David Blaine is having an electrifying weekend… And, he’s inviting the world to watch…
The 39-year-old half-Puerto Rican master illusionist and endurance artist kicked off his latest stunt on Friday evening: standing on a pier in Manhattan for 72-hours straight while a musician plays a keyboard that will send a million jolts of electricity through his body via Tesla coils that surround him.
Blaine, who is wearing a chainmail-style armor suit, doesn’t plan to sit or eat for the entire length of the show.
Entitled Electrified: One Million Volts Always On, the live-streaming event, which began at 7:30 pm on Friday, is taking place in New York’s Pier 54.
“[I]t’s an environment we normally shouldn’t be in,” explained Blaine, in an statement to Wired UK. “It’s like when I did the dive with great white sharks — you’re in this part of nature where you don’t belong, and the brain sends signals saying you shouldn’t be here. But, at the same time, it’s beautiful and intimidating.”
In an AP videotape of his rehearsal on Tuesday, Blaine demonstrated by outstretching his hands to create lightning bolt-looking shocks of electricity and even conducted the volts out from his headgear.
On Sunday evening at 7:30 pm, musician Andrew W.K. is scheduled to jam a keyboard solo that’ll send a million jolts through Blaine.
If you’d like to see Blaine getting “electrified” this weekend, check out the YouTube live stream here.