Ricky Jay | |
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 Jay at the premiere ofRedbelt in April 2008 | |
| Born | Richard Jay Potash (1946-06-26)June 26, 1946 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | November 24, 2018(2018-11-24) (aged 72) Los Angeles,California, U.S. |
| Occupations |
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| Known for | Sleight of hand, card tricks, history of magic |
| Spouse | |
Richard Jay Potash (June 26, 1946 – November 24, 2018)[1] was an American stage magician, actor, and writer. In a 1993 profile forThe New Yorker,Mark Singer called Jay "perhaps the most giftedsleight of hand artist alive".[2] In addition to sleight of hand, he was known for hiscard tricks,card throwing, memory feats, and stagepatter. He also wrote extensively onmagic and its history. His acting credits includeThe Prestige,The Spanish Prisoner,Mystery Men,Heist,Boogie Nights,Tomorrow Never Dies,Heartbreakers,State and Main,House of Games,Magnolia, andDeadwood. In 2015, he was the subject of an episode ofPBS'sAmerican Masters, the only magician ever profiled in the series.[3]
Jay was born in theNew York City borough ofBrooklyn to Shirley (Katz) and Samuel Potash.[1] A member of a middle-classJewish family, he grew up inElizabeth, New Jersey.[4][5] He rarely spoke publicly about his parents, but did share an anecdote: "My father oiled his hair withBrylcreem and brushed his teeth withColgate", Jay recalled. "He kept his toothpaste in the medicine cabinet and the Brylcreem in a closet about a foot away. Once, when I was ten, I switched the tubes. All you need to know about my father is that after he brushed his teeth with Brylcreem he put the toothpaste in his hair."[2]
During an interview on theNational Public Radio programFresh Air withTerry Gross, Jay said that possibly "the only kind memory I ever had of my parents" was when they secretly hired one of his idols, magicianAl Flosso, to perform at hisbar mitzvah.[6] Jay's grandfather, Max Katz, was acertified public accountant and amateur magician who introduced Jay to magic.[7][8][9]
Jay first performed in public at the age of seven, in 1953, when he appeared on the television programTime for Pets.[10] He is most likely the youngest magician to perform a full magic act on TV, the first magician to ever play comedy clubs, and probably the first magician to open for a rock and roll band. At New York'sElectric Circus in the 1960s, he performed on a bill betweenIke and Tina Turner andTimothy Leary, who lectured aboutLSD.[2]
During the 1960s and 70s, Jay lived inIthaca, New York, performing while also intermittently attending theCornell University School of Hotel Administration, but later moved to theLos Angeles area.[11][12][13]
He quickly developed a following among magic aficionados, and a reputation for sleight-of-hand feats that baffled even his colleagues. In his 1993New Yorker profile of Jay,Mark Singer related the following story from playwrightDavid Mamet and theater directorGregory Mosher:
Some years ago, late one night in the bar of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Chicago, [Jay] was performing magic with a deck of cards. Also present was a friend of Mamet and Mosher's named Christ Nogulich, the director of food and beverage at the hotel. After twenty minutes of disbelief-suspending manipulations, Jay spread the deck face up on the bar counter and asked Nogulich to concentrate on a specific card but not to reveal it. Jay then assembled the deck face down, shuffled, cut it into two piles, and asked Nogulich to point to one of the piles and name his card. "Three of clubs," Nogulich said, and he was then instructed to turn over the top card. He turned over the three of clubs. Mosher, in what could be interpreted as a passive-aggressive act, quietly announced, "Ricky, you know, I also concentrated on a card." After an interval of silence, Jay said, "That's interesting, Gregory, but I only do this for one person at a time." Mosher persisted: "Well, Ricky, I really was thinking of a card." Jay paused, frowned, stared at Mosher, and said, "This is a distinct change of procedure." A longer pause. "All right—what was the card?" "Two of spades." Jay nodded, and gestured toward the other pile, and Mosher turned over its top card. The deuce of spades. A small riot ensued.[2]
Three of Jay's one-man shows,Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants,Ricky Jay: On the Stem, andRicky Jay: A Rogue's Gallery, were directed by Mamet, who also cast Jay in a number of his films.
A collector and historian, Jay was a student and friend ofDai Vernon, whom he called "the greatest living contributor to the magical art." He collected rare books and manuscripts, art, and other artifacts connected to the history of magic, gambling, unusual entertainments, and frauds and confidence games. Jay opposed any public revelations of the techniques of magic.[2]
Jay was formerly listed in theGuinness World Records for throwing a playing card 190 ft at 90 miles per hour (140 km/h) (the current record is 216 feet (66 m) byRick Smith Jr.). He could throw a playing card into awatermelon rind (which he referred to as the "thick,pachydermatous outer melon layer" and "the most prodigious of household fruits") from ten paces. In addition, he was able to throw a card into the air like a boomerang and cut it cleanly in half with a pair of "giant scissors" upon its return. In his shows, he often attacked plastic animals with thrown cards in "self defense".
