First, Zachary Mortensen learned to juggle balls, then create balloon animals and then juggle knives. “And then I got someone to teach me to eat fire,” he said. After that he got certified in hypnotism.
Now the Waukegan native is known as the fire-eating hypnotist. He’ll perform April 6 and 13 at Three Brothers Theatre Upstage in Waukegan.
First he’ll demonstrate swallowing flames with a torch and then he’ll invite audience members to come up to the stage to get hypnotized.
“I won’t make anybody act like a chicken,” Mortensen said. “However, a wolf or chimpanzee is not out of the question.”
More Top Picks Grow Light
He promised he wouldn’t make anyone do something he wouldn’t do, and said most people are hypnotizable.
While attending Waukegan High School, Mortensen enjoyed psychology and computers. He studied computers in college, but found his true love was entertaining.
“I realized I need to be in a job where I’m dealing with people. I love people too much to be in a cubicle all day,” he said.
One of his first shows he did was at a pizza place in Waukegan juggling and making balloon animals. He was 18.
“I loved how excited everybody became,” he said. “I remember some of my parties as a kid didn’t have that kind of excitement.”
Mortensen said he enjoys eating fire and hypnotizing people because, “I love being able to do something that looks magical, but really it’s all science.
“Fire-eating is all physics, just like walking on glass or laying on a bed of nails. There are simple properties you have to understand like thermal dynamics,” he said.
Mortensen cautioned the reader shouldn’t try this at home — but explained that the fire-eating concept is based on the fact that heat rises. “I look up to the sky. Most of the fire is going out of my mouth. Closing my mouth around the flame cuts the oxygen off and fire needs oxygen,” he said.
He asked a local professional to help him learn to eat fire.
“He was there in case he needed to call 911,” Mortensen said. ” Really, it’s just taking care of your own mental state.” However, there is some danger involved. “If you inhale, the fire goes straight down your lungs and they collapse.” Mortensen has performed his fire-eating skills at Milwaukee’s Summerfest and other venues.
He studied hypnotism “because I was very interested in psychology and I saw clinical as well as stage applications with hypnosis,” he said.
“Being hypnotized is having someone guide you into a natural state of trance — similar to a meditative state, except your mind is a little more active.
“Everybody can be hypnotized,” he said, but it’s easier when an audience member is comfortable with the hypnotist.
This is Mortensen’s first time performing at Three Brothers Theatre.
“There will be very dramatic display of hypnotic powers,” he said. “But it’s the volunteer’s innate power, not some mystical power I have over people. I’ll have them experience things as if they were really happening. It’s just going to be a wild night.”
Sometimes you can discover things about yourself you didn’t know by being hypnotized, he said.
Mortensen has a video of a young man doing a handstand under hypnosis. The young man told him, “I can’t do that. Apparently he can,” Mortensen said.
At the end of the Waukegan event, Morten said, “I hope your hands hurt from clapping and your face hurts from laughing. It’s all the better when you see it’s your friends and your family up there being hypnotized. It makes it something special.”
Sheryl DeVore is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.
Zachary Mortensen, The Fire- Eating Hypnotist
When: 7:30 p.m. April 6 and 13
Where: Three Brothers Theatre Upstage, 221 N. Genesee St., Waukegan
More Top Picks Best Blue Light Glasses For College Students
Tickets: $15-$20
Information: 319-621-0024; eventbrite.com/e/zachary-mortensen-the-fire-eating-hypnotist-tickets-42177561221