Here’s the introduction that Eric Lange read to the sold-out audience heard before we walked on stage:

“Welcome to a magical evening at the Y!

“Tonight we’ll be “Looking for Magic with Steve Cohen,” who has delighted and mystified audiences all over the world.  He’s the star of Chamber Magic, the longest-running solo magic show in New York, presented each weekend in an elegant suite in the Waldorf Towers. His audiences include a who’s who of celebrities, royalty, and other notables.  A media favorite, Cohen was also the star of a sold-out solo show at Carnegie Hall and a TV special you will see excerpts from tonight, Lost Magic Decoded, that premiered on the History Channel in 2012.

“Cohen will talk about the making of the film with the film’s writer, director and co-producer Robert Palumbo, whose credits include documentaries for HBO, Showtime and National Geographic.  Steve and Robert traveled the world on their magic quest, so they have a few stories to tell!

“We’re honored to welcome back famed talk show host and author Dick Cavett, who will moderate their discussion.  What you may not know if that he began his own illustrious showbiz career as a magician!  The winner of three Emmys for the groundbreaking  “Dick Cavett Show,” he has also hosted talk shows on the USA, HBO and CNBC cable networks, is the co-author of two books,  and has appeared on Broadway and in feature films including Forrest Gump.

“So let’s welcome them all, and let the magic begin!”

Here’s how the event appeared on the 92Y website:

And here is the catalog advertisement. (See below) Nice company to be included with! On the same page: Nathan Lane, Oscar de la Renta, Dick Van Dyke, David Brenner, Andy Borowitz, Judy Gold, and Alan Dershowitz. The 92nd Street Y really brings in some major talent. Two weeks before my event, there was a Mel Brooks tribute, and the following weeks featured Martha Stewart, Marina Abramovic and General Petraeus.

The New York Times wrote a nice promo article prior to my event, and included a photo of me. I’m not a fan of this particular photo, but they had it in their archives (nicknamed “the morgue”) from when a staff photographer visited me at the Waldorf several years back.

In our greenroom, Robert Palumbo, Dick Cavett and me, waiting to be called onstage. Dick was constantly cracking jokes and made both of us feel right at home. (The Chagall painting I’m standing in front of makes it look like I have a severely inflamed ear. Ta-da! For my next trick…)

The projection monitor showed a good deal of “Lost Magic Decoded” – highlighting The Turk, Think-a-Drink, the Light and Heavy Chest, the Indian Rope Trick, and the Bullet Catch. If you haven’t seen the special yet, click HERE for more details.

Here are a few stage shots of us – we stopped and started the film so we could explain behind-the-scenes tales of what it was like to travel across three continents in search of ancient and little-seen magic illusions.

After a lively question-and-answer session (alas, no secrets were given away…) I performed one interactive card trick that everyone in the audience could experience in their own hands.

In all, “Looking for Magic” at the 92nd Street Y was a successful evening that will linger in my memory for years to come. Thank you to Dick Cavett and Robert Palumbo for joining me on stage (and in Dick’s case, adding “star” power). And many respectful deep salaams to Holly Peppe for all of her work in organizing this event.

Event photos (c) Joyce Culver

The post Finding Lost Magic at 92nd Street Y appeared first on Chamber Magic.

“Lost Magic Decoded” was praised by The New York Times (“baffling”) and USA Today (“jaw-dropping”).

The screening will be hosted by legendary talk show host Dick Cavett (click on his name to read his NY Times blog), and will include a discussion with the film’s writer/producer/director Robert Palumbo. I also plan to perform some live magic after the screening.

If you are in the New York area on June 2nd, I hope to see you there.

For details and to order tickets, CLICK HERE.

The event will be held at the 92nd Street Y, located on Lexington Avenue at 92nd Street.

Event time: 7:00pm

In India searching for the legendary Indian Rope Trick

The deadliest illusion in magic: the Bullet Catch

Performing the Light & Heavy Chest with a champion bodybuilder

The post Dick Cavett hosting “Lost Magic” screening at 92nd St Y appeared first on Chamber Magic.

Published: October 17, 2012

Some viewers will no doubt be annoyed at having been misled by the title of “Lost Magic Decoded,” a frothy special Thursday night on History, carrying as it does the implication that the secrets behind some legendary illusions will be revealed.

