the many facets of

FRANZ HARARY
In his first ever
full-length feature
on a remarkable career
that has spanned
over 30 years
and six continents,
we learn …
FRA
THE MANY FACETS OF
36
GENII
ANZ
HARARY
BY DUSTIN STINETT
AUGUST 2009
37
FRANZ HARARY
Franz Harary has so many sides that it can be difficult to count
them. This is because one of them, his magic side, has been
carved—as if by a master diamond cutter—into several intricate
facets. Besides this magical side, there is also the producer,
the engineer, the psychologist, the inventor, the musician,
the dancer, and the dreamer.
F
ranz Harary was born
47 years ago in Ann
Arbor, Michigan. Three
of his sides were shaped
early in his life: A love
of music, dance, and
theater. This comes as no surprise
since his parents are both artistic;
his mother a dancer and operatic
singer in her youth and his father a
teacher and composer of classical
music. He says that he was a “geek”
as a boy and that his friends were
all geeks as well. “I’m still a geek,”
he admits, “I just dress better.” But
magic was the furthest thing from
his mind until his teens. “I didn’t
get into magic until I was 13 or 14
years old,” he says. “I was into acting, and musical theater: I thought
I was going to Broadway.
I believed magicians were
dumb. Why would a grownup—an intelligent adult—do
something that wasn’t real;
play make believe? I thought
it was silly.” But one day
after class he discovered Hank
Moorehouse’s Magic Emporium.
Then he began visiting more
often. “I would drop by after
class and Hank would teach
me a new trick every couple of
days. He was the guy who got
me hooked.”
One of his other sides—the
self-educated psychologist—started to emerge at this
point. “I found myself dissecting illusions,” he says. “I
was fascinated with why these
tricks worked rather than how
they worked—the psychology behind them.” Harary’s
discovery that he could do
something his parents and
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his teachers could not drove him
deeper into that aspect of magic.
“I realized there was a power there
and I wanted to understand it. It
became an obsession.” He’s thankful
that it did. “How many people,” he
asks, “are still going through their
lives looking for that obsession; that
passion?” He knows he is fortunate
to have found his calling early and
that it remains with him. “It’s a
pretty precious thing,” he says.
“Everything I do is driven by my
sense of wonder.”
Harary is convinced that magicians are people whose wonder
was never lost. “As children, we all
have a sense of wonder,” he says.
“But for most, it gets knocked out
pretty quickly.” He also knows that
not everyone who keeps their sense
of wonder finds magic. “They find
something else that’s illusion-based;
an outlet for that wonder, like special effects in movies.”
Even though magic had become
part of Harary’s life, music,
dance, and theater were
still uppermost. “I went to
Eastern Michigan University
on a music scholarship,”
he says. “Magic was just a
hobby. Until I was 21 I was
certain that I would go
to New York and become
a Broadway star.” But
the siren song of magic
called; it began to take
over and he started to
experiment with illusions. “I wanted to be
Doug Henning after
seeing him perform
illusions, so I never got
into close-up magic,”
he says.
During that period,
Harary’s exposure to
other magicians was
limited. “There was
not a lot of magic in
Ann Arbor in the ‘70s
and ‘80s. I was in the
I.B.M. for a bit,” he
recalls, “but I was a
loner. Everyone at the
meetings was doing Double
Lifts and Elmsley Counts.
I’m worthless from the wrists
down. I was on a different
track.” Being somewhat isolated
had its advantages. “When I started designing illusions,” he says, “I
had no one telling me I was wrong:
Being in that vacuum allowed me
to do a lot of free-thinking.”
He knew he wanted to do “big
magic” for large audiences. He
back-engineered methods for
some standard illusions. “I
remember studying the
back of the album cover
for Doug Henning’s The
Magic Show and breaking down the Thin
Sawing, the Mis-Made
Girl, and the Zig-Zag.
I didn’t know what
the hell I was doing,
but I broke them down.
I thought of every method
possible for those illusions.”
Some of his thoughts were
off-base, including the idea of a
hidden camera for the Zig-Zag. A
positive result of some of this contemplation was that he came up
with many new methods, some of
which he still uses. It also gave
him a deep appreciation—and
respect—for the work of the
designer. “When the light goes
on and you figure it out you
think, ‘Oh my God! Robert
Harbin was a genius!’ I also
gained awareness for the
fantastic amount of time
committed, the passion,
and the blood that goes into
designing illusions,” he says.
“So right from the beginning I had this really strong
commitment not to copy the
methods of others.”
Harary admits he has
an obsession with doing
“his own thing.” “If you’re
not doing your own magic,
you’re the equivalent of a
karaoke singer. Don’t imitate:
innovate. Even if you’re doing
a classic in magic, take the
time to make it your own with
character development or an
original presentation.”
