CASTING SPELLS : In Hypnotist Flip Orley’s Gigs, the Crowd Gets Into the Act

Comedian Flip Orley is booked into the Brea Improv throughout the month of May: no opening acts, just Orley, in a fast-paced show that can run nearly two hours. But if you plan on visiting the comedy club more than once this month, don’t think it’ll be like watching a rerun of “An Evening at the Improv.”

With Orley--a comic hypnotist--no two shows are alike.

“The creative process is different every night because the people are different every night,” Orley says. “Depending on who comes on stage, you don’t know what to expect.”

Orley, who is considered one of the most popular one-man acts plying the comedy club circuit, opens his show with 20 minutes of stand-up comedy. In the process of talking about marriage, family life, traveling and how he got involved in hypnosis, he establishes rapport with the audience and explains what the rest of the show will be about.

Then the real fun begins.

With volunteers from the audience who undergo a brief hypnotic induction, Orley dips into his vast repertoire of “hypnotic sketches.” Picture a group of total strangers becoming loving couples in a fun-filled version of “The Newlywed Game.”

Or the volunteers’ being transformed into aliens visiting the Earth for the first time and using interpreters to explain why they’re here. Or adults regressed to 6-year-old children, waiting to sit on a grumpy 92-year-old Santa’s lap.

The possibilities are endless--and so are the volunteers’ responses.

“Literally, when I say each show is different, I mean that,” Orley said. “This is the purest form of improvisational entertainment you could ever see. The show writes itself every night.”

Speaking by phone last week from his home in Lafayette, La., Orley said he remains “very involved in all the situations. I’m not a puppeteer who stands back. I create situations where I can direct where it’s going and be part of the situation as well.”

As a comic- hypnotist, Orley knows what he’s up against.

“One of the things that’s been a real challenge for me has been to break the stereotype,” he said, conceding that many people are turned off by the prospect of seeing a hypnotist. “And yet if people happen to stumble in for whatever reason to see the show, they’re usually so entertained and taken aback by it they’re going to tell a friend and come back.”

Orley said he has more than 10 hours of material to choose from, with bits ranging in duration from three to 20 minutes.

“You need that kind of bulk of material so you can accommodate each show,” he said, explaining that he selects bits that are most suitable to the evening’s volunteers and then builds a show around them.

Orley, who has worked with as many as 40 volunteers but usually uses between six and 12, emphasizes that his act is not a hypnosis seminar.

“I’m doing a show for entertainment,” he said. “I tell people if you plan to come on stage, you’d better be willing to cooperate me with me and also participate in the show. They know full well they’ll be participating in bits for entertainment. Even within that, when someone is on stage and deeply hypnotized they react to the suggestions I provide according to their personality, background, sense of humor, and their creativity. All those things come into play.”

Orley acknowledges that there are always nonbelievers to contend with.

“I think one reason people don’t believe in hypnotism is because there’s a real general misconception of what hypnotism is,” he said. “People think that hypnotism is one person controlling another person--a very weak-minded, weak-willed person who is easily manipulated through some kind of Svengali-type person.

“That has nothing to do with hypnosis at all.”

What the hypnotist is actually doing, Orley explained, is working with someone’s innate abilities to create.

“Your mind has all this ability, and oftentimes people don’t know how to use the ability they naturally have. Hypnotism is really just a skill that helps you use your mind more efficiently and more powerfully.”

And the hypnotist, he said, “is kind of like an orchestra leader where you’re directing where the show is going but you’re leaving it up to the people to interpret what you want.”

Orley, 31, a native of Phoenix, first became interested in hypnotism in the sixth grade and then studied it privately in high school for three years. He began dabbling in stand-up at 18 while majoring in communications at the University of Arizona in Tucson and by the time he began doing comedy full time when he was 23, he already had incorporated hypnotism into his act.

“My show is really light,” he said. “I want people to have a good time. There are times when people walk out with more than being entertained. That’s the gravy; that’s the hope. If I can possibly leave the audience intrigued and curious to pursue their ability to use their mind better, that would be great.

“If I can leave the volunteers with a better ability to relax and sleep better and just have more self-control, that’s great too.”