The post NY Times Review: Now You See It: Tales of Amazing Illusions appeared first on Chamber Magic.

I had an uncanny out-of-body experience this week. A gentleman from England sent me his uncle’s scrapbooks from the 1930s and 40s, and they were filled with memorabilia of a famous magician who worked for 18 years at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York. The magician’s name? Dr. Sydney Ross PhD.

He entertained aristocrats, dazzled celebrities, and stumped politicians – even several US presidents. For all intents and purposes, he was “The Millionaires’ Magician” of his day, and even worked in the same hotel as me!

Going through his clippings, photos and promotional material felt like I was reading about myself from the future. What a mind-trip!

According to his nephew, Dr Ross jokingly told people that his PhD was in “phinagling.” He must have been very good at it, since he was invited to entertain Franklin D Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt in the White House. More on that in a moment.

Ross’ specialty was close-up card magic, and he entertained tableside – by request only – at the famous Peacock Alley lounge in the Waldorf-Astoria’s main lobby. Here is his business card (note the bottom line that touts his long residency at the Waldorf):

Dr. Ross came to the United States from England in 1928, and found himself in a land of prohibition. He promptly got himself a job entertaining in New York City’s best speakeasies, including the now-famous 21 Club. He went to the Park Lane Hotel for a year when prohibition lifted, and then to the Club Trouville. Lucius Boomer, the famous proprietor of the Waldorf-Astoria was so entranced with Dr Ross’ work that he engaged him to work at the Waldorf.

He later worked for six years at the Rainbow Room in Radio City, Rockefeller Center, but headed back to the Waldorf-Astoria in 1943.

His signed scrapbooks included testimonials from Rockefellers, Fords, Chryslers, Edisons, Whitneys, Pratts, Wideners and Phipps. He was praised in print by Ed Sullivan (“The greatest card entertainer in town”), and lauded by Amelia Earhart (“Performing card tricks is certainly more difficult than flying!”).

Novelist Edna Ferber thought him incredible; Walter Damrosch called him the Paderewski of the Cards. And composer Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote, “Your tricks are marvelous.”

The New York Daily Mirror ran a cartoon titled “At the Waldorf” that included Dr Ross, looking much like a knave in Alice in Wonderland. The illustration was drawn by famed society illustrator Jacques Kapralik.

A dear friend of mine, magician Harry Lorayne, told me that he saw Dr Ross perform at the Waldorf when he was still courting his wife Renée. According to Harry, Ross would greet a couple at their table, wearing a white jacket and red cummerbund. He shook hands with the gentleman, and then kissed the woman’s hand, and continued kissing her, all the way up her arm to her elbow!

According to Ross’ business card, he lived at 800 Riverside Drive in Manhattan. This is a very nice apartment building (I’ve actually been inside, by happenstance) near the George Washington Bridge, at 158th Street.

Geographically, this address ties into a story I remember reading in the New York Times about a magician on the uptown subway in the 1950s. Here’s the story, submitted by an 80 year old reader in 2004:

Visiting New York, I boarded a subway car in Midtown, heading uptown to a technical meeting at Columbia University. I struck up a conversation with a man sitting next to me, and he informed me that he was the official house magician at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel. This unusually interesting revelation to an out-of-towner resulted in a lively conversation between us, terminated only many minutes later when he stood up to exit the car at a stop just before mine.

As he approached the door, he suddenly wheeled around and handed me my wallet and wristwatch. I had felt absolutely no physical contact whatsoever during the entire ride, but his warm and wise smile taught me what he must have generously thought I needed to know.

Later in his career (in 1950), Dr Sydney Ross performed informally in the Cascades at the luxurious Hotel Biltmore, now an office building next to Grand Central Station.

And finally, to the Franklin D Roosevelt story I promised at the beginning. On April 6, 1937, Dr Ross and his wife (and assistant) Zara had the honor of entertaining in the East Room of the White House in Washington DC. In addition to Roosevelt and his wife Eleanor, many important guests were present. The trick that most pleased the party on that day was the spirit painting production of the President’s own portrait. It was one of the highlights of a memorable evening.

