A Vegas magician has been canceled by his colleagues who are furious with him for making viral videos that reveal trick secrets.
Illusionist and magician, Murray SawChuck, 50, has captivated audiences, specifically on the Las Vegas Strip for more than 20 years, but now, the magic community is not impressed with him.
Tensions started to rise in January when SawChuck and his wife, dancer, Dani Elizabeth SawChuck, started uploading at-home magic videos to his Facebook page that featured classic tricks, including swallowing a raveled up sword and using a prosthetic thumb with a tissue stuffed inside to make it look like it vanished.
His hugely-popular videos were soon noticed by the Magic Castle, an exclusive members club for magicians, that kicked him out in March, ‘pending an investigation by the Committee of Member Conduct.’
Now fellow magicians are angry with SawChuck, as his revealing online videos, which have been popular since 2015, have reached a larger audience of about 70million this year.
‘I bought some stuff on Amazon, just stuff you can buy literally for five or 10 bucks, and purposefully did it because that means it’s attainable to anybody in the world,’ SawChuck told 8 News Now.
‘I do the tricks cheesy, as I am. Then my wife just busts at me, not impressed, like a wife would be, very similar that Lucille Ball would do to Desi (Arnaz),’ he added.
Along with the members-only magician club, the Academy of Magical Arts, a non-profit based in Los Angeles that ‘protects and enhances the art of magic’,’ has also taken notice of his videos.
In a recent email shared with 8 News Now, the Board of Directors at the academy told SawChuck that he is ‘expected to’ take videos down within 30 days or he will be ‘expelled from the Academy of Magical Arts without any further process.’
In response, SawChuck told the academy that there are other ‘famous performers’ that belong to the exclusive club that have not been treated the same way as him, even though they also post ‘revealing key magical principals.’
‘Magic exposure is an unavoidable reality in our world, pre-dating the internet and intensifying with its advent,’ he added.
He said that the academy and his values ‘no longer align’ and that the organization’s stance is ‘inconsistent.’
‘My career, spanning over 40 years, should not be judged solely on a handful of videos. Thank you for the past 27 years. I wish the Academy of Magical Arts continued success,’ he said in his letter.
‘Anyone associated with the Academy or The Magic Castle is always welcome at my shows in Las Vegas or on tour.’
The America’s Got Talent star added that people have argued that he does magic for money, and he agrees with their view.
‘Yeah I do magic for money. That’s how I live in this house. That’s how I pay the bills. I didn’t do it vindictively. I did it for entertainment purposes only.’
In March, SawChuck exclusively told DailyMail.com that the tricks he performed in his video have previously been debunked online, and that had his video not gone viral – he would not have been suspended.
‘I think I’m being unfairly targeted in the sense that the stuff I’m revealing, I’ve shown before in videos,’ he said. ‘So my question is why now? I know why now – because the video did really well and got a lot of views,’ he said.
‘I really believe that if the video only got 100 or 200 views, a lot of people wouldn’t have seen it,’ he said.
‘I’ve been teaching tricks for a long time. I think what’s a little unfair is the fact that exposing magic is exposing magic. You’re showing how a trick is done. Right?’
‘And [with] magic, you’re supposed to create mystery. You’re not supposed to expose a trick.’
‘But if I say, I want to teach a trick. Well, teaching is accepted. But teaching a trick is still exposing. It’s just a nicer way of saying you’re exposing a trick to hopefully someone wanting to learn it.’
Noting the irony, Murray pointed out: ‘A lot of these magicians have taught tricks online or in courses to get people involved in magic. We want to keep this old art alive.’
In other videos, SawChuck performed tricks including disappearing flowers, the never ending handkerchief, and a floating orange.
Murray had been a member of Magic Castle and the Academy of Magical Arts for more than 26 years.
A spokesperson for Magic Castle told 8 News Now that they do not ‘police’ the magic community, but regardless, as a member, SawChuck pledged to ‘oppose the willful and needless public exposure of any principles or methods in the art of magic.’
‘Due to some of his relatively recent online activity, Mr. SawChuck was asked to appear before the AMA’s Committee on Member Conduct and has been given the opportunity to take down the video footage in question,’ they added.
Along with SawChuck, Penn & Teller, other well-known Las Vegas magicians, said that they were also expelled from the club in the 80s, but were eventually welcomed back more than a decade later.
Magic Castle did not provide a list of other members that were suspended or banned from the group.
SawChuck now has until Sunday to take down his videos or he will be expelled, but he said he has accepted his fate and will not remove them.