"Unfortunately, you will always get one or two thugs," said a spokesman for Sky One, which, with Britain's Channel 4, has bought the TV rights to Blaine's story for an undisclosed sum.
Projectiles aside, Blaine still has his fans. More than 2 million people watched the TV special in which he entered the box, and he is attracting a corps of loyal observers, including one the other day dressed as Saddam Hussein. "I think he's really brave," said Hitesh Vajir, 21, a student, as Blaine waved at some people below. "You don't normally get things like this in London."
Chris Alexander, a bartender and writer who had come from Boise, Idaho, specifically to see Blaine in the box, had worn the same clothes -- black pants, a white windbreaker, and a black beret -- every day, and tried to catch the illusionist's increasingly bleary eye.
"I give him the same wave, and I think there's been a glint of recognition," Alexander said. He attributed the egg-throwing and other episodes to simple jealousy. "They have to put him down because they can't fathom doing something like this in a million years," he said.
That's right, said another bystander, Robert Jones, 49, who was far from impressed at Blaine's activities, which included some desultory squat-thrusts and exchanging what appeared to be sign language remarks with a man on the ground.
"How boring is this?" Jones said. "They were probably doing him a favor, throwing eggs at him."
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