After that night, Ross was happy to bring home signed photos of the President and his wife, each framed in wood from the hull of the Mayflower, as brass plates attest.

There’s an old saying that all artists stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before us. I feel honored to be carrying on the good work of the good Dr. Sydney Ross.

The post The Millionaires’ Magician circa 1928? Have I been reincarnated? appeared first on Chamber Magic.

Hedge fund billionaire Steven A. Cohen (shown above, with me and his charming wife Alex) has been to my show in NYC, and has also invited me to perform privately in Connecticut. We first met at an event years ago at the Pierre Hotel in New York, and have stayed in touch ever since. Steve then introduced me to Robin Hood Foundation, and arranged to have me entertain the Board of Directors at their annual luncheon. A truly amazing group.

Funny enough, I get a fair amount of “Steve Cohens” who come visit me at my Waldorf show. After the show I always do a meet-and-greet, and these fellows come up to me with a challenging tone in their voice, saying “Bet you can’t guess my name!” The moment they say that, I KNOW it must be “Steve Cohen.”

When I first began my show in 2000, my marketing budget was slim to none. I tried to think of clever ways to get people in the door without spending too much money. One of the things I did was send out advertising postcards to every “Steve Cohen” in the Manhattan telephone book! (There were several pages worth.) I figured that people are vain, and would wonder what my show was about. Sure enough, when they received the postcards, their curiosity got the best of them, and a lot of them actually showed up at once.

For completeness’ sake, here is the text of the NY Times article, by Joseph Berger:

Calling Steven Cohen. No, Not That One.

January 4, 2011, 2:38 pm

Steven M. Cohen, left, with Andrew M. Cuomo, then the attorney general, at a news conference last April. Mr. Cohen has been named secretary to Mr. Cuomo. But perhaps he is not the only Steven Cohen in the picture.

Steven Cohen is the new secretary to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, among his most powerful aides. So please don’t confuse him with Steve Cohen, the Memphis congressman, or Steven A. Cohen the billionaire hedge fund manager.

Or the two Steve Cohens who are experts on Israel often quoted in The New York Times and other newspapers — Steven M. Cohen at Hebrew Union College in New York and Stephen P. Cohen at the Institute for Middle East Peace and Development, also in New York.

And though they have the same middle initial, the latter should not be mistaken for the Stephen P. Cohen who is an expert on South Asian politics at the Brookings Institution. And he should not be confused with Columbia University’s Steven A. Cohen, who is director of its environmentally focused Earth Institute. Or New York University’s Stephen F. Cohen, who is a professor of Russian studies and history.

None of the above is the Steve Cohn who was a Democratic district leader in Brooklyn for many years, until he decided not to seek re-election in 2010. (His son sought his seat and lost.)

The world is filled with accomplished Steven Cohens or so it might seem when entering the realms of academia or public policy, which seem to be populated by a profusion of quotable Steven Cohens. A search of Wikipedia has articles on no less than 12 Steven or Stephen Cohens, including a wrestler, a magician and a soccer player, and not including Stephen Cohn, a composer of concert and film music.

To be one of these Steve Cohens, however, can mean wrestling with the muddles growing out of their identical or nearly identical names.

“I believe I’m the third one my wife went out with,” said the environmental Steven Cohen, who also blogs for The Huffington Post.

He also had the misfortune of ending up in the same building on Morningside Heights where the Russian studies Stephen Cohen had once lived, so he spent a good deal of time forwarding mail.

“And Google has only made it worse,” he said. “I get e-mails from people asking me about Jewish social policy or Russian politics and I refer them to the other Steve Cohens.”

This Mr. Cohen met Mr. Cuomo’s Steven M. Cohen — a former federal prosecutor — during the campaign for governor because he was asked to write position papers on energy and the environment.

“He was a very nice guy,” he said of the governor’s Steve Cohen. “There was, of course, confusion.”

Stephen Cohen, the Russian expert, recalls receiving an enveloping bear hug from Bill Clinton at a fund-raiser about six years ago because the former president wanted to consult about Middle Eastern policy and thought he was buttonholing that Stephen Cohen.

