''D. Devant, Conjurer'' (french: D. Devant (prestidigitation), also known as ''Devant's Hat Trick'') was a 1897 French

short Short may refer to: Places * Short (crater), a lunar impact crater on the near side of the Moon * Short, Mississippi, an unincorporated community * Short, Oklahoma, a census-designated place People * Short (surname) * List of people known as ...

silent film A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, when ...

Georges Méliès Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès (; ; 8 December 1861 – 21 January 1938) was a French illusionist, actor, and film director. He led many technical and narrative developments in the earliest days of cinema. Méliès was well known for the use of ...

, starring the magician

David Devant David Devant (22 February 1868 – 13 October 1941) was an English magician, shadowgraphist and film exhibitor. He was born David Wighton in Holloway, London. He is regarded by magicians as a consummate exponent of suave and witty presentation ...

. Devant, a major stage illusionist based in London, was an early proponent of moving pictures, introducing them into the magic performances he did with John Nevil Maskelyne at the Egyptian Hall and taking them along to private performances and on tour. He knew Méliès in London as well as in Paris, where Devant often went to get new films. It was Devant who, in 1896, sold Méliès a film projector made by the British pioneer Robert Paul. The year appearing for Méliès's camera, Devant had also been filmed by Paul, and Devant would later go on to try filmmaking on his own. ''D. Devant, Conjurer'' was sold by Méliès's

Star Film Company The Manufacture de films pour cinématographes, often known as Star Film, was a French film production company run by the illusionist and film director Georges Méliès. History On 28 December 1895, Méliès attended the celebrated first publi ...

and is numbered 101 in its catalogues. In Britain, the Philipp Wolff Company also sold it, under the title ''Devant's Hat Trick''. The complete film is currently presumed

lost Lost may refer to getting lost, or to: Geography *Lost, Aberdeenshire, a hamlet in Scotland * Lake Okeechobee Scenic Trail, or LOST, a hiking and cycling trail in Florida, US History *Abbreviation of lost work, any work which is known to have bee ...

. However, a flipbook showing a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, published by Léon Beaulieu in the late 1890s, was rediscovered in the 2010s and has been tentatively identified as a fragment of the film. Two of Devant's films for Paul appear to survive in a very similar fragmentary format, as short sequences for flipbook-like devices.

References

External links

*
Flipbook
on

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, tentatively identified as a fragment of ''D. Devant, Conjurer'' {{Authority control 1890s French films French black-and-white films Films directed by Georges Méliès French silent short films Films about magic and magicians 1897 short films