The genuine spontaneity of these happenings is one of the things that makes comedy so exciting. When I saw  One Man Two Guvnors with James Corden there was some audience participation in that. It was brilliantly done but – spoiler alert – a plant turned out to have been involved. While non-comedy goers were probably not disappointed, as someone who sees authentic "AP" a lot in stand-up shows I felt a little cheated.

All of which is not to say, of course that plants are never used in stand-up comedy. The most famous case, which I think is long ago enough now that I can discuss it, was in Brendon Burns' superbly subversive 2007 if.comedy award winner, So I Suppose This Is Offensive Now, in which he ended up having a full-on mid-set  argument with a member of the audience who said he was being offensive. It was an inspired twist to the show that ingeniously toyed with the audience's emotions. Everyone was convinced that the argument was genuine – it was only at the end that we found out we'd all been brilliantly duped.

The whole issue of plants will no about rumble on as shows become more immersive in a reaction to conventional Live at the Apollo Route One stand-up. I was told off the record recently about a performer who started off using plants until they were confident enough to use "real" people. They are now so good at audience interaction I wondered if they had started using plants again – sometimes you can't win...

From my chat with Chris Cox – "I am positive that Derren (Brown) doesn't use any plants. Nor do I for that matter. I know a few performers who do and think less of them because of it. It's far too dangerous to use a plant as it undermines everything we do. We shouldn't have to either, we should work hard on finding a method (there's always a method) to make what we want to do possible without using a plant. If I remember rightly an act got banned from a big magic competition for using a stooge in the audience. I think it's morally wrong to use someone that will just do/say what you want. There are, however, very clever methods and techniques to use real people and get them to do exactly what you want them to do, with the effect still being strong for them. That I think is a much more elegant way to achieve something. Stooges/plants, any of that stuff, they are bad for magic and especially mentalism. If you get found out then you're career is dead, who is going to believe anything you do if you use a plant?

I think some magicians don't frown upon using plants.. but I think those magicians are bad magicians. There are many old magic books I have where the method for a trick is basically, give the person a card to read which says 'play along and pretend you are a chicken' or something like that. There are much more clever ways to do something like this which means when that person comes offstage they don't just go, 'oh he told me to do it.'

I think there is certainly some skill in choosing the right person, but I think really the skill is in the performer for making the person you choose do what you want them to do. My tricks live and die by how someone responds to them and how they react on stage. If they react poorly, the audience react poorly, so I need to make them as comfortable and happy as possible on stage, get them to follow instructions for the effect and more importantly, teach them the sort of responses I want from them. In essence though they're moving props, but if you treat them like that, you won't get good stuff from them.

In terms of what you can do to make them great, there's not much other than basic human psychology. Make them the star of the show, they normally really don't want to be on stage and are thinking about looking stupid etc... have fun with them, make them laugh, make them relaxed and they'll do what you want. Sam off of Tape Face is a master at this."

Chris Cox is currently on tour without any plants. Details here.