One of his first illusions—a
version of which he still does—
involved three lit fluorescent light
bulbs passing through the body of
a girl. “I was 16, I had an exciting
passion for illusion,” says Harary,
“and I had a girlfriend!” The illusion has been refined since—”it’s
less uncomfortable for the girl,” he
AUGUST 2009
39
FRANZ HARARY
notes—
but the original started his understanding of the relationship between the human body and
the methodology of illusion.
Because of his status in the music
department at Eastern Michigan
U, he made important connections with the Theater and Opera
Departments, the symphony orchestra, and the marching band at
the University of Michigan. These
allowed him to create illusions for
the Opera Department and perform
during halftime at the school’s football games. “Their stadium, which
holds about 100,000 people, was my
playground,” he says. He invented
a way to produce a car in a football stadium. “It was an illusion I
just sort of figured out,” he says.
“I had no money or resources; just
my friends and a little sports car
that one of them had.” The illusion
became a staple of his repertoire.
He still uses several of the methods—or “formulas” as he often
refers to them—that he devised
in his teens and early twenties.
“Figuring out how to produce a car
40
GENII
with
nothing
was one of the most valuable things I’ve come up with,” he
says. Another principle, developed
over 20 years ago, has served him
well. “I wanted to create a walking
through a woman illusion without
any equipment,” he says. The result
was a stunningly visual version he
calls “Aqua.” The only cover is a
small screen that is held in place by
his assistants. “It’s all about body
position,” he says, adding, “I have
used the same formula to produce
and vanish people.” And while his
work is focused on entertaining
the general public, Harary has created illusions geared toward fooling
magicians. “‘Double Cut’—or ‘Cross
Culture’—was designed strictly for
that purpose,” he says. The illusion
is a completely different take on
the double sawing wherein the bottom halves of two girls exchange
places after having been divided in
half.
His methods have become increasingly simpler over the years. “It’s
the classic, ‘KISS’ principle: Keep
It Simple Stupid. I love robotics,
electronics, and other
technologies, but
I will always take the
most direct path and go
low-tech.” He cites the illusions
created by his friend Brian Daniel at
Creative Magic as an example of this
kind of directness. “His illusions are
simple, affordable, and very deceptive (and I should add that you don’t
need a truck to haul them around).
I believe effect is everything, image
drives the presentation, and method
is the least important of the elements of an illusion.” [Editor’s Note:
Hidden in the DVD accompanying
this issue is an opportunity for you
to enter a drawing to win one of
three illusions being given away to
Genii readers by Creative Magic.]
There are two other unseen
elements that are important to
Harary’s designs: Portability and
durability. “Fifty percent of all my
engineering goes into making my
stuff able to tour.” Engineering
came to him via trial and error, but
these days he is not alone. “I figured out all the psychology myself,
and I became a pretty good engineer, but I’ve surrounded myself
with some really great minds.”
For the imagery, Harary uses
music and dance. “You can create
imagery with just music,” he says.
“Take a strong piece of music and
add it to a strong piece of magic
and the illusion will feed off the
energy created by the track. It
drives the magic forward making it
even stronger.” Harary also sticks
to popular music in his shows. “Pop
music and pop-culture change so
fast that if you don’t stay in it, you
are out of the loop. This industry
is not about doing tricks. It’s about
communicating with an audience
and controlling an environment
called a ‘stage.’ You need to manipulate the audience to get them to
focus where you want them visually
and mentally.
To do that, you need
the best and most relevant
tools.” He notes that while other
art forms advance with the times,
magic stagnates. “It always seems
to be 20-years behind the times.
You can go to an illusion show today
in Las Vegas and see guys who wear
the type of leather jacket I wore in
1987; still doing that rock concert
look. It’s crazy. It’s not the entire
community,” he adds. “There are a
lot of progressive thinking people
out there, but like a lot of artists,
it’s hard for them to break through
the barriers. I don’t understand
how the magic community can be so
close-minded.”
In 1983 Harary was performing
his illusions at football game halftimes (including performing an Asrah
Levitation at the Rose Bowl game
between the Michigan Wolverines
and the UCLA Bruins in Pasadena,
California), auto dealership openings, and he was four years into a
five year scholarship at EMU. Then
an incident that garnered worldwide press happened to Michael
Jackson: “Michael’s hair caught
fire during a commercial shoot,”
recalls Harary. “The name of his
attorney was mentioned on television and I wrote it down. Using
the wherewithal of a 20 year-old, I
tracked down the person who was
putting together Michael Jackson’s
‘Victory Tour’ and sent him a videotape of me producing a car in the
middle of University of
Michigan Stadium.” He
explained to the producer that he could do
illusions in 360 degree
stadium conditions, so
he could do them for
Jackson.
