Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

King’s court: Comic magician’s show is an odd mix

What: "The Mac King Comedy Magic Show."

When: 1 and 3 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday.

Where: Comedy Cabaret, Harrah's hotel-casino.

Cost: $10.95.

Information: Call 369-5111.

Watching Mac King perform is a little like watching Elmer Gantry, Burt Lancaster's Oscar-winning turn as a salesman turned evangelist, come to life.

He's equal parts childish, impish and charming as he craftily works the audience from skeptics to full-fledged believers.

Only instead of hawking some of that old-time religion as did Gantry, King is selling equal parts magic and comedy. And his audiences are buying it up, as evident during a recent performance when the crowd sat mesmerized by King's tricks and jokes.

For example, his goldfish routine: A seemingly simple sleight-of-hand trick, King plucked the fish out of thin air and onto a rod and reel, before making it disappear, ultimately spitting it out into a glass of water. Both funny and laugh-out-loud gross, the bit is the sort of magic act where you know it's got to be easier than it looks to perform, but you could spend a lifetime trying to figure out how. It also had the audience staring in amazement.

King, who performs at the Comedy Cabaret at Harrah's hotel-casino, plays up the part of a good-natured yokel from Kentucky (his home state), but behind his deceptively simple tricks and vaudevillian style of comedy is a master craftsman who knows far more than he cares to let on -- even when not on stage.

For example, the plaid suit the 40-year-old magician/comic wears during his act is straight out of a John Waters film. For appearance's sake, it certainly wouldn't occur to most people in the audience that this hayseed has a dual degree in anthropology and magic from Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minn., which he attended on a National Merit Scholarship.

"When he first comes out on stage, people think he's an idiot for the first few minutes," Lance Burton, longtime friend and fellow magician, says. "But he's actually one of the smartest guys I've ever met."

King, though, as befitting his personality, is self-deprecating when it comes to both his act and talent.

"It's just a funny magic show," King says backstage after a recent show. "I'm just a dork doing magic tricks."

But the "dork" is getting noticed: He has several national TV appearances to his credit -- "The Donny and Marie Show," NBC's "The World's Greatest Magic," "The World's Wildest Magic" and "Penn and Teller's Sin City Spectacular."

Meanwhile King continues to build an audience in Las Vegas.

And in true Gantry-like fashion, the performer knows the value of winning converts. For example: being as accessible to his fans as possible -- autographing Mac King T-shirts and glossies and posing for family photos after the show.

"I like doing it," King says of his meet-and-greets. "People like coming by and saying hello."

Ultimately this will benefit him, King acknowledged, especially when making a name for himself amid the crowded billboards along Las Vegas Boulevard, a problem compounded given his limited budget for advertising.

"Most of my audience is (through) word of mouth," he says.

But his work is paying off. King just inked a three-year deal to keep his "Mac King Comedy Magic Show" alive at Harrah's.

It's a far cry from his heavy touring days when he was on the road a majority of the time. "If I saw my wife (Jennifer Sils) two weeks in a row, it was because of a bad spot in my schedule," he says.

Now he's settling into his new gig and all the creature comforts that come with it. His new lifestyle has even provided the perfect time for the couple to welcome their first child -- a girl -- due Aug. 30. (King joked about naming her "Harrah.")

Looking and acting vaguely like a diminutive Harry Anderson (of "Night Court" and "Dave's World" fame), King is jovial, quick-witted and pleasant -- in short, everything you see on stage, which Burton said is a key ingredient to his popularity.

"That's the thing about magic or performing," Burton says. "The successful people are the people who go out and just be themselves. That's what makes Mac successful: What you see onstage is what you see in real life."

'Magic powers'

King,who was born in Hopkinsville, Ky., had his first experience with magic at the hands of his grandfathers -- Elwood Huffman and Pax King -- both amateur magicians. At first convinced that the two were in possession of powers beyond mere mortals, King eventually learned the truth behind his grandfathers' "magic powers" and began to replicate them himself.

Soon he was hooked.

Later, after moving to Louisville, King met fellow magic enthusiast Burton, who lived on the opposite end of town. The two, who were on the cusp of their driving years, would perform magic together -- including the "Mac and Lance Show" at a small amusement park in Kentucky.

"We were instrumental to each other," King says, although when it came to actually practicing the acts, Burton was the more driven of the two.