More than coincidence may explain this plethora of namesakes, and there are several Steven Cohens with the credentials to provide an analysis.

Steven M. Cohen, the professor of Jewish social policy at Hebrew Union College in Greenwich Village, pointed out that Cohen is the most common Jewish name. And Steven or Stephen was a popular name for baby boomers, adds the environmental Steven Cohen, particularly among Jewish parents wanting to brand their children with an Americanized moniker.

Those boomer Steven Cohens have now reached their 50s and 60s, an age where their reputations have been burnished.

“So it is no surprise that there are so many Steven Cohens at the peak of their careers,” said the Jewish social policy Steven Cohen.

That Steven Cohen also thinks that it should not be surprising that many professors have the name Cohen because a high proportion of Jews work in academia. The abundance of namesakes explains why so many Steven Cohens are insistent about using their middle initials.

Some might speculate that the prominence of Steven Cohens has to do with the fact that almost all Cohens are descendants of the esteemed priests — the Cohanim — that tended the Jewish temple. However, the environmental Mr. Cohen said that he is not such a descendant. His last name was given to his grandfather by an Ellis Island immigration official looking to simplify a now-obscure Eastern European name.

Not all Steven Cohens have distinguished themselves in a way that promotes pride among their doppelgängers.

Indeed, Wikipedia shows that a Stephen M. Cohen was accused by a federal court in California of fraudulently acquiring control of the domain name sex.com in 1995 — not long after he spent time in prison for bankruptcy fraud.

And other names are common enough to have generated numerous Wikipedia entries — Mark Levine, say, or Steve Ross, or John Williams, a name that includes an award-winning composer and two authors, one black and one white, who were often confused with each other.

Charles M. Newman, a professor at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University and a probability expert, said, “These kinds of coincidences are not as unusual as they sometimes sound.” If Steven Cohen is a common name, then a certain percentage of them would be well known, depending on what threshold one uses for fame.

His own name, he pointed out, is relatively common. Four years ago, he found himself somewhat unnerved by opening The Times and seeing an obituary of a namesake, the editor of a literary magazine. He was relieved when he read that the literary Charles Newman had been married five times. The mathematical Charles Newman has only been married once.

Do you have a name that seems to have you coming and going? And, if so, does it bring you pride — or is it unsettling?

The post NY Times: Too Many Famous Steve Cohens! appeared first on Chamber Magic.

The photo above is with Jason Segel, and here’s a photo of me with Chris Williams:

I presented a total of four Chamber Magic^® performances at the magnificent Beverly Wilshire hotel – a Four Seasons property. I am humbled that I received four standing ovations.

Outside the Beverly Wilshire hotel

At the front entrance

Here is a view of the showroom where I presented the shows:

And here’s the sign directing people to the show:

The staff of the Beverly Wilshire ranks among the best I’ve ever worked with. Thanks for welcoming me back for my third visit at your hotel!

I remember how difficult it was to sell tickets to my previous two runs in Los Angeles (back in 2005 and 2007). This difficulty stemmed mainly from the fact that I was a relative unknown in LA at that time. Despite having an established show in New York, it was an entirely different matter to draw enough interested people in a new city. Especially since I didn’t have a marketing budget, then or now.

This year, however, all four shows sold out before I even left New York. This was an interesting phenomenon to me. (The same thing happened last week in Boston.) Most ticket sales were through word-of-mouth; I didn’t do any media appearances to promote the Chamber Magic tour. I guess there is enough momentum from my NY Times article and Late Show appearance earlier this year. Whatever the reason, I can’t tell you how blessed I feel. It’s thanks to supporters of the arts, like you, that artists can continue to be creative for a living.

The night before my shows, I had a great dinner with an old friend at Asia de Cuba in the Mondrian hotel. After that, we went over to the world-famous Magic Castle in Hollywood.

One of the highlights of the evening was spending time at the bar with Milt Larsen, one of the founders of the Magic Castle. I was surprised to find that he has been closely following my career. He told me that he considers me to be “the modern-day Max Malini.” That was a mighty fine compliment, especially since his father knew Malini himself, and Milt had met Malini growing up. I don’t know if I could ever fill those shoes, but it was an honor to be viewed this way.

