The Magical Life of Harry Maurer

We are often hired by companies for the sole purpose of creating attention and stopping traffic. Magic has that unique effect on people. One of our clients, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, hired us to entertain at their convention booth at McCormick Place in Chicago. For those unfamiliar with McCormick Place, the total isle length of the convention space is over TEN MILES LONG! For three days, we literally stopped traffic in the isles by performing comedy magic at their convention booth and turned what would have been simple “passers-by” into prospects. For the NJ Builders Association Convention, we made half of the Pettibone Corporation booth into a performance stage and literally did a “stand-up” show every two hours! The show times were posted and at the appointed time, conventioneers stopped what they were doing to race to our booth for a fun-filled 20-minute show. People talked about the shows at the “Pettibone Booth” throughout the three-day convention. As a result, the booth ...

While I was performing at the Tropicana Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City one week, I got a call from the Vice President of Entertainment at Trump Castle Casino Hotel with a frantic call saying, “Foster Brooks didn’t show up — can you do the show tonight?” I had just stepped out of the shower and was dripping wet. I had performed my act at Trump Castle for an eight-week engagement just a few months earlier, so not only did the V.P. of Entertainment know that my act was strong and consistent, but the stage techs already knew the cues to my show! Trump Castle has a wonderful “Vegas Style” showroom and as much as I wanted to do the show, I was already contracted to emcee and present a 30-minute show at the Tropicana Hotel on the other side of town. “We already know that,” the Vice President continued, “…but we only need 15 minutes. If we can time your performance to happen between your sets at the Trop, would you do it?” I thought about it. The Tropicana is on the Boardwalk...

While we were entertaining in Atlantic City, Minuteman Press wanted to present a 30-second television commercial locally to promote their high speed “color laser copier” when it was first introduced to the public and we were asked if we could design a “magical” commercial for them. Carol Ann and I spent the next week tossing ideas back and forth. We developed three ideas — quick 30-second clips — interestingly enough, only one was designed with magic in mind. The first concept started with a janitor late at night alone at the Louvre Museