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Wolf Messing – the true story of Russia’s greatest psychic – Tatiana Lungin

"Then my manager sold me to the variety show at Berlin's Wintergarten. This was a major stepping stone in my career: instead of playing the role of a living corpse, I could at least be myself.

I appeared before the audience in two different capacities.  In the first, I portrayed an Eastern fakir - something like a yogi. They pierced my chest with needles and ran swords through my arms and legs.

At the end of the show an actor appeared on stage portraying a rich idler - a fashionable dandy dressed like an aristocratic millionaire. He wore a magnificent tailcoat and top hat, and his fingers were covered with diamonds. Suddenly 'robbers' would burst onto the stage and ‘kill’ him, after first stripping him of his jewels. After committing the evil deed, they became the kindest of philanthropists, distributing amethysts, sapphires, and diamonds to the spectators, and suggesting that they hide them wherever they liked without leaving the auditorium. 

Then a brilliant young detective appeared - Wolf Messing. He walked about among the spectators, passing from one small table to the next, asking the charming ladies and honourable gentlemen to return this or that jewel, hidden in such and such a place.

"This number was invariably successful, and the public poured in to see the presentation. But still I was paid the same five marks.