I’d love to return to the Beverly Wilshire soon. Other cities have been beckoning, though. It seems that there is a lot of interest in Chicago. Should that be the next stop on my tour??

The post Back from Beverly Hills appeared first on Chamber Magic.

Grand Illusions

Richard Perry/The New York Times

CLOSE UP Steve Cohen performing Chamber Magic, the show he does five times a weekend in a plush suite in the Waldorf-Astoria.

By N. R. KLEINFIELD

Published: March 7, 2010

THE Millionaires’ Magician does not like doing magic every waking moment. He goes to cocktail parties or dinners and everyone expects lamps to levitate and cards to materialize inside wine bottles. It gets excessive.

But magic was the point. So all right, he would do something.

When we first met, Steve Cohen had made my pen disappear and turn up behind his ear. Next time, I said, how about something better?

He phoned. He told me to come to Riverside Park at 72nd Street just before sunset. “That’s when wishes come true.”

He came in a tailored suit. He has red hair, balanced features, a mellow disposition. Around us, people walked dogs.

On a small pad, Mr. Cohen drew a circle to represent a wishing well. He gave it to me and told me to secretly write a wish inside the circle, tear off the paper and put it in my pocket. I wrote, “Travel the Appalachian Trail.”

We walked toward the water. “Moses had the Red Sea,” he said. “I have the Hudson River.”

When we got there, he dug out a quarter, scrawled his initials on it and asked me to write mine, along with a symbol. He told me to toss the coin in the river.

Leveling his gaze, he had me fixate on my wish. He mentioned something to do with travel, a politician, Tennessee. Then he said, “Travel the Appalachian Trail.”

He said my lucky coin could make the wish come true. Too bad, he reminded me, it lay at the bottom of the Hudson.

He clenched his right hand into a fist. Water seeped from it. He opened his hand. There was the coin, wet.

O.K., that was better.

Richard Perry/The New York Times

Steve Cohen does not have the marquee name of a David Copperfield, David Blaine or Penn & Teller. What he does have, at 39, is Chamber Magic, five shows a weekend at the plush suite in the Waldorf-Astoria where Crown Prince Sultan of Saudi Arabia stays when in town. The audience is capped at about 50 people, who pay $75 each ($100 for the front row). They are expected to dress well. And two or three private events a month, for which he gets $10,000 to $20,000.

Mr. Cohen’s specialty is parlor magic, fusing close-up maneuvers and tricks with common objects for small audiences. He models himself after conjurers who entertained the aristocracy in European salons in the 1800s. He does not saw women or make elephants vanish.

“He works in the style of a soiree at the home of some Vanderbilt or Rittenhouse, where you might expect an evening of light opera but have lucked into an expert magician,” Teller, the silent member of Penn & Teller, wrote in an e-mail message.

The Millionaires’ Magician moniker came about eight years ago, when he was brainstorming with Mark Levy, a marketing strategist and amateur magician, about raising his visibility. He had always cultivated the upper crust, and, in a brief profile, Avenue magazine mentioned that he was sort of the millionaires’ magician. Be that, Mr. Levy said. Mr. Cohen worried it might limit who would hire him. Mr. Levy said, “You’ll get the right calls.”

The shtick clicked. Mr. Cohen makes a point of dressing up (he owns no jeans). He favors props like diamonds over sponge balls. He has performed for Barry Diller, Goldman Sachs, the queen of Morocco, Prince Sultan (whose interest picked up immensely when Mr. Cohen transformed a $1 bill into a $100 bill). For good luck, he keeps in his wallet a souvenir of a trick: the crude drawing Warren Buffett did of his neighbor’s dog on the four of diamonds.

Making money in the magic world can itself seem impossible: one client, a little tight, paid him in stock options, another in innumerable limousine rides. Yet Mr. Cohen, the son of schoolteachers from Westchester County, earns more than $1 million a year fooling people into believing something is happening that isn’t.

THE Conjuring Arts Research Center, on West 30th Street, is one of those idiosyncratic New York institutions. In essence, it’s a house of secrets. Its library contains 12,000 titles on magic, some from the 15th century.

