What it means to be a Magician PART II

When I first began to perform magic, I wanted more than anything to be exactly like Doug Henning or David Copperfield. They had a big stage with a big cast and lots and lots of BIG illusions. David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty disappear for God’s sake! Who wouldn’t want to be a magician like him? I tried and tried to figure out where and how I could get my hands on these types of illusions and years later, I was still unable to figure out how they got them, or where they got them. Did they buy them from someone else? Did they have them built? Did they build the illusions themselves? I didn’t know the answer and I thought I would never become a good magician if I didn’t have the right illusions or the right stage, or the right assistants. I was wrong. The more and more I watched people like Henning, Copperfield, Blackstone and others like them, the more I realized that it wasn’t the illusion itself that was creating the magic for me, it was the performer and the way the magic was presented that made it magical and exciting. It all comes down to one word: Entertainment. Never was this concept made so clear to me, than that special night so many years ago. It was after the show was finished and I had taken my final bows to a wondrous applause. I found myself outside later in a section they had set up to sign autographs and speak with the audience members as they exited the auditorium. I was speaking with a father and his son about the show and they asked me the typical questions that most people are curious about such as, “How long have you been doing magic?” “Are the tricks you perform, easy or does it take a lot of practice?” “Do you know David Copperfield?” To the last question I usually reply, “No, but have his autograph.”

The boy and his father stayed behind after more people went through and waited to speak with me again. I graciously complied, chitchatting about which illusion or trick was their favorite. The boy thought for a moment and reached into his pocket and extracted a red backed playing card that I had thrown out into the audience during a complex manipulation routine with cards. I gazed at the card for a moment and realized he must have caught the card as it flew overhead, or he found it on the floor nearby his seat. He looked up at me as he held the card and said,

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