“The production
guy flies me out to
Los Angeles, I meet
Michael and we immediately connect,” says
Harary. “We become
friends and the next
thing I know I’m working for the world’s
biggest pop star.” He
left school and went
on tour with Jackson.
“I designed the illusions for the Victory
AUGUST 2009
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FRANZ HARARY
Tour. I had no idea what I was doing:
I was so out of my league it was
ridiculous.”
Harary recalls one illusion that
went wrong. “We had this Asrah
Levitation that we originally
rehearsed on a sound stage. But
when we got to Kansas City we
were outdoors and I had not taken
into account the wind. During the
first rehearsal the wind catches
the Asrah form and it starts flying
around like a kite and—remember,
I’m just 20 years-old—I’m running around trying to catch it. The
producers, the record executives,
and other industry people—who
have no idea how this works—are
in the audience and they think that
their billion dollar pop star is flying
around the stage out of control. I
learned a lot about environmental conditions with that one.”
After the tour he permanently relocated to L.A.
His reputation as “the
guy” to design illusions
for rock concerts was
set and he started
working with other
stars and bands
including Stevie
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Wonder and Janet Jackson. But
in 1987, he went out on his own;
an idea that came from Michael
Jackson. “I was hanging out with
Michael one day when he says,
‘Franz, why don’t you do this for
yourself?’ Well that got me off my
butt,” says Harary. “I missed performing,” he says. “I realized that
I was living vicariously through the
pop artists I was working with.”
With his concert connections,
Harary now had access to the best
lighting, sound, wardrobe, pyrotechnics, and laser effects people
in the business. “I went to all
my fiends and put
together this
rock
and roll illusion show,” he says. “I
went full out: I had the big Bon Jovi
hair, the mustache, the heavy metal
look—a lot of leather—it’s actually
an image that a lot of people still
think of when they hear my name.”
His first appearance with the show
was as the opening act for Kool and
the Gang. “That illusion show got
me a lot of recognition.” He also
realized his dream of performing a big illusion show in front
of large audiences. “It’s one
thing to be behind the scenes,
but to get on that stage and
work for all those people,
well, it’s different!”
He started making appearances on national television
including Dick Clark Presents,
That’s Incredible, and the first
World’s Greatest Magic. Most
recently, Harary appeared on
MTV’s reality series, America’s
Best Dance Crew. In the episode,
he worked with the competing
dance crews, giving each a different
illusion that they needed to incorporate into their dance routine.
“It was a challenge because these
crews were working virtually surrounded by the audience,” he says.
In 1996, Harary fulfilled his dream
of working on a Broadway production, though he would not appear on
stage. He created all the magic segments for the production of Ragtime
which had Houdini as one of its
main
characters.
“I researched
Houdini and got
really deep into his psychology and what made him work,” he
says. “I then had to come up with
magic and illusions that would have
the
same
effect but
would also work
for a contemporary audience.”
The show previewed in Los Angeles
at the Shubert Theater and then
opened in January of 1998 at the
Ford Center for the Performing
Arts. The show enjoyed a successful
two-year 834 performance run and
garnered four Tony Awards (with 13
nominations). “It was really cool to
be right there in the soup of it,”
he says. “But I have to admit that I
would have loved to have been on
that stage!”
His illusion show continued to
evolve over time. “Each year I created an average of four new illusions,”
he says. “And I don’t mean repainting a Mis-Made Girl,” he adds. In
the early 1990s, the show changed
from rock and roll to an “Xtreme
Sports” look. “It had a very athletic
look with bright colors. It was a
polar opposite from the dark heavy
metal look,” he says. “I kept that
style until 1997. From ‘97 to 2004 I
embraced Japanese animation and
made that the look for the show.”
Asia and the Far East have made
up Harary’s primary territory for
decades. “I look back,” he says,
“and I see all these guys trying to
get a room in Las Vegas. I’ve got all
of India and much of China.” The
AUGUST 2009
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FRANZ HARARY
logistics of touring a large illusion
show throughout Asia and the Far
East is complex. It involves many
shows in storage and/or in transit.
“I have containers with complete
illusion shows in them all over the
place,” he explains. “By the time
we finish one tour, the equipment
for the next one has arrived by ship
to where the next tour is: The one
we just finished gets packed up and
shipped to the next destination.”
The man organizing the pieces of
this international puzzle is Steve
Roper and his company, Back Stage
Cargo. “He’s a genius,” says Harary.
There is also the issue of communication. “Obviously I tour places
where they don’t speak English,”
he says. “I speak a little Japanese,
a fair amount of Thai, and German
is my first language, but I have
learned that with about 40 words
and phrases of the local language,
I can do the entire
show. It’s a different art,” continues
Harary, “There’s a
skill to performing a
large illusion show
for an audience that
doesn’t speak your
language.”