When Mr. Cohen stopped by the other day, he was greeted by Bill Kalush, the director and a sleight-of-hand master. They made small talk about a Japanese magician who recently ate a horse on stage. Mr. Kalush mentioned it was a very old trick. Most are.

Mr. Cohen had come to research a trick called Aerial Fishing. A hook is affixed to a string and tossed over the audience’s head. Reeled in, the line holds a goldfish. Dropped into a bowl of water, it swims about.

“I have an idea where I’d catch three and then do a fourth barehanded,” he said.

Normally Mr. Cohen avoids animals. “If you do magic with livestock,” he said, “you end up becoming a gamekeeper.”

He has made a Jeep disappear. It was on a History Channel show about Jasper Maskelyne, a magician who helped Britain during World War II by rendering tanks invisible and making a city vanish and reappear miles away. Mr. Cohen demonstrated the technique. It was all in the lighting.

“But I don’t do flashy, big magic,” he said. “My magic is more of a thinking man’s magic. Most of it happens in your head. If you want to see a Las Vegas show, go to Las Vegas.”

Mr. Cohen’s heroes are two 19th-century magicians, Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin, who performed for high society in small theaters in Paris, and Johann Nepomuk Hofzinser, who did magic in Vienna salons for tiny audiences. Mr. Cohen once visited Hofzinser’s grave in Vienna. They look a little bit alike.

It disturbs Mr. Cohen when tricks are exposed on the Internet or by the Masked Magician TV show, “Magic’s Biggest Secrets Finally Revealed.”

“A lot of young magicians will show how a trick is done and put it on YouTube,” he said. “It’s like a father telling his son that Santa Claus doesn’t exist.”

Being a successful magician, he said, comes down to three things. “The first order of importance is you have to have a great personality so the audience likes you,” he said. “The second is presentation — what are you going to say. The third is technique. Most magicians don’t get this. They think everything is technique.”

NAT ZUCKERMAN was a sign painter and an amateur magician. Standing at one side of the room, he asked his grandnephew to pick a card and slide it in his pocket without examining it. He yelled across the room to his wife, “Viola, what card did he take?” She named the five of hearts. His grandnephew checked his card. Five of hearts.

The grandnephew was Steve Cohen. This was the first trick he learned. He was 6. When he was 10, he performed at a birthday party for a 4-year-old neighbor. It led to more.

For four summers, starting when he was 12, he attended Tannen’s magic camp on Long Island. A fellow camper was David Blaine and his counselor was Johnny Ace Palmer, a skilled close-up magician. While in high school, Mr. Cohen got $20 an hour to walk around doing magic at a local restaurant.

He went to Cornell University and majored in psychology, figuring things like persuasion and eye tracking could help an aspiring magician.

He dated a classmate, Yumi Morishige, clinching her affections when he whipped away a cloth napkin and produced a dozen roses. They married and moved to Tokyo. She worked as a journalist. He became a legal translator, squeezing in magic shows on the side.

After a few years, they returned to New York, where he continued translating and hustling magic gigs. He hung out at the bar of the Peninsula Hotel. He would nurse a soft drink and do tricks for the bartender. People would notice, say wow, and book him.

He did a regular show at a friend’s apartment, until after three weeks the man’s wife tired of the furniture being rearranged. He moved it to the National Arts Club, where he met Holly Peppe, now his manager, who connected him with the Waldorf in 2001. The first few years, he had to beseech friends to attend. Ms. Peppe called her dry cleaner, her trainer, anyone.

Then she introduced him to a Web site, TheaterMania.com, that enabled him to send e-mail to tens of thousands of people. In 2003, another site listing local activities, dailycandy.com, mentioned him. Shows have been sold out for the last six years. Once a month he does Miracles at Midnight, which is limited to 20 people who pay $250 each to see tricks culled from his private events: a borrowed watch turns up baked inside a loaf of bread.

Why do magic?

“I love giving people that reaction,” he said. “Wow, I can’t believe that!”

HE had shopping to do.

The owner of Tannen’s Magic shop on West 34th Street showed him a fake dove that looked real. “Nice,” Mr. Cohen said, but he doesn’t do birds anymore. There were raccoons, rabbits, skunks. He thumbed through a mentalism book, one of his specialties. “Mentalism is the last form of adult magic that people believe in,” he said. “They think it might possibly be real.”

