Colin Fry Transcript

[Loki]

In the James Van Praagh thread showme2 wrote :

Fry exhibits no symptoms of cold reading. Indeed, when people butt in and start to give him information, he will invariable say "No, don't tell me. I will tell you."

This is very much at odds with my opinion of Fry - his style has seemed to me to be very much 'in the mold' of the other TV celebrity mediums (and therefore containing much that is 'cold reader-ish"). So, I though I'd make a transcript of the show screened here yesterday afternoon (been a slow weekend!).

So, the first reading from the show (more to follow if (a) anyone's interested and (b) I can find the time)

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Fry : "Right... Okay. My first connection is, I feel, a gentleman. I'm over here somewhere [gestures to his left]. Hang on a minute. I've got an arch going over the 3 of you here [points to 3 men in second row]"

1st Man (aged about 45, tough/no-nonsense looking) : "No - two of us".

2nd Man(aged about 45): "Just two"

3rd Man: [looks confused, shakes his head - Fry doesn't mention him again]

Fry: "Right. Okay [points to 1st Man] Sir, please, would you be able to understand a gentleman that went to the spirit who was not in the army but was in the Home Guard?"

1st Man : [Thinks] "No"

Fry :[points to 2nd man] "Do you?"

2nd Man : "I know someone, yeah".

Fry : "This is, this is, quite peculiar what's going on because I now think I've realised what's going on. I've got more than one person trying to connect to me. I got the feeling that its both, its with both of you, its Grand Dad links that I've got here with you."

Both Men : [nod yes]

Fry : [Addressing both men] "Would you understand about someone that fell in, or got thrown into a pond?"

2nd Man : "Yep"

Fry : "Right. You?"

2nd Man : "No, I threw someone in. "[smiles]

Fry : "You threw someone in!"[audience laughs]

Fry : "Would you please also understand about playing chicken with somebody with either a dart or a pen knife?"

2nd Man : [nods]"A crossbow"

Fry : "A crossbow! [audience laughs] Playing chicken? My god, you were a dangerous child"

2nd Man [laughing]"I was!"

Fry : "Alright. [pauses, thinking] Who is Peter?"

2nd Man : "He's got a brother Pete [points to 1st Man]"

1st Man : [nods]

Fry : [to 1st man] "I'll come back to you in a minute then." [To 2nd man] "Who were the group of kids who hung around either the chapel or Chapel Rd or Chapel St?"

2nd Man : "I don't know. Can't remember. Used to be loads of us used to hang around together."

Fry : "What's this about getting chased out of a cemetary?"

2nd Man : [smiles and nods]

1st man : "That was him." [points to first man]"You again isn't it"

Fry : "Yes? Right. Okay. I understand what that sort of...you please understand that this cemetary, there was sort of a small building or chapel in this cemetary?"

2nd Man : "Yeah"

Fry : "Thank you. Alright. Okay, because its like...just like this...a lot of these things, this whole boys thing" [Fry pauses, appears to be speaking as the spirit] "I shouldn't... they didn't think I knew about these things...that I shouldn't know about these things, but you tell them I do"

Both men : [smile, nod]

Fry : [to 2nd man] "We must be going back to like the early 1970's now. I also want this thing about " [counts on fingers 1..2..3..4] "...4, 4 lads all went round together. And if it wasn't the parkers, it was the Cromby jackets?"

2nd Man : [thinks, shakes head] "No, that weren't..."

1st Man : [to 2nd Man] "It was me, not you"

Fry : [to 1st man]"That was you? Alright then, lets move over to you. Okay. Who flushed Peter's head down the toilet?"

1st Man : [laughing] "Probably me I think"

Fry : "It was you?"

1st Man : [still laughing]"Yeah"

Fry : "And did... would you please under...is Peter younger than you?"

1st Man : "No, he's older."

Fry : "So why did you bully him?"

1st Man : "Because I was tougher than him." [audience laughs]

Fry :"See, the feeling that I'm getting here from your Grand Dad is you were a loveable rogue."

1st man : [laughs]"Oh thanks."

Fry : "So your grand Dad was always sort of quite fond of you."

1st Man : "Yeah."

Fry : [Eyes closed, appears to be communicatng with the spirit] "Alright. Alright. Okay." [Eyes open] "Your grand Dad's asking me to actually ask you to give Peter a bit of your time."

1st Man : "Right."

Fry : "Right. You understand that?"

1st Man : [nodding] "Yeah I understand that."

Fry : "And he's just actually saying son stop trying to toughen the boy up. He can't be you. Do you understand that?"

1st Man : "Yeah, I understand that."

Fry : [Continuing the spirits message] "Would you also look at this lad's book or project?"

1st Man : [looking slightly lost] "He was into books..."

Fry: "And actually try and...show a bit of interest."

1st Man : "Alright."

Fry : "You might not understand it ..."

1st Man : "No I don't"

Fry : "..but show a bit of interest."

1st man : "He's a doctor, so I wouldn't"

Fry : "Show a bit of interest. But" [walking away] "just got this feeling like that both of your grandfathers just got this feeling of, sort of pleased that you're not quite the rogues that you used to be."

Both Men : [laughing]

Fry : "You just grown up, alright. I'll leave your grand Dad's best wishes to you."

[audieance applauds - reading ends]

The show then cuts to a later followup interview with two men.

2nd Man : "I went to one of these craft fairs with someone, and this woman come up to me and said do you want a reading, and i said nah I don't believe in it sorry, and she said well it's not very busy I'll do a reading. And when she was doing it she said well I think you could do this. And I thought here it comes, here's the catch - you know, being a bit skeptical as I was - and she did, she taught me for nothing. She said Noel, you can definitely do this and she started on teaching me to be a medium and this sort of thing and that's how it went on."

1st Man : "But then he done the palm reading and that, he done it with the girls to start with, to get, to chat the girls up" [laughs]

[ Cut back replay of Fry mentioning 'Grand Dad links'],

2nd Man : "I've had me Dad come through, me Nan's come through, me wife has come, I've had my wife as well on a one to one basis, but I've never had me grand Dad so it's good. He died...well, a lot of that he must have saw while he was dead though because I'm 45 now, and I was like 8 or 9, so it's a long time ago. He's talking, like watching me, you know, grow up."

1st Man : "And my grand Dad's never come through before and that's the first time that he's come through for me"

[Fade cut]

1st Man : "He was very stern to other people, a sort of a military sort of person so he was very strict, but with me he was fine."

[Cut back to replay of Fry mentioning "Playing chicken with dart or knife"]

1st Man : "When we were 17 or 18 we had , we were having a few drinks, me and a few friends up in a flat that we rented at the time, and what we decided to do was - seems really stupid now - put a crossbow apple on someone's head and try with a crossbow to see who could hit it. And then we'd had a few more drinks then we decided we'd play chicken with this crossbow with an apple on the head, Lucky for both of us I think we weren't very good shots and it just went through the walls basically."

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I'm out of time now, so I won't offer any analysis/opinion on this reading. Comments welcome....

 

[Darat]

Good work Loki. When showme2 made his comment it also didn't tally with my view of Fry's show so I'm glad you took the time to transcribe this.

I see nothing that isn't explainable as a typical medium spiel or cold-reading. (Of course my comments are based on the assumption your transcription is pretty accurate )

I think this transcript is a great example of something mediums use time and time again to generate what are afterwards considered "hits". This something is that we all have a tendency to perceive events that happen to us as being unique to us, whilst forgetting or ignoring the simple fact we share with millions, if not billions of people the same common experiences during our lives.

I see three good examples of Fry working this technique in the above transcript.

1) "Would you understand about someone that fell in, or got thrown into a pond?"

First of all this is not a piece of detailed or unique information. This seems very specific to a "pond" but if the sitters don't respond to pond this can easily be opened up to any type of water incidence from a log-flume at a theme park to falling in the sea. Plus notice how the action itself is kept very vague i.e. "fell in or got pushed in"; I would say that there is a huge difference in falling and being pushed yet in Fry's fishing expedition it almost seems natural that they are easily confused by either the spirit or the spirit-to-medium communication channel. Yet all Fry is doing is ensuring his net is spread as widely as possible.

But the big give away here is how non-specific this bit of information really is, he doesn't give us a who, when or what, yet once the sitter gives him the information the "hit" is created. (Notice that Colin's guess that it is the sitter who was thrown in was wrong but in cold-reading terms a pretty safe risk to take and is ignored.)

2) "Fry : "Would you please also understand about playing chicken with somebody with either a dart or a pen knife?""

Almost exactly the same technique as above; again it is not detailed or specific and again he puts two guesses (dart & pen) together to open out more chances of a "bite".

And once again Fry does not get a hit. However the sitter is helpful by claiming that Fry is talking about a "crossbow" incidence.

There has been no unique information provided by Fry. The idea that a young boy/lad/man has played a dangerously with an object is just another common experience shared with a good proportion of 50% of the population of the whole planet.

Again no requirement for communication with a spirit required to explain the "crossbow hit".


3) Fry : [to 1st man] "I'll come back to you in a minute then." [To 2nd man] "Who were the group of kids who hung around either the chapel or Chapel Rd or Chapel St?"

The same technique, yet again.. No who, when, how or what and he uses a very common street name in the UK, ‘Chapel’ - which could easily be expanded to be "hit" with any Church, Vicarage and so on.

So if they'd been a "bite" again it could seem quite specific in a retelling "yeah he knew me and my friends played at the youth centre in the Church" yet all Fry has done is presented another common experience.

And as for the cemetery - again which kid (especially given the age of the men in question) didn’t ever play in the local cemetery or the graveyard of the local church or chapel?


My conclusion from this is that Fry's technique is just a straightforward typical medium act of fishing for information, he does not impart any unique or specific information and therefore there is no reason to assume he is communicating with a spirit.

(Edited for formating.)

 

[magicflute]

Good analysis Darat! I concur, just plain old out-of-the-box cold reading.

 

[Loki]

Darat,

I have 4 real problems with this reading.

1. Fry and the sitters seem to be talking about two (slightly) different things. Fry uses terms like "kids" and "child", and (seems to) be implying that the grandfather -when he was alive - knew things about the boys that they didn't hink he did. But the men reveal that the grandfather(s) died when they were ony 8 or 9, and that most of the things referred to happened when they were 18 or older.

2. Fry has no trouble getting the name "Peter" completely clearly. Yet neither grandfather could manage to get their own names, or the names of the sitters, through? And didn't even try? Why do spirits have such a strong ability ( and desire) to bring through names of people *not* directly involved in the reading?

3. Fry gets a 'hit' from the sitter for "playing chicken with a dart or pen knife", when the matching event is "crossbow". Now, we're being told that Fry is communicating with a dead grandfather. The spirirt *wants* to pass a 'validation' to the sitters that will enable them to be sure that contact has been made. Fry *wants* to pass this on as accurately as possible, but the spirit (for some reason) can't just tell him. So the spirit creates a feeling/image/sound/presence/intuition (whatever) that Fry has to interpret, and express in words. Why the hell do we get 'dart' or 'pen knife' instead of crossbow? Is "crossbow" too difficult a visual image?

4. The spirit passes a message through Fry for one of the men. On the show, Fry stops for several seconds, eyes closed, apparently listening to something, and says "Alright. Alright. Okay" as if talking to the spirit. He then relays the messages "stop bullying the boy", "give a bit of your time to him" and "show a bit of interest". Very complex messages. Strange how these pieces of information come through so clear and precise, yet the grandfather's or sitters' names do not.

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There doesn't seem to be much interest in poor old Colin (even showme2 hasn't put in an appearance) so I'll hold off on any more transcripts. No comments to make , Clancie? Ian?

 

[Ersby]

Thanks greatly to Loki for doing this.

This is quite nice, as you’d expect from an edited transcript. Having two sitters clearly makes things easier, though, and given their respective ages the “grandfather” guess is pretty safe.

As an aside, the nature of the guesses is interesting. He steers pretty clear of names and months and means of death and instead talks about life experiences quite a lot. This is interesting in that these are pretty easy to edit down into something impressive without actually being dishonest. It’s often been said (by the more believing types) that since the shows are edited for time, repetition of a guess is okay to remove. In fact Jim Underwood’s article about Crossing Over showed an example of that and those on tvtalkshows found nothing odd about that.

But repetition is a good technique: it allows the sitter time to think, it allows the medium to rephrase the guess to include other aspects and it makes it look like the medium is actually being prompted by spirits unseen, and not just throwing stuff out at random.

Take a look at these. This is taken from a reading I did. First, the repetition is edited out, and it looks pretty smooth…

ME: Okay, they’re talking about your daughter’s birthday, which is why I said 14, which is just coming up. Have you started making arrangements for a party? I don’t know how old she is, but did someone suggest hiring a clown? Maybe the clown thing is something for the future, but someone will suggest a clown.

HIM: her class is going to the county fair tomorrow, barring a rain-out, so she may come in contact with one.

And then, with the whole conversation left in, it’s not so assured…

ME: They’re talking about your daughter’s birthday, which is why I said 14, which is just coming up. Have you started making arrangements for a party? I don’t know how old she is, but did someone suggest hiring a clown? They’re telling me “Don’t do the clown!”

HIM: plans for daughter's birthday involving a clown: No.

ME: Maybe the clown thing is something for the future, but someone will suggest a clown, perhaps as a joke, and they’re saying don’t do it.

HIM: clown thing: possible but doubtful; although her class is going to the county fair tomorrow (barring a rain-out), so she may come in contact with one.

