John McLaughlin

When the pandemic went into high gear, I was halfway through teaching a graduate seminar on American intelligence and foreign policy at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington.  Overnight, faculty members and students had to figure out how to continue our courses online, with everyone stuck in place wherever they were.  This involved crash courses on video programs like Zoom, Panopto, Microsoft Teams, WebEx, Skype – anything that would allow us to stay connected and move forward.  And magic inevitably played a role – more below.

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By Eric Henning

As we emerge from both lockdown and the worst of the pandemic (fingers crossed), I wanted to give you a behind the scenes look at what magicians in general, and our Washington Magic team in particular, have dealt with this past year and a half.

VIRTUAL ISN’T THE SAME

Probably the biggest difference was not having live audiences in the room. Magic is an intimate medium, and ideally must be experienced in person. Magic on TV is fine, but it just doesn’t have the same immediacy of something that happens in real time right in front of your eyes, even in your own hands. In this age of technology, live entertainment is the only thing that can compete with the magic that’s at our fingertips every day.

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I’m so proud of my teacher Tony Clark fooling Penn and Teller on “Fool Us.” He does a tribute to his teacher Slydini……and since he taught me some of Slydini’s routines, that makes Slydini my teacher, too, and that makes me especially proud.

Watch this great clip—he will fool you and even more importantly touch you:

David

1. GO EAT

The amazingly reliable Washingtonian Magazine 100 Best Restaurants issue is out and go here for your next great meal.

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