By Bo Lee

It was a spectacular sight. Nick Healy ’13 was awing the audience with masterful magic tricks and appeared to be fully enjoying himself throughout the process. It was approaching the end of the show, and he was to perform his final act. He took out a floss box and tore out several pieces of floss as the audience patiently waited. He then wound up the pieces into a small ball and attached an additional piece of floss onto the ball. He then unwound the ball slowly, and to the confusion and amazement of the audience, the ball became a single connected line of floss. Loud cheers and claps by audiences followed this magical phenomenon during Healy’s moment to shine.

Healy exhibited this magic trick along with a few others during the intermissions of both Series A and B of the Playwrights’ Festival, which took place from April 14 to April 17.

“I was auditioning as an actor for One Acts, and Mr. Moore at the audition, just flat out asked me if I wanted to perform at intermission because he had heard that I was a magician, and that I had been at the [World Famous Hollywood Magic] Castle several times, and I said ‘yes,’” Healy said.

For some, it is a life-long dream to be able to perform at the Magic Castle. For Healy, it is reality and a regular aspect of his life. Declared as the “mecca” of magic by many magicians, Healy feels fortunate to be able to perform in the venues set up for the prolific magicians at this exclusive private club.

“The best magicians in the world go there. It’s where they can learn from each other, teach each other, and hang out,” Healy said.

Healy was just four years old when he got a magic set as a Christmas present. He started playing with everything in the magic set and had his mom read the instructions to him since he was too young to read himself. Once he learned how to read, he was able to get books on magic and teach himself without his mom’s assistance.

“You have to get the books,” Healy said. “You can get magicians to teach you some stuff, but you have to have some degree of being self-taught.”

Healy is currently a member of the Junior Group at the Magic Castle and gets to perform on a regular basis after having gone through two auditions. First, he had to go through a rigorous audition to become a member of the club. Then, he had to go through another audition in order to become a part of the week-long Future Stars event during the summer, which guarantees regular performance privileges to the participants of the event.

“Since I have gone through all of the auditions, at this point, I can just say, ‘I want that date,’” Healy said. “‘Give me that date, and I want this many guests,’ and they just give it to me.”

Healy has had many years of experience doing magic and has performed in paid gigs and commercials. He also designed all of the illusions and tricks that were shown in the school’s fall play, “Pippin.”

“I don’t know if it’s a God complex, but it’s fun to be able to make people feel that way about something you do,” Healy said. “The reactions that magic can evoke are completely different than anything else you’ve ever seen. I’ve seen people laugh, cry, and also get really angry that they just saw what happened.”