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I'm probably the only kid in history whose parents made him stop taking music lessons. They made me stop studying the accordion.

Ricky Jay

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Ricky Jay
Age: 72 †
Born: 1946
Born: June 26
Died: 2018
Died: November 24
Magician
Non-Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Writer
Brooklyn
New York
Richard Jay Potash
Made
Parents
Probably
Study
Accordions
Parent
Accordion
Stop
Studying
History
Lessons
Kids
Whose
Music
Taking

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I wouldn't want to try to make a living as an actor. I think actors... I give them a lot of credit for what they go through, but putting myself on the line like that would make me crazy.
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I like being fooled. When I watch someone who does sleight-of-hand and fools me, it's a great feeling.
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I suppose that if I could only do one thing, a solid card effect would be pretty high on the list. That's the root of it all, sleight-of-hand. It's certainly the thing I feel most comfortable with.
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It probably is harder to fool people when they know they're going to be fooled.
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I know absolutely nothing about the 20th Century.
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Magic is a powerful art that can support a weak performer.
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Dai Vernon, the greatest sleight of hand figure in the history of the art, rarely performed. But he invented magic and had an enormous influence on the whole range of sleight of hand. And so often the magic he was doing was to fool other magicians.
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I grew up like Athena — covered with playing cards instead of armor — and, at the age of seven, materialized on a TV show, doing magic.
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The pain is bad magicians ripping off good ones, doing magic badly, and making a mockery of the art.
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If it sounds too good to be true, it always is.
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I think a lot of people just assumed I came to L.A. to do more television and get into show business.
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The book says we may be through with the past but the past ain't through with us.
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In the winters, I enrolled in the hotel management program at Cornell University. I naively thought that I knew something about sleight-of-hand, entertainment and food, and that would be all I needed.
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Every acting gig isn't the same, every writing job isn't the same, every live performance isn't the same - the challenge is the level of difficulty or ease, and that may vary.
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Sitting with a deck of cards in your hand all day is an obsession. Visiting print shops and bookstores and libraries is an obsession. And writing about this is an obsession. I think, in general, most collectors are obsessed. I think the only form of a rationalized greed is when you're collecting something you are supposedly serious about.
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Maybe the the luxury of not having acting be my only profession is that I can be more selective about what I choose to be in. I've been really lucky in terms of film projects with people, terrific actors and also writers and directors that I really respect.
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I certainly was performing before my writing was published, because I was performing when I was very young. And the thing is I'm very comfortable on stage, so a large portion of my act did come from ad-libs.
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Theft annoys me more than anything else. The purloining of effects from another magician. Some people think it's massive to steal the secrets of nuclear reactors, but to steal a card move is trivial. They're wrong.
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Unlike other Jewish families, we didn't go out for Chinese food on Sundays, but we spent our time in a world of baking powder biscuits and the best shrimp cocktails that ever were.
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I'm pretty fortunate that I'm in the films I'm in largely because the directors have asked me to be in them. I'd love to do more of them, but the writing and historical stuff I'll probably always do.
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