Jay appeared in a number of David Mamet films includingHouse of Games,The Spanish Prisoner andRedbelt; he also appeared in a few episodes of the Mamet-produced TV seriesThe Unit as a C.I.A. recruiter.
Jay played Henry Gupta, a henchman to villainElliot Carver, in the James Bond filmTomorrow Never Dies; and appeared inPaul Thomas Anderson'sBoogie Nights andMagnolia, as well as Christopher Nolan'sThe Prestige.
He joined the cast of theHBO western dramaDeadwood as a recurring character and writer for the first season in 2004, playing card sharp Eddie Sawyer. He wrote the episode "Jewel's Boot Is Made for Walking"[14] and left the series at the end of the first season.
As an expert on magic, gambling, con games and unusual entertainment, Jay was a consultant on Hollywood projects for many years, beginning with his work onFrancis Ford Coppola's production ofCaleb Deschanel'sThe Escape Artist.[15] Other early work included teachingRobert Redford how to manipulate coins forThe Natural and working withDouglas Trumbull on hisShowscan projectNew Magic (1983).
In the early 1990s, Jay and Michael Weber created a firm, Deceptive Practices, providing "Arcane Knowledge on a Need-to-Know Basis" to film, television and stage productions. By offering both vast historical expertise and creative invention, they were able to provide surprising practical solutions to real production challenges. Among many accomplishments, they designed the wheelchair that "magically" hidGary Sinise's legs inForrest Gump; the glass that "drinks itself" used by the gorilla inCongo; and an illusion "in which a man climbs to the top of a ladder of light and vanishes in midair" for the Broadway production ofAngels in America: Perestroika.[16]
Other projects they worked on includedThe Prestige,[17]The Illusionist,Sneakers,Leap of Faith,Wolf,The Parent Trap,I Love Trouble,The Great Buck Howard,Heartbreakers, andOcean's Thirteen.
Additionally, he worked with libraries and museums on their collections, including the Mulholland Library of Conjuring and the Allied Arts and theMuseum of Jurassic Technology inCulver City,California.[18]
Jay authored numerous articles and delivered many lectures and demonstrations on such subjects as conjuring literature, con games, sense perception, and unusual entertainments. Among his presentations:
Jay also lectured atHarvard University,USC, theGrolier Club, theHammer Museum,Getty Center, andTown Hall Theatre in New York City. In 1999 he guest-curated an exhibit at the Harvard Theater Collection entitled "The Imagery of Illusion: Nineteenth Century Magic and Deception."[19]
Exhibitions of material from his collections have been mounted at the Hammer Museum,[20] theYerba Buena Center for the Arts,[21]University of California, Davis,[22] the Christine Burgin Gallery,[23] theMuseum of Jurassic Technology,[24] and UCLA'sClark Library.[25] He loaned material to the Getty Center for their exhibit "Devices of Wonder"[26] theSkirball Museum, theHuntington Library, theWhitney Museum of Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art for an exhibit entitled "Wordplay: Matthias Buchinger's Drawings From the Collection of Ricky Jay" in 2016.[27]
Jay is the subject of the feature documentaryDeceptive Practice: The Mysteries and Mentors of Ricky Jay.
Jay died on November 24, 2018, at age 72. His attorney Stan Coleman confirmed his death but further details were not immediately released.[28] Later press coverage reported that Jay died of natural causes.[29]
He also performed on the 2005 BBC Radio adaptation of David Mamet'sFaustus.[31]
Jay was the author of eleven books:[1]
Charles McGrath called Jay "perhaps the last of the great 19th-century authors." Jay's last book,Matthias Buchinger: "The Greatest German Living", was well-received, called "awe-inspiring" by theLos Angeles Times and "beguiling" by theNew York Review of Books.[1]
Ricky Jay contributed to several projects in the music world, most notably the 2007 Sony releaseRicky Jay Plays Poker, a box set containing a CD of poker-related songs (byBob Dylan,Robert Johnson,Townes Van Zandt,Patsy Cline,Lorne Greene,Howard Da Silva,O. V. Wright, and several others), a DVD featuring Ricky Jay discussing and performing notable feats of card table deception, and a box of Ricky Jay playing cards.
He performed "The Fiddler" withRichard Greene onHal Willner'ssea shanty-compilationRogue's Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs, and Chanteys (2006), as well as "The Chantey of Noah and his Ark (Old School Song)" on its follow-upSon of Rogues Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs & Chanteys (2013).
He appeared in the music video for Bob Dylan's song "Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum",[32] from the albumLove and Theft. During the production of the video, a screwdriver reportedly fell from the rafters and lodged in Jay's hand.[33]
He appeared in the video for the Jerry Garcia and David Grisman single "The Thrill Is Gone", available on the DVD of theGrateful Dawg documentary.
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