In & Of Itself: Magic Review

Over the past few days, friends have been contacting me about Derek Delguadio's show, In & Of Itself, which played in New York several years ago for more than 500 performances, and which is now available on Hulu. Everyone wants to know whether I've seen it, and what my reaction to it is, so rather than answering everyone individually, I thought I'd process my thoughts here as one collective response. Maybe, in so doing, it will become clear how I felt about it.

Let me start by saying that the show is extremely good: entertaining, novel, and well executed. Most people have not seen a magic show like it or a cardman of Derek's caliber. I remember seeing Ricky Jay as a kid and being blown away by his card handling, and that show focused me on who and what I wanted to be as a magician and performer.

Derek I met about ten years ago when I first arrived in Los Angeles. Words and adjectives that come to my mind about meeting him: ambitious, intelligent, skilled, somewhat dour, and a tad crass (for my taste, anyway). He handled cards expertly and I could tell that he shared my obsession for card technique; this is a particular niche within the field of magic and it's highly technical. Derek showed me a few moves he had created himself and everything he did looked effortless and fluent.

While I attended the Magic castle on a periodic basis to have a good time and meet colleagues, Derek was there virtually every night. He had moved into an apartment complex directly across the street from the Magic Castle, part of his plan to meet the right people and build his name in the magic community and elsewhere I suppose.

For a time, I espoused having similar goals. But looking back, with hindsight and honesty, I realize I did not truly want that for myself. Certainly I had spent most of my life honing a craft, and it's nice to be appreciated and to give people the gift of magic. But I never saw it is a viable way to make the kind of living I wanted for myself. Don't misunderstand--there are magician's that make very nice livings doing magic, and indeed the field of magic is an entire industrial complex full of niche and opportunities. But the only place I could see myself within the complex was as a performer, and for reasons I can only briefly articulate, pursuing magic as a career was not natural to me. I always knew that I wanted a business that endured during good times and bad times. I wanted to be home for dinner. I did not want to tempt myself with women other than my wife or spend too much time away from her or the kids. I did not want to be up late at night and sleep late. I did not want to sell “time” and I did want to earn money somewhat passively by assembling a business. And so with all this, I wanted to sell something necessary and non-discretionary. And so I started my business, Shleppers Moving & Storage.

Sometimes I also think about Lady Gaga, an incredible artist and singer who sang "I live for the applause, applause, applause". Well, after years of singing in a cappella groups and performing magic for audiences since the age of 12, eventually I realized that I do not live for the applause. I love applause. It's terrific. Everyone loves to be appreciated, and approved of, and admired. But in me, there was no void to fill, no fire to be loved or famous.

When I first moved to Hollywood in 2010, I lived in an apartment building above Ian Kessner. Ian, a cool Jewish guy from Toronto, was married to Israeli actress Bar Paly, and one day I found myself hanging out with them at their apartment. I told them a bit of my life story, and Ian informed that in his early twenties he was close with Leonardo DiCaprio & David Blaine. I mentioned that I knew David from my time doing magic in NYC as a teen, and that in some respects I wanted to follow along in his path.

Ian responded quickly, and in no uncertain terms, that this was not going to happen. "You're not going to be anything like David Blaine Michael." I asked why he would say such a thing, and he followed up with a series of questions: are your parents still married? Yes. Did you go to college...earn a degree? Yes, Philosophy & an MBA. How about siblings...are they okay? Yes. Your family had enough money growing up? Yes.

'Right', Ian said. 'That is NOT David Blaine at all. David never knew his Dad. He slept on his mother's couch and they had no money. His mother had a hard time keeping herself together and could not support them. From the time he was 14, he's been hustling every day and night to make a living for himself and take care of his mother. He has no back up plan. He's not going to switch to real estate (like you) if magic doesn't work out. He thinks all day and night about magic. When he's figuring out where to eat, it's based on who may be there, and what he will do if he sees someone famous. Every thought, every action, every motivation, is curated around the singular goal of being a famous magician. There is no home base, no place to rest, nothing to fall back on. Everyone he meets wants something from him and he can never let down his guard.'

At first hearing this made me upset. But then, I reflected on Ian’s words and message, and I found within them a wisdom. I realized how easy I had it, and rather than running from that fact, I gradually learned to accept it, and more, to be thankful for it. Extremes breed extremes. And so while I may admire people that have gone through the proverbial flames that life can offer only to come out stronger on the other side, I do not want to trade places with them. Coming from a stable home, full of love, is a great thing and something I value giving to my kids. For every David Blaine, there are countless others that simply didn’t play the odds right.

Last night, in watching Derek's show, I was reminded of Ian's words. In many ways, In & Of Itself is thematically similar to a show I wrote and performed in NYC years ago called ADD-Lightful, which was about the challenges of articulating an identity when none of the words seem to fit: Magician, Conjuror, Sleight of Hand Artist, etc. Picking a title for oneself is not inconsequential when we live in a society that asks us to define ourselves by what we do, and the inability to find a title that feels right causes insecurity, not to mention questionable branding!

Derek's show does an excellent and poignant job of examining this existential question of identity. But Derek's story and show are far more painful than mine. His father ran off before he was born. His mother supported them and he longed for the day when he might meet his dad. One night, he awakens to find his mother on the couch kissing another woman. Then, terribly, a community of homophobes turns on them, slanders her to his face, and eventually forces them to relocate.

Hearing the story was painful, and Derek appears in pain throughout the performance, almost as if his belief, rational from his perspective, is that the journey of self exploration must be fraught with pain. This is where our plots and themes diverge. To me, the existential sadness of identity crisis is nearly synonymous with the human condition itself, a basic ennui that we all feel from time to time but do not let consume us. And when I perform, I like to delight and dazzle—I want my audiences uplifted. Derek's show indulges the part of ourselves that falls pray to a destructive inner voice, without providing a coherent hope that there is light at the end of the tunnel, or a corresponding joy that offsets the pain. A lot of great art comes from this place. In my youth I indulged this voice, but as an adult, I wanted to get through it and past it. I wanted to be stable, and happy, and to transform the ennui into wisdom. At some level, I wish this for Derek, too.

All told, I unequivocally recommend seeing Derek's show. I hope that it provided him joy, fulfillment, money, and a modicum of catharsis.