There are six complete shows touring
the globe. Each show
is about 40 percent
different from the
others. “I have about
three of every illusion,” he says. Each
show is modular so the
correct length of performance can be produced to match the
market. “In India,”
he explains, “we do
a three-hour show
because that’s what’s
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expected there. In India, time
equals value.” In China the troupe
will do an hour and a half to threequarters. “They sell products around
my shows there,” he adds. “Once
it was Franz Harary binoculars.” In
the United States—”I usually play in
Atlantic City when I’m in the U.S.,”
he says—his shows are one hour and
twenty minutes. “That’s short,” he
notes, “but it’s designed that way
because it’s a casino town and they
don’t want to keep the audiences
away from the slot machines for too
long.”
Since 2004, the show has had a
more intellectual style. “Some in
the press call it a ‘thinking man’s
illusion show.’ It’s intelligent.” One
reason for this is the fact that he’s
now 47 and has had two back surgeries for a ruptured disc. “I don’t
jump in and out of stuff quite like
I used to,” he says. “These days I
have
no
interest
in sweating
on stage. I like to
stand on stage, walk
around, and enjoy my relationship with the audience.” And
like Howard Thurston, who originally
sent Dante out as a touring unit of
his show, Harary has other illusionists performing in the lead role.
“Basically these guys are clones of
me,” he says.
During all his own touring he continued working with pop artists and
still does. In 24 years, Harary has
been
involved in
over 150 concert
tours. “These pop artists
are great,” he says, “They’re always
trying to top each other.” Working
with them is a balancing act, given
the egos involved, and not just
those of the artist. “It’s a matter of
understanding the artist, the show,
and getting in with the director,” he
says. “We have to apply illusions to
move the story forward, but magic
can be very powerful and in the
wrong place it can eclipse the message. We can’t have people leaving
the concert wondering how the star
disappeared.”
One such example
was an illusion
performed by Alice
Cooper. The premise is
that a paparazzi breaks
through security. “Alice
takes his microphone stand
and ‘stabs’ the guy all the way
through with it. He then takes the
mic off and continues the show,”
says Harary. “It was very strong
stuff, but it didn’t eclipse Alice.”
The illusion is also an example of
Harary’s “no props” style. “There
are props, but you just don’t see
them,” he says. “The engineering is
deep within the scenic design.”
Primarily, the illusions Harary does
for concerts are productions and
vanishes. “Instead of the artist just
walking on stage, he or she appears
on stage.” Vanishes are used to end
shows and also during the show,
usually for costume changes.
While Harary’s concert career
started with Michael Jackson, it
is the rock band Earth, Wind &
Fire that he credits for getting
him into rock and roll tours in the
first place. “EWF was actually part
of two key events in my life,” he
says. “First, as a kid, I took up the
trumpet because they had horns
and that made horns cool. But it
was EWF that were the first to use
magic in their shows. If they don’t
do magic in their show, Michael
Jackson doesn’t do magic in his
show and I don’t go to work for
Michael.” It was John Gaughan who
first worked with EWF and it was
Gaughan who took the young Harary
under his wing when the 20 year-old
first arrived in L.A. “He taught me
the ins and outs of the business,”
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FRANZ HARARY
Harary says of the legendary illusion builder. “We worked closely for
about a decade; he’s my hero.”
The list of performers Harary has
worked with is lengthy and includes
rock and roll, pop, hip hop, and
country music artists. Besides those
already mentioned, others include
NSYNC, Cher, Snoop Dog, Tupac
Shakur, Tone Loc, Styx, Dr. Dre,
Usher, Boyz II Men, Queen Latifah,
TLC, Hammer, Reba McEntire, and
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Tina Turner. His magic
has also appeared on
several music award
shows including the
American Music Awards,
MTV Music Awards, and
the Grammy Awards.
“One of the great
pleasures I have while
working with these
acts,” he admits,
“is that during tech
rehearsals I get to play the part of
the artists when they are not there.
So, for those few minutes, I’m living the dream of being a pop star.
Fortunately,” he adds, “no one will
ever see it!” Working with these talented individuals—and so many over
the years—has another, more practical perk: “When you work with
them, it gives you the opportunity
to get into their minds.”
Two stars he is currently working with are Missy Elliot
and, from Japan, Ayumi
Hamazaki. “Ayumi is touring with an illusion where a
40-foot pirate ship appears
on stage. She and her dancers climb aboard and it
floats up and flies around
the stage as they sing and
dance.” Missy Elliot is very
enthusiastic about magic
and has been involved in
several illusions. “She’ll
do almost anything,” says Harary.
“I’ve had her crawling across the
stage under a black cloth with a
layer of smoke; she was barely able
to breath, but she’s fearless.” Her
courage—as well as Harary’s—was
once tested by the power of Mother
Nature. “She was appearing inside
a ring of fire,” he recalls. “She
was in the load chamber when all
of a sudden there’s an earthquake.
