show and he had actually hurt himself.
"At this point we become very worried not only for David Days but also the guests that were onstage oblivious to anything as they were still hypnotised.
"They simply just sat there 'asleep'."
Though nothing like this has ever been reported, Days does keep a back-up hypnotist and a recording on-hand to bring volunteers out of hypnosis in case of emergency.
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If you are inclined to play-along in these stage shows then you are a perfect candidate for stage-hypnosis. Most forms of manipulation work this way, I'm just getting you to do what you are inclined to do, if I use some creative injunction that gets you to act, that is the manipulation.
In france they did an experiment shadowing Milgrim's famous obedience experiments in the form of a live game-show. Of 80 "questioners" 81% issued lethal electric shocks to "contestants" when the host told them to do so. Very few were able to rise above the myriad pressures of the crowd and the host, the lights and cameras and all the expectations put on them. Only 9 people managed to quit before the shocks became lethal. The show was called La Zone Extreme and is nicknamed Le Jeu de la Mort (The Game of Death). There is a documentary about it on netflix by the same name (The Game of Death) with french subtitles.
I count backwards from three, you'll be in a state of complete
relaxation. your worries, cares and ambitions will be gone. And you
will remain in that state until I snap my fingers. Three. Deeper and
deeper. Way down, way down. Two. Way down.....