It’s silly to try to name the Greatest Magician Ever, even if you break it down into subcategories like Grand Illusionists, Escape Artists, Mentalists, Comedy Magicians, etc. Yes, there are competitions held each year at which magicians win prizes and honors, but comparing artists of any kind has always seemed pointless because personal taste comes […]
I had never heard of magician Misty Lee until my friend (and hers) Mark Evanier mentioned her a few times on his blog. Since then, I’ve watched some of her videos on YouTube, seen her perform on Penn & Teller’s “Fool Us,” and subscribed to her Unicorn Wednesday channel, in which she posts a weekly […]
My wife and I have seen Penn & Teller many times since they made their off-Broadway debut in the mid-1980s, but haven’t gone back for seven years or so until this weekend. I’m glad we did. Unlike other Vegas acts, who have been doing the same tricks over and over, year after year, P&T regularly […]
This month, Showtime is airing a documentary about Johnny Thompson, one of the most famous magicians of his time. He performed (with wife Pam) as The Great Tomsoni for many years, and then became a mentor for other magicians who needed help devising illusions, figuring out how to make a trick better, or merely sharing […]
Lance Burton and Mac King are two of the best magicians I’ve ever seen. I was first introduced to Lance’s work by Penn Jillette, who told me that Lance did the finest close-up routine (Max Maven tells me the preferred term is “stage manipulation”) in the world — high praise from the man who works […]
A few years ago, I saw a Kickstarter campaign for a documentary about magicians. I know a few people in that business and have always enjoyed the work of good illusionists and great sleight-of-hand artists, so I donated some money. The filmmakers, Marcie Hume and Christoph Baaden, spent the next few years following a quartet […]