Bend it like Kennedy

IT is a question that I've purposely left till last: "Would you be able to read my mind?" I feel I must be worse than mad, but Kennedy doesn't seem surprised - it is his livelihood, after all, and he must do this every day.

We start with me devising questions with a yes or no response and Kennedy indicates the answer with a card. When he gets every question right, he says he'll guess my partner's name and turns away so I can write it down in privacy. He then proceeds to read my thoughts by looking deep into my eyes, and after asking me more questions, writes something down in blue felt tip. With the suggestion of a smile, he lets me read the single word.

He's got it right - the name is Paul' - though I am baffled as to how.

The man who's simply known as Kennedy' has a fascinating job. Though he is classed as a magician he claims his act is so much more - just like the famous Derren Brown, he is a master of psychology. He pulls no rabbits out of hats, nor is he handy with a saw - though he is not averse to bending the odd fork like Uri Geller - so what precisely does he do that makes him different from the norm?

"When people ask me what I do I say that I'm a psychological magician and mind reader," explains Kennedy. "Where a magician uses his hands to fool you, what I do is use my mind and your mind to fascinate you, I suppose. Where a magician will use clever sleight of hand, I'll use psychological techniques and my intuition."

While it seems difficult to believe, he claims no trickery is used - the skills he uses in his act, he says, are just as they appear. He also says he's not unique and that with effort, they can be learned. "I think what's paramount to remember for me is that I don't have any special gift,"

says Kennedy. "I think anyone can learn to do what I do if they work hard and study. That's one thing I like to do in my show - I like to empower other people to be able to do it. I think it's all very well and good me going on there, but I like to say this is not about me, it's about people believing that they can do things and if you believe you can do it, you can'."

YET Kennedy's background does suggest that he was born with certain talents. His first real memory of these is as a youngster of 15. "My auntie came to visit - she'd just lost her husband - and I just had a strange feeling,"

he says. "I said I know this is a strange question, but do you have a letter that's folded in quarters inside a book in the bottom drawer of your dressing table, but you don't know who it's from?' She looked at me like I was the devil and she said you're quite right'. She had a letter signed George' and she didn't know whether it was from her late husband George, or her brother George, who had died two years before."

To Kennedy's mind, the whole experience was disturbing. He didn't want to be a psychic and was suspicious of the art. "I thought psychics were all charlatans and con men and women, but I decided I should look into it a bit more," he says. "I read a book - I think it was called The Psychology of the Psychic - and I got interested in psychology and psychics.

Then I developed it myself and now most of my stuff isn't learned through books, it's by observing people and trying things out and seeing how they actually work."

He studied something called psychometry - where psychics pick up objects' memories' and relate their hidden details - and started using this on friends, but while he knew he could impress, he never took his talent seriously.

"I did a drama degree at Northumbria University and that's what I wanted to do - I wanted to be an actor," says Kennedy, who lives in Cramlington, Northumberland. "But during my second year I was doing a lot of functions for friends. I was the freaky guy who would do the freaky stuff."

Then fate stepped in and opportunity came knocking. He was presented with an offer and felt he couldn't turn it down.

"I was contacted by a guy from the London area to do a theatre show, which was called Beyond Belief," he says. "It pushed me to do this as a job."

For Kennedy's act he had five guns, with only one containing bullets, and while the audience looked on, he fired the others at his head. Of course, his very life depended on selecting the right ones and that he didn't end up dead, he say,s is down to pure psychology. "It was psychology - just making sure that they mixed them the way I wanted them to,"

he says. "As you can imagine, my mother never came to see me do that."

NOW he's a full-time entertainer, and corporate functions are his main work. He says although it isn't acting, what he does is just as good.

"I'm on stage, people are laughing at me and then I have the ability to suddenly turn it around and make people really tense," he says.

"I think there's so much misery in the world and if I can make somebody have a good time and get to show off what I do, then that's great. My goal is to entertain.

I live for the fun and to have a good time and my show is not too serious.

When you look like me - a weird guy with crazy hair - you can't take yourself too seriously."

As far as the future is concerned, he says he'll take things as they come. So far he's loving what he does, and clearly building up a fan base, but while TV has been discussed, he's been reluctant up to now. "I've been offered three TV deals, but they've all had the same format as Derren Brown's, so I've had to say no because I don't want to be seen as a Derren Brown copy," says Kennedy. "If somebody comes up with the right idea, then, yes, I will do it."

But until TV beckons, he'll simply carry on as normal, amazing audiences everywhere with his unfathomable skills. So just what is the explanation for what Kennedy can do? "I've stopped trying to rationalise it now because I've lost a lot of sleep over it," he says. "I'm like, I don't understand how or why that happened'."

* Kennedy will perform in Peer 6: Mind Reading, Can You Hide? at Newcastle Castle Keep from July 19- 21. Tickets are available on 08700- 600100 or www.mindofkennedy.com