A guy comes on the PA system and
tells everyone to evacuate—and
they all did, leaving Missy behind.”
It tested a major fear of Harary’s:
“Earthquakes scare me,” he says.
“In the greatest moment of valor in
my life—which went against every
instinct in every cell in my body
which wanted me to do nothing but
get out of this building that was
shaking like crazy—I ran over to the
illusion and pulled her out of the
load chamber. We were the last
ones out of the building. The crew,
everyone, was already gone!” (An
interview with Missy Elliot is on the
DVD which accompanies this issue.)
Harary used to travel with these
concert tours, but now has a crew
that goes out to supervise the
illusions he created. “I have my
‘Illusion Squadron’ and depending on the show, one or more will
go out on tour. They are there to
make sure it always looks right and
doesn’t get sloppy.” He has sent the
illusions out without any support in
the past, but the results weren’t
positive. “It always comes back to
bite me. If something I designed
doesn’t look good, it’s my fault.” He
points out that artists—and in particular magicians—get sloppy when
they are performing the same thing
nightly. “It’s easy to get sloppy.
In the music industry it’s called
‘ragged’ but it’s the same thing;
sloppy. In means it’s going downhill
but they—the performers—don’t
recognize it. My guys are there to
maintain my brand as an illusion
designer.”
As Harary toured his own show
and worked with music acts, he was
always learning. “I became interested in lasers, so I learned everything
I could about laser technology.”
This interest led to another Harary
company that supplies laser shows
and effects for concerts and other
events. But it doesn’t end there. “I
have a pyrotechnics company too,”
he smiles.
His interest in pyrotechnics
evolved from magic as well. “I use
fire as cover for illusions instead of
a cloth,” he says. “I’ve also used
fire for its ambient light and misdirection. Fire has many uses in magic
and stage effects.”
Franz Harary Productions can
address the needs of a client via
any one—or more—of its various
arms: Live show production, magic
and “FX” design, “Mega Magic” and
“Mega Stunts,” as well as the aforementioned laser and pyrotechnics
effects services. His company can
provide a client with a completely
self-contained illusion show that can
fill an arena, or a magic and illusion show that can play in a hotel
ballroom.
Much of Harary’s work—magic and
stage effects—is used for corporate
events. He has worked with over 50
of the Fortune 500 companies. The
list is a “who’s who” of business and
among them are Honda, Unocal,
Sony, Volvo, Toyota, Ford, Reebok,
Pepsi, Nissan, AT&T, and United
Semi-Conductor. He levitated a new
Corvette around the stage for GM’s
introduction of the car. He has also
worked for Steven Spielberg. “In
Japan, for the launch of the movie
Transformers, I created a car that
transformed into a robot. I also created the illusion that a landmark
building transformed into a robot.
The gig lasted 14-minutes.” Most of
this work, like his performing, is centered in Asia. (More on Harary’s company can be found at his website,
www.franzhararyproductions.com.)
Many of these illusions are onetime events and the props don’t
always survive to be performed
another day. “If I think I can use
it again, then I’ll store it. But the
reality is that it costs more to store
this stuff than it does to replace
AUGUST 2009
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FRANZ HARARY
it,” he says matter-of-factly. “I
have replaced millions of dollars of
equipment. That
is painful.” But he
once rescued some
classic magic.
“When Doug
Henning retired,
and they auctioned
off all his stuff,
there were three truck containers
left. I got it all for a song. I stored
it in my L.A. warehouse for a while,
and then I realized that I needed
to get it out there.” He refurbished
much of the equipment and put it
to work in theme parks and rock
and roll shows around the world.
“Night Ranger toured with some of
Henning’s original equipment without knowing it was Henning’s,” he
says. “So for another decade, Doug’s
stuff lived on, entertaining tens of
thousands of people.”
It was in the 1990s that Harary
hit upon the type of illusion that
he is best known for in the United
States: “Mega Magic.” These illusions—primarily vanishes—involve
large to enormous objects. Though
not his first, vanishing the Space
Shuttle on the first World’s Greatest
Magic television special in 1994
certainly is the most memorable
among the general magic community. “I’ve vanished every manner
of plane, train, and automobile,”
says Harary. “I moved Diamond Head
in Hawaii two miles offshore and
I made the Sphinx in Egypt disappear.” He has also “transported”
the Goodyear Blimp, made the
Tower Bridge in London “invisible”
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and made the Battleship Missouri
vanish from its moorings in Pearl
Harbor. Of course, the landmarks
are always made to reappear. “I’m
about at the point where I’m out
of effects,” he adds. “My biggest
challenge is not to repeat myself.”
