Derren Brown makes a living by bamboozling his audience into behaving in extraordinary ways. But the illusionist described the “terrifying” moment a man plunged over a 45ft balcony during one of his live shows this weekend.

Brown, 42, said a man in the audience was pushed from the upper circle at the Palace Theatre in London’s West End on Saturday during one his Infamous shows.

He wrote on Facebook: "Tonight a woman pushed her hubby as a joke from the front of the balcony. He fell and caught the upper circle on the way down, and was hanging from it. He's fine, but what a finale. Sending best thoughts to him & wife, terrifying."

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Another eye witness, Rob Millwood, told The Sun: "He hit the lights and grabbed the bar with one arm. Three or four guys ran down the steps and pulled him back.

"A few inches to one side and there would have been nothing to break the fall."

The man fell 15ft before he managed to hold on to the lighting rig, The Sun reported.

The Palace Theatre warns guests on its website not to sit in the highest tier if they are scared of heights or have limited mobility.

The Independent's critic Julian Hall last month described Infamous as "Brown's most understated show yet," which nevertheless "left his audience dumbfounded, while his tongue-in-cheek homage to mediums made the frauds look better than they ought to."