60 Fun Facts About Magic

Harry Houdini took his stage name from which French magician?

He later turned on his idol, publishing The Unmasking of Robert-Houdin in 1908.

In which city was Houdini born?

He was born Erik Weisz in 1874; the family emigrated to Appleton, Wisconsin, in 1878.

What escape did Houdini introduce at the Circus Busch in Berlin in 1912?

He was suspended upside-down in a locked, water-filled cabinet, holding his breath for more than three minutes.

Which London newspaper challenged Houdini in 1904 with handcuffs said to have taken five years to make?

He emerged free after an hour and ten minutes and broke down in tears; many now think the stunt was arranged.

Houdini was the first person to do what in Australia, in 1910?

He flew a French Voisin biplane at Diggers Rest, Victoria, and never flew again after the tour.

What large animal did Houdini famously vanish on stage at the New York Hippodrome?

He bought the trick from magician Charles Morritt.

On what date did Houdini die?

He died of peritonitis after refusing surgery for appendicitis; his wife held Halloween seances for ten years afterwards.

What secret code did Houdini agree with his wife Bess to prove communication from beyond the grave?

Rosabelle was their favourite song; a medium named Arthur Ford claimed to convey it in 1929.

Houdini's crusade against fake mediums cost him his friendship with which famous author?

Doyle, a devout spiritualist, believed Houdini himself had supernatural powers.

Houdini served as president of which organisation from 1917 until his death?

He was elected nine successive times and built it into a national network of clubs.

Under what surname was Copperfield born?

He took his stage name from the Dickens novel because he liked its sound.

Which monument did David Copperfield make disappear on live television in April 1983?

He raised a curtain in front of 20 tourists on Liberty Island and lowered it to reveal empty space.

Which famous structure did Copperfield appear to walk through in 1986?

The following year he escaped from Alcatraz.

What is Copperfield's illusion in which he appears to be sawn in half by a giant rotary blade?

Presented as an escape gone wrong, it debuted in 1986.

Copperfield's private resort in the Bahamas is called what?

He claims the islands may hold the Fountain of Youth, which won him a Dubious Achievement Award.

How many Emmy Awards has Copperfield won?

From 38 nominations, plus 11 Guinness World Records.

Which supermodel was engaged to Copperfield in the 1990s and appeared in his act?

They sued Paris Match after it claimed the relationship was a paid sham, and won.

What did Copperfield found in 1982 to help disabled patients regain dexterity?

It uses sleight of hand as physical therapy in more than 1,100 hospitals.

Copperfield's magic secrets are etched on nickel plates aboard what?

The Arch Mission Foundation payload was on Israel's Beresheet lander.

In which year did Penn and Teller first perform together?

Their debut was at the Minnesota Renaissance Festival on August 19.

At which Las Vegas hotel have Penn & Teller performed since 2001?

They are the longest-running headliners at the same hotel in Las Vegas history.

Which card do Penn & Teller force on spectators in nearly all their card tricks?

Their bullet catch has each of them firing through glass and catching the other's bullet in his teeth.

What was the name of Penn & Teller's Showtime series that debunked psychics and pseudoscience?

It ran from 2003 to 2010.

On which channel did Penn & Teller: Fool Us originally air in 2011?

Jonathan Ross hosted the first two seasons before Alyson Hannigan took over.

What do magicians who baffle Penn & Teller on Fool Us win?

The trophy is cheekily branded with the initials 'FU'.

Blaine's breakthrough 1997 TV special was subtitled what?

Penn Jillette said it 'really, really does break new ground'.

Where was David Blaine suspended in a Plexiglas box for 44 days in 2003?

The stunt was called Above the Below; George W. Bush joked about it in a London speech.

For how long did David Blaine hold his breath in 2008 to set an oxygen-assisted world record?

His Drowned Alive stunt two years earlier had left him with kidney and liver damage.

How many helium balloons carried David Blaine aloft in his 2020 Ascension stunt?

He floated over Page, Arizona, in a stunt streamed live on YouTube.

Blaine's 2002 stunt Vertigo involved standing for 35 hours on top of what?

The pillar was only 22 inches wide and he was not harnessed.

Siegfried & Roy headlined which Las Vegas casino from 1990 until 2003?