Vanishing buildings is another
of his specialties. “I’ve vanished
a bunch of office buildings for
clients,” notes Harary. Making the
Sante Fe Hotel in Las Vegas disappear on live television during the
1990 Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon
was his first use of the method
behind these large-scale illusions.
“It was a major moment for me,”
he recalls, “because I wasn’t really
sure it would work. When it did,
not only was I relieved, but I also
knew that I had something there.
These methods have become workhorses for me. I’ve even vanished
The Taj Mahal in India!”
Critics argue that Harary is
using “camera tricks” to create
these illusions, but he counters
that no electronic trickery is used.
“At its core, Mega Magic is about
controlling the environment,” he
says. “Television is a mono-scopic
medium, but we live in a stereoscopic world; I take advantage of
the mono-scopic principles of the
television camera.”
By taking advantage of the medium and also the characteristics of
time and distance, Harary was able
to create the illusion of teleporting
himself and a pop star from Tokyo,
Japan to Beverly Hills, California.
The illusion—something he considers
among his greatest innovations—was
broadcast during the 2000 Millennial
Broadcast, a 22-hour program, in
Japan. “It was a major
program,” he says.
“There were no twins;
just one guy and the real
me—no ‘Mini-Me’ was
involved. We borrowed
items from the studio
audience then stepped
into a ‘Star-gate.’ In a
matter of 10 seconds we
were shooting live from
the streets of Beverly
Hills were we had just
arrived. I can’t give up the secret,
but I will say that we did do it live
and that there was a chartered
transpacific flight involved.” While
it was the greatest distance for one,
it was not Harary’s first “teleportation” illusion. “I’ve been teleporting
people and things long-distances
since the 1990.”
Taking advantage of an environment—be it a stage, a television studio, or a 100,000 seat stadium—is a
hallmark of Harary’s work. It has led
to innovations that many in magic
are unaware of. “A large percentage
of my formulas are unknown to the
general magic community,” he says.
“My goals are, and always have
been, to change the industry and
advance the art.” And while the line
between amateur and professional
can be blurred, it is Harary’s opinion
that there is a clear line between
artist and craftsman. He feels that
many amateur magicians—and some
professionals—are more craftsman
than artist. “A guy goes into a magic
shop,” he says, “buys a trick—or
a video—follows the instructions
and he can do the trick flawlessly:
That’s craft, not art. Art is something that is developed from scratch
that ultimately communicates the
human experience. That’s not what
a lot of magicians do, so by their
very nature you get guys copying
each other. Sometimes you get copies of copies.”
More troubling to him is the issue
of unauthorized copying. “It bothers me that some magicians take
the work of others and claim it as
their own. You cannot grow in any
art like that. Artists who have gone
through the process, whether it’s an
illusion designer, a dancer, singer,
musician, painter, or whatever, they
understand what it takes to create. But that’s not true for some
people in magic. It’s hard to blame
them. After all, name another performance art where someone can
spend $2,000 and have an act. All
they need is a van big enough to
carry the box around. They buy an
illusion without understanding the
‘why’ and they copy a magician
they’ve seen on TV.” He recognizes—particularly in the case of
amateurs—that the practice is often
innocent. “They simply don’t grasp
the magnitude of the offense they
are committing,” he says. “If the
magic community understood that
and rallied around it, it wouldn’t be
a problem. All we have in the end
is the brotherhood: The ethics are
driven by our community.”
Unauthorized copies pose another
problem: “I’ll get a call from some
guy who bought one of my illusions
from a builder who is not licensed
to sell it and complain to me that
the ‘design’ doesn’t work! It’s not
the original design because it’s a
rip-off, but ultimately I get the heat
because I created the illusion.”
Harary also recognizes that
enforcement is difficult at best.
“David Copperfield spent a load of
money trying to tackle the problem, and he’s to be given credit for
making a little headway, but it’s
very difficult. Currently there is an
illusionist in Las Vegas who is using
one of my creations—a production of
a woman—without my blessing. My
only consolation is knowing that it’s
the best part of his show.”
A copy of his one of his illusions
caught him by surprise. “I was
in China,” he relates, “and I was
pitching the show to the buyers
and I was describing an aerial cast
vanish that I do. One of them says,
‘We can’t do that here; there’s a
circus across the street doing that
trick.’ My pompous-self says, ‘Sir,
that’s not possible; I invented this
illusion.’ I went across the street
and sure enough, there was an
exact copy of my prop; right down
to the design flaws.” Today, he is
no longer surprised. “There is a
particular venue in a city in China
where,” he notes, “there is a copy
of everything. There is a version of
David Copperfield, a version of me;
there’s a version of everyone there.
Everyone who has ever played this
place: It’s crazy!”
