After 50 Years, the Magic Circle (Finally) Inducts Penn & Teller

Arts|After 50 Years, the Magic Circle (Finally) Inducts Penn & Teller

Penn & Teller have been a cultural force for half a century. The “bad boys of magic,” as they once billed themselves, have been on Broadway, hosted several television shows and headlined a long-running show in Las Vegas. They have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

But one honor had long eluded them: membership in the Magic Circle, the exclusive private society of magicians based in London.

That changed on Friday. Penn Jillette and Teller (whose given name was Raymond Joseph Derickson Teller) were inducted into the society on the steps of the London Palladium, where Penn & Teller have been performing a 50th anniversary residency.

For decades, there was resistance to allowing Penn & Teller into the Magic Circle, which was founded in 1905 and has about 1,700 members, because in their shows, they have been willing to reveal the secrets behind their illusions — a big no-no in the craft of magic.

But it’s a bit more nuanced than that, Marvin Berglas, the president of the Magic Circle, said in an interview. Yes, they reveal secrets, Berglas said, but then they “quite frankly blow you away with an entirely different and creative method.”

“There has perhaps been some criticism in the past for apparently exposing certain secrets,” Berglas said. “However, to those really in the know, the magic was always their original and artistic performances, whereby audiences thought they understood how something may have been done, only then to be utterly fooled by an entirely different original method. And for that, Penn & Teller really are the kings.”