Steve Wynn signed them to a five-year, $57.5 million contract.

What was the name of the white tiger that attacked Roy Horn on stage in October 2003?

The 400-pound tiger bit into his sleeve and then his neck during a Mirage show.

Where did Siegfried and Roy first meet in 1959?

Roy was a waiter on the TS Bremen and challenged Siegfried to pull a cheetah out of a hat.

The father of modern conjuring, Robert-Houdin, trained in what trade before magic?

His mechanical skill fed automata like the Marvelous Orange Tree.

Napoleon III sent Robert-Houdin on a 'magic mission' to which territory in 1856?

He used the Light and Heavy Chest to convince tribal chiefs that French magic was stronger than the marabouts'.

Robert-Houdin's illusion in which a barren plant bloomed and bore fruit was called what?

A version of it appears in the 2006 film The Illusionist.

Which British magician gave the first public performance of sawing a woman in half, in January 1921?

Horace Goldin's American version later that year is the one modern audiences would recognise.

Which magician died on stage at London's Wood Green Empire in 1918 when a bullet catch went wrong?

He was really an American named William Robinson who performed in yellowface and pretended not to speak English.

What was the real name of the American 'Chinese magician' who died in the 1918 bullet catch?

He copied his act from the genuine Chinese magician Ching Ling Foo, who publicly called him an impostor.

Historian Peter Lamont argues the Indian rope trick legend began with an 1890 hoax in which newspaper?

John Wilkie wrote the story; no accurate references predate it.

The cups and balls trick was performed by conjurers of which ancient civilisation, as recorded by Seneca?

Its Latin name was acetabula et calculi.

Which 1584 book by Reginald Scot was among the first to explain magicians' secrets?

He wrote it to stop people being executed as witches.

At which London venue did Maskelyne and Cooke stage magic shows for 31 years from 1873?

Maskelyne is credited with inventing many illusions still performed, including levitation.

In what year was The Magic Circle formed in London?

Penn & Teller were long denied entry for revealing how tricks were done.

How do visitors open the hidden entrance at Hollywood's Magic Castle?

The clubhouse for the Academy of Magical Arts opened on January 2, 1963.

Which brothers converted a 1909 mansion into the Magic Castle, opening it in 1963?

Their father William Larsen Sr. founded Genii magazine and the Academy of Magical Arts.

Which Canadian sleight-of-hand master, 'The Professor', held court at the Magic Castle until his death at 98?

He famously fooled Houdini, who boasted he could work out any card trick seen three times.

Doug Henning's Broadway hit The Magic Show, which opened in 1974, had songs by which composer?

It ran four and a half years and earned Henning a Tony nomination.

What did Doug Henning promise NBC in order to land his first television special?

It was the first time the escape had been performed since Houdini himself.

Criss Angel's TV series Mindfreak aired on which network from 2005?

His Las Vegas show, originally called Believe, plays at the Luxor.

What is Criss Angel's real name?

He was born on Long Island to a Greek-American family.

Ricky Jay was once in the Guinness Book of Records for doing what with a playing card?

He could throw a card into a watermelon rind, and appeared in Boogie Nights and Tomorrow Never Dies.

Which playwright directed Ricky Jay's one-man show Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants?

Mamet also cast him in House of Games and The Spanish Prisoner.

Lance Burton won the Grand Prix at which international magic competition in 1982?

He produced doves, candles and canes in top hat and tails, then headlined the Monte Carlo in Las Vegas for years.

Which Harry Blackstone Sr. staple made a canary and its cage vanish while children held on?

His other signature piece was a light bulb that floated over the audience.

Howard Thurston inherited his touring show from which magician?

He ran the Thurston-Kellar Show for about 35 years until a stroke in 1936.

The famous floating-woman illusion performed by Kellar, Thurston and Blackstone was called what?

John Nevil Maskelyne originally devised it.

Which Peruvian magician on The Ed Sullivan Show inspired a young Doug Henning to take up magic?

Henning grew up in Winnipeg and later studied psychology at McMaster University.

What did Houdini do to make his straitjacket escapes more impressive, on his brother Hardeen's advice?

Both brothers later did the escape dangling upside-down from buildings.

Copperfield left which university after three weeks to star in the musical The Magic Man?

He was 18 and adopted his stage name at that point.