Describing the feeling of seeing
one of his creations stolen or unaccredited, he admits, can be difficult
to articulate. “I’ve had many of
my illusions stolen and every time
it hurts. There is a huge amount
of time, sweat, money, and sometimes even blood invested in these
things.” For Harary, the most pointed example of this feeling comes
from his creation known simply as
“Twister,” an illusion he conceived
and Ed Alonzo first performed.
The effect is that someone—an
assistant or the illusionist—is placed
into a box that covers him from the
neck to the tops of his legs. The head
is clamped by the sides (the face and
back of the head remain visible).
The head is then turned 360 degrees
several times. When the doors of the
illusion are opened, the body is seen
to be “twisted” as if having been
rung out. The process is reversed and
the victim emerges unscathed.
“I can remember the day I put
two and two together like it was
yesterday,” he starts. “I had created
this version of the ‘Head Spinner’
illusion; the first one where the
back of the head stays visible while
it’s turning,” Harary explains. “I
was working with Ed Alonzo at a
consumer show in Minneapolis at
the time. He had a Sword Box—with
mirrors for a vanish—that he had
put together. We were sitting in a
Denny’s restaurant after the show
one night and I tell him that we
could put my Head Spinner on his
Sword Box. I drew the plans on the
back of a paper placemat. Ed says,
‘Cool! Can I use this?’ I said sure.”
Harary even recalls the exact date
of his creation: “It was on my birthday in 1986.”
Shortly after this, and unknown
to Harary, Alonzo and then wife
Lynetta Welch got busy building the
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illusion. “We had the big parts cut
out by a guy with a table saw,” says
Alonzo, “but Lynetta did the rest
with the hand tools we had. It was
Lynetta who built the first ‘Twister’
illusion in our little apartment.” Ms.
Welch—who was also Alonzo’s on
stage assistant and therefore was
the first person ever “Twisted”—
recalls the period: “Ed was moving
away from the straight illusion act
we did,” she says. “The illusion
and the presentation we came up
with was perfect for the new, nerdy
character he was working on.” They
added the Chubby Checker song,
“Lets Twist Again” to their presentation, which later David Copperfield
would use—with Alonzo’s permission—in his presentation of the
effect. “It’s a good illusion,” says
Alonzo, “but I think everyone agrees
that is was that song and the choreography that makes it really great.”
A few months after their meeting at the restaurant, Ed Alonzo
called Harary. “He told me to bring
my video camera to the ‘It’s Magic’
show at the Variety Arts Theater,”
Harary recalls. “My jaw dropped
when I saw Ed performing the
‘Twister.’ There it was, the illusion
I came up with.” Harary admits
that there was a period when there
was some friction between him and
Alonzo over the illusion. “I think it
was my pride,” he admits. “I probably didn’t think that he would really
build it before I did.” Others started
copying the illusion, so Harary
decided to market it with Bill Smith
as the builder. In the mean time,
comedy magician Mark Kornhauser
had become involved. “After the
first night we performed the illusion at the Magic Castle,” says Ms.
Welch, “the stage manager says to
us, ‘Mark Kornhauser is going to be
mad at you; he had the same idea.’”
Harary contacted Kornhauser after
this revelation. “Mark tells me that
he had a similar idea,” says Harary,
“so I think, ‘okay, parallel idea.’
So Mark’s name was put on the
advertising.” I have had at least five
different people tell me—with all
conviction—that they created it,” he
says. “I’m at a point in my life and
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career where it no longer bothers
me,” he says, ‘but for a while it was
disturbing. We work in this business
largely for credit and when it didn’t
come, I thought, ‘There’s something
wrong with this picture.’”
Franz Harary believes people get
into magic for one particular reason—whatever that might be—but
the longer they stay in magic the
driving forces change and evolve. “I
got into magic because of ego,” he
admits. “I wanted the recognition;
I wanted to be a star. Later, my
motivations were security and stability. But my values and needs have
changed again. I’ve realized that it’s
about the human experience. I want
to share that with as many people
as I can. And I love taking in as
much as I can. I’ve traveled to some
incredible places and seen many
amazing things.”
For the last year or so, Harary has
started carrying a still camera everywhere he goes. This new hobby, for
which he shows an aptitude (we
asked him to include a selection of
his photographs on the accompanying DVD) may have stemmed from
him having a camera crew following him everywhere since the late
1990s. “I had two camera operators,
a director, and all the supporting crew just following me around
shooting everything,” he says.
“Once, a spike from an illusion went
through my hand. My first words off
stage were, ‘Where’s camera one’?”