"When we were kids I would say 'Do you want to go to the movies?' (Burton) would say, 'I can't, I'm going to practice the floating ball (trick).' Literally, that was our conversation."

Although Burton's dedication to his craft helped to inspire King, he didn't act on this motivation right away, often opting first for the movies, then practice.

And although King said that the two seem to take a cavalier attitude toward practicing their tricks -- often telling would-be magicians "Oh, you don't need to practice" -- the reality is that old adage: practice makes perfect.

"(Burton) worked so hard," King says. "I don't know anyone who worked harder. It does take work."

In 1987 King left for Los Angeles and went solo, performing in various comedy clubs. While performing with Burton he had focused primarily on magic, working on his sleight-of-hand tricks. Now in the comedy clubs, he found a new source of inspiration: comics.

King began to observe the comedians and watch how they approached their acts -- both in writing the jokes and presenting them.

He then began to incorporate more humor into his act, learning, among other things, the art of the set-up and punch line, and then later in the act returning to the punch line.

Soon after that he met two of his mentors: Billy McComb, an Irish magician who moved to the United States years earlier; and Jay Marshall, a Chicago magician who made several appearances on "The Ed Sullivan Show." The two performers separately had hybrid acts of comedy-magic that King wanted to emulate. When he met them -- McComb at the Magic Castle, a clubhouse for magicians in Hollywood, Calif.; and Marshall at a club in Chicago -- they offered both praise and suggestions for King, advising him on older gags and telling him about new ones.

King continued to play in comedy clubs all over the United States and began to expand to performances to other parts of the world, such as Spain, Japan, Holland, Finland, Chile and Portugal. Still living in Los Angeles, Burton tried to convince King to move to Las Vegas. It was a suggestion that went unheeded for several years.

"Why?" Burton says. "I don't know. Nobody likes to pack up all his stuff."

But the allure of work in the "Entertainment Capital of the World" was too much for King to resist, so he lined up a job at the Maxim hotel-casino, filling in three months a year for magician Nick Lewin. This led to a full-time stint at the casino for King when Lewin left in September. A month later, however, the casino announced it was closing in December. King knew he would soon be unemployed.

"I was sort of panicked," King says. "I hadn't taken any work. All the shows I had gotten calls for I had turned down. Luckily, Harrahs stepped in."

And King's show made its debut at Harrahs on Jan. 11, where he's continued to develop it -- both in terms of humor and magic.

When pressed for a definition of what he considers his show now, King said it's a "magic show," but one that's "structured like a comedy show. It's a magic show to me. A funny magic show, I hope."

That sounds like some other types of acts in and around Las Vegas, but Burton assures none are like King. "There are a lot of great magicians and great comedy-magicians: Penn and Teller, Amazing Jonathan, Fielding West, Mac King -- they're all different and unique," Burton says.

"(King's) one of my favorite shows to see. It's a real nice combination of magic and comedy. ... Whenever I have friends in town, I always tell them to see Mac's show."

Nervous energy

Even as King attempts to relax backstage, nursing a bottle of water, he's fidgeting, fumbling with a deck of cards. Perhaps it's because he's between shows, with the late performance less than an hour away. It's not that he's nervous, per se, but rather that he's ready to get back on stage and perform.

Still, as the conversation continues, King seems content with the way his life is unfolding. This includes the fact that he's performing in the afternoon and not the evening, which is considered more prestigious.

"I have my nights free," King said. "I leave my house about 11:30 and I can be home by 5 p.m. if I really hustle. That's a pretty dang good schedule for a guy in show business."

He's also got several things in the works, such as always improving or adding new tricks to his act. The one he's been focusing on recently is a "big illusion" he's set to unveil soon, perhaps in two weeks. "But that's optimistic," he said.

When asked what the trick is, he declined to discuss it, saying, "Who knows what changes it'll go through? ... but it's coming along nicely."

Then there's his upcoming book, "Mac King's Tricks With Your Head," to be published by Crown Publishing. (King wasn't sure when it will be available in bookstores, but did say it is about finished.)

As the title suggests, the book is about tricks one can perform with one's head or someone else's -- not in terms of mental powers, but physically. There's even a gag for a cat's head.

"I called some friends and got some suggestions," King said of the book, which he's been working on for nearly eight years. "I tried to sell it, but had no luck at all. People talk to you a little easier once you've been on TV."

archive