A notable difference. but all I did was cut out the repetition, and some people have maintained that there’s nothing wrong with cutting out repeated guesses. In the first version my guess got an instant hit and gave the impression that this was the first thing the sitter thought of: that it was meaningful and specific. In the second the sitter mentions it almost in passing. It’s only because I insisted on the point that the sitter made it fit. (And some people think because a medium repeats a miss, that’s proof of his ability: and that a cold reader would move onto something else.)

(btw,I posted the reading on tvtalkshows, and was going to reveal the unedited version as a kind of coup de grace to the thread there, but time’s been short recently.)

 

[voidx]

Pretty similiar to JE in all respects, which is to say, resembles cold-reading. There are several examples where he asks a question and waits for a reply. This is the same tactic showme2 mentions, but used differently. Rather than having a sitter right of the bat giving info and then saying "no no be quiet, don't tell me" you ask them a question instead and then let them ramble on, supplying information. Interesting that Fry doesn't have them reply with just Yes or No. Here these people are going on telling little tidbits of stories, and Fry allows them too.

 

[Barkhorn1x]

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I'm out of time now, so I won't offer any analysis/opinion on this reading. Comments welcome....

I would like to see a couple more from Mr. Fry. But so far I agree w/ everyone here - it's the same old fishing expedition.

Barkhorn.

 

[Clancie]

Hi Loki,

Thanks so much for doing this. Yes, I do have some comments (some on Fry's behalf; others agreeing with some of the posts here). But its going to take a little while to pull them together.

For now, I just wanted to address one of ersby's comment which I strongly disagree with (unlike some of his Fry observations above):

Posted by ersby

It’s often been said (by the more believing types) that since the shows are edited for time, repetition of a guess is okay to remove. In fact Jim Underwood’s article about Crossing Over showed an example of that and those on tvtalkshows found nothing odd about that.

I believe the "those" you're referring to were neofight and me. As I wrote there, the repetition that was taken out, imo, did not affect the credibility of the reading one way or the other.

This point was significant in terms of Underdown's own argument...that editing on CO dramatically changes the meaning of readings, easily creating a false impression of the hits and misses, etc.

My point was that Underdown criticized CO's editing, but his own editing in his Skeptic article was highly selective. He reprinted only highly edited snippets of a JE reading rather than the complete original reading--something I find most surprising, given Underdown's argument about how easily editing, alone, can be used to deceive. (i.e. It's a true hypothetical point...and as true for print as it is for television Underdown's edited snippets don't make his case any more credibly than JE's make his, if that's his feeling about editing and deception).

Since most of Underdown's edited examples only showed unnecessary, repetitive information being taken out, my point was that, if that reading example was the best he could come up with from a 6 hour taping, then CO must be a lot more accurate than even -I- ever thought......

 

[Ersby]

But repetition is NEVER unnecessary. As I explained above, it serves several purposes. Take the repetition out and any reading will look more assured and confident.

 

[Stumpy]

For the chance for a 1-to-1 reading with Fry where he will doubtless reveal personal fact that "he couldn't have possilby have know" all you have to do is fill out this simple form:
http://www.colinfry.co.uk/contact.html

To increase your chances of a personal reading simply go to his fan fourm at the livingtv.co.uk site where you are encouraged to give details of sick and recently departed relatives - purely for "spiritual healing" purposes only you understand!

Frankly, I am astounded by this man's abilities and simply can't work out how he does it.

 

[homer]

Nice one Stumpy . I must admit that the guy is pretty clever .
Actually I know that there is no possiblity of any contact with my deceased relatives because one of my recently deceased relatives told me that once they get to ' the other side ' theres no coming back .
Ah you say how did she/he manage it then ?
Shucks caught me out !

 

[CFLarsen]

My point was that Underdown criticized CO's editing, but his own editing in his Skeptic article was highly selective. He reprinted only highly edited snippets of a JE reading rather than the complete original reading--something I find most surprising, given Underdown's argument about how easily editing, alone, can be used to deceive. (i.e. It's a true hypothetical point...and as true for print as it is for television Underdown's edited snippets don't make his case any more credibly than JE's make his, if that's his feeling about editing and deception).

But you yourself have used incomplete edited readings from Crossing Over as examples of just how good John Edward is. I fail to see why you are not having double-standards here.

Since most of Underdown's edited examples only showed unnecessary, repetitive information being taken out, my point was that, if that reading example was the best he could come up with from a 6 hour taping, then CO must be a lot more accurate than even -I- ever thought......

I don't understand this. Are you saying that the unnecessary, repetitive information that is being taken out is evidence that the readings are a lot more accurate?