This footage evolved into a 14episode television show called Magic
Planet that is syndicated around
the world. In India, the show has
800 million viewers (and a DVD collection of these shows will soon be
available to the magic community
through the Trick Photography division of the Miracle Factory). Magic
Planet is a combination magic show
and travelogue. But there is more to
it than just showing both Harary’s
magic and that of the local magic
of the different parts of the world
he visits. Each one-hour episode
beautifully shares the cultural and
geographic diversity of the various countries and cities. “The real
story is not on stage,” he says. “My
crew and I go to these places and
we realized that magic has a different definition from culture to
culture. It’s a looking glass into the
hopes and dreams of its people. You
used to go to China and magic was
making fish appear because people
were hungry. In Indonesia, they have
to overcome fire because they are
dealing with natural forces. In the
United States we make airplanes
appear because we are capitalists.”
One show resulted in him doing
“the stupidest thing” and another
“the most rewarding thing” he’s
ever done in his life.
“On our show from Mexico I was
working with Joaquin Ayala, who I
think is one of the greatest most
creative magicians in the world. We
did this thing where we levitated
him between two buildings. The
method, which looked great for the
people there and for TV, was ridiculously dangerous; we never should
have done that; we let our egos
control us on that one.”
The episode filmed in India centers
on street magicians who live under
a bridge in Delhi. “These people
live in this village called Shadipur
Depot that they built up from nothing,” says Harary. “It’s inhabited
by street performers of every kind
including magicians. Though they are
performers, their caste is that of the
beggar, so the government forbade
them from working on the streets for
money.” Harary used his celebrity
there to convince the government
to recognize them and allow them
to work and accept money. “It’s the
most rewarding thing I’ve ever done.
It’s fulfilling; it’s why I’m here and is
what magic is all about.” (Video of
the illusion and the street magicians
can be seen on the accompanying
DVD.)
Harary would like to see more of
this unknown magic shown in the
western world. “I’ve been all over
the world and I have seen local
magic that just blows my mind,” he
says. “The vast majority of great
magic is invisible;
it can’t be found in
magic magazines.
What you get is
mostly from white
guys and Asians,
but there is little
representation from
Africa, the Far East,
and the Middle East.
I believe if there
was a way to introduce this magic to
a western audience,
it would kill.”
Recently Franz
has been consulting and creating
magic for other
magicians, and for
the last three years
he’s has been working with Penguin
Magic on a major
DVD project that
will share his own
experience in the
illusion show industry. “It’s more that
just a ‘how to’ on
illusions,” he notes.
“It’s a complete look at the whole
process: Illusion performance, illusion design, sound, lighting, wardrobe—all aspects of stage craft—production design, how to tour a show,
video production, everything.” Once
again, Harary was followed by a film
crew. “We had a gig in Atlantic City,
so we shot everything; from loading
in, to performing, and loading out.”
They also filmed his work with Missy
Elliot and a tour in China. “In the
end, we sent hundreds of hours of
video to our editor.”
In addition to his own work,
Harary interviewed many of his
friends and colleagues where they
discuss illusions and stage craft.
“Over a 30-year career, a lot of this
stuff I take for granted now; it’s
automatic. But for someone who
wants to learn it, it’s invaluable.
We were able to capture moments
where not everything went perfectly,” he says, “but the process
of problem solving is an important
tool, so that will be included.”
Such a project wouldn’t be complete without illusions, and several
will be included. “There is a vanishing motorcycle, an appearing car, an
appearing girl—a bunch of practical
stuff that people can use,” he says.
“I’m not holding back anything,” he
adds. “I am sharing all that I know
about this industry in this project.”
(The multi-disc set will be available
soon from Penguin Magic.)
Along with the practical experience garnered over a three decadelong career in show business, as
well as the cultural revelations he
has encountered over the years,
Franz Harary’s life journey has been
one of self-discovery. His mortality
was revealed to him when he nearly
lost his life in a well publicized auto
accident on an interstate highway
outside of Los Angeles earlier this
year. “I was on my way to a meeting
in Las Vegas and just cruising along
when I see this bush fall off a truck
that was in front of me. I swerved
to miss it and my car—a convertible
with the top down—flipped over
twice. My first thought was, ‘I’m
going to be late for this meeting.’
Well, actually that was my second
thought; my first one can’t really
be printed in a magazine.” The fact
that he was buckled in and that he
drives in a reclined position saved
his life. “I was banged up a bit—I
received 40 staples on my head and
now have a scar that kind of looks
like Korea—but I’m alive.”
His friend and confidant Eugene
Burger has helped him along this
road of self-realization. “The guy is
brilliant,” says Harary. “I’m learning that as I discover my place in
the universe and magic’s place in
the world, I realize that Eugene has
known this for years. It’s all beginning to make sense. For me it’s all
about the ride,” he says. “Where
we are in our lives; if you look
around, you’ll see the forks in the
road before you get to them. And
all people have an inherent need for
wonder, and magic is something that
we can share globally. The message
is that we are all the same. You create your own reality and you control
your own destiny.”•
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