A Pickpocket's Guide to New York

Preparing for his role as Harry, an aging pickpocket in Noah Segan’s film “The Only Living Pickpocket in New York,” John Turturro trained with Apollo Robbins, a celebrated pickpocket and former Vegas performer. Robbins helped choreograph the film’s thefts, teaching Turturro how to lift objects and then alter his movements to disappear into a crowd. During a park demonstration, Robbins explained pickpocketing jargon and techniques, including “reefing the kick,” which moves an object toward the top of a pocket from outside. He also demonstrated how easily he could take a wallet or watch during an ordinary conversation, even planting one person’s student ID in another person’s wallet.

The encounter explores pickpocketing as a craft that depends on attention, timing, misdirection, and performance. Turturro sees a balletic quality in its nonviolent finesse and a connection to acting, which also draws on observing and assembling details from life. Robbins’s own path began with childhood theft and a later fascination with magic; he blended lessons from both worlds into his stage act. He has studied how theft varies across cultures and how phones create distractions while surveillance cameras make stealing harder. Now he runs a security company, applying his understanding of deception to advise government contractors and demonstrate cognitive blind spots to law-enforcement audiences. For Robbins, theft has shifted from a literal act to a tool for explaining how people fail to notice what is happening around them.