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This trick, which they debuted on Saturday Night Live in 1986, put an unexpected twist on Houdini's classic water tank escape.

Question: Explain your famous water tank trick. Penn Jillette: We wrote the water tank for Saturday Night
Live. We wanted to do something big, it was for the Madonna show, a
kick off show the year we were on and we want to do something big. And
we wanted to do something that... our favorite Penn and Teller stuff is
the stuff that the big trick is ignored. When David Blaine does a water
tank all he's talking about is, "I'm in the water. I'm going to drown. I
might die." Our way of doing the water tank is "I'm going to do a card
trick, the card trick is what matters, I have supremely skilled hands.
I'll do the beautiful card trick and oh by the way Teller is holding his
breath during it." That to me is much more interesting.So we
started with that and did it for the first time for "Saturday Night
Live" and then it was the bit we did the most. We did it on just about
every show. We did it on "Letterman." I mean, a bit that he did on
"Saturday Night Live" and on "Letterman" and a lot of other shows and
also we had our own show over in England called the "Unpleasant World of
Penn and Teller." We brought John Cleese on as a guest and he played
the audience member part in the water tank.Recorded on June 8, 2010Interviewed by Paul Hoffman

Question: Explain your famous water tank trick. Penn Jillette: We wrote the water tank for Saturday Night
Live. We wanted to do something big, it was for the Madonna show, a
kick off show the year we were on and we want to do something big. And
we wanted to do something that... our favorite Penn and Teller stuff is
the stuff that the big trick is ignored. When David Blaine does a water
tank all he's talking about is, "I'm in the water. I'm going to drown. I
might die." Our way of doing the water tank is "I'm going to do a card
trick, the card trick is what matters, I have supremely skilled hands.
I'll do the beautiful card trick and oh by the way Teller is holding his
breath during it." That to me is much more interesting.So we
started with that and did it for the first time for "Saturday Night
Live" and then it was the bit we did the most. We did it on just about
every show. We did it on "Letterman." I mean, a bit that he did on
"Saturday Night Live" and on "Letterman" and a lot of other shows and
also we had our own show over in England called the "Unpleasant World of
Penn and Teller." We brought John Cleese on as a guest and he played
the audience member part in the water tank.Recorded on June 8, 2010Interviewed by Paul Hoffman