To maintain his image, he stays away from obvious props like black boxes with dragons stenciled on them in which objects vanish. He mentioned something said by Joseph Dunninger, the famed mentalist: “Every time you take out a prop, your price goes down.”

He bought two tricks he liked, a book and some cards.

Then he walked a block south to Fantasma, a newer magic shop. Occupying the store’s center is a display of original Houdini props. A dummy Houdini descends from the ceiling and extricates himself from a straitjacket. Next to the display is Rambo, the store’s pet rabbit.

Mr. Cohen studied a row of trick drinking glasses. He vetoed the beer glass — better suited for the thousandaires’ magician — and took a Champagne flute. He hoped to do a trick making caviar and Champagne materialize, a good Millionaires’ Magician effect.

Later, he picked up June, his 5-year-old daughter, from preschool. The other parents know him — the magician.

His son, Alex, who is 10, can do some card tricks. June can do one trick. Someone secretly draws something on a sheet of paper and June, from across the room, produces a matching drawing. It took him a year to teach it to her. His wife used to be able to rip up a dollar and reassemble it, until she forgot the restoration part and moved away from magic.

At preschool, he steered June and a dozen classmates to a hallway and did a few tricks. Card stuff, a glass of orange juice emerging from beneath a handkerchief, an orange turning up inside a girl’s hat. Giggles, bug-eyed looks.

June wanted to do her trick. A school worker was drafted to covertly draw something simple a child would recognize. June came up blank once, twice. She was rusty. One more time. The worker drew a heart. June drew a heart.

IT takes an hour and a half to set up the Chamber Magic show at the Waldorf, as long as the performance. There is what the audience sees — not much — and what Mr. Cohen conceals in the room, which is a lot.

Upholstered chairs stood in four rows in the suite’s living room, its windows extravagantly draped. A small cloth-covered wooden table was up front. Mr. Cohen, in a morning coat, positioned himself behind the table.

He began with cards and an absorbing coin trick. He wove in humor, personal ruminations, audience involvement. The show is 12 tricks, each consuming seven or eight minutes and anchoring in the mind.

His signature is Think-a-Drink. It has existed in some form for over a century. The version Mr. Cohen does was popularized in the 1930s by Charles “Think-a-Drink” Hoffman, who performed it in vaudeville houses.

Favorite drinks were scribbled on slips of paper by the audience, and Mr. Cohen poured four of them from a tea kettle: grapefruit juice, red wine, a martini, a margarita.

He asked the wine person to pick a year. He chose 1720.

“This is a free drink, sir,” Mr. Cohen said.

A volunteer poured a final drink that matched the choice on a slip of paper that had been tucked into his pocket: chocolate milk.

Over time, Mr. Cohen has poured more than 100 drinks from his kettle, without missing. Once someone, presumably with stomach issues, chose Pepto-Bismol. “I can’t pour medicine,” Mr. Cohen said.

Magic continued happening. Cards rose from a deck, three rings borrowed from fingers in the audience became linked. Mr. Cohen segued into some benumbing mind-reading (your daughter’s name is Sara, you met John Kennedy, your lucky number is 56). Then the triumphal climax, an astonishing card trick where shuffled cards from two decks aligned in order.

After the final show, some other magicians came by and they retreated to the lobby bar for drinks and a session. Soon, they were showing each other card manipulations. “You seen this one?” “Let me show you this.”

A match book turned into a crumpled card; the backs of queens changed colors. Dialogue grew esoteric.

“Was that stolen from the back or the middle?”

“The middle.”

“That clip shift is unbelievable.”

David Kaye, a children’s magician who performs as Silly Billy, said: “We are a little eccentric. I brought a girlfriend to a magic convention, and she said all we do is sit around and talk about nothing.”

Then Silly Billy showed a trick, cards with slices of cake on them, the slices mysteriously changing size, a card left with no cake at all.

“Very nice,” Mr. Cohen said. “That’s cool.”

The night lengthened. It was almost 2 in the morning. The magicians kept talking. Kept doing tricks.

The post NY Times article: Grand Illusions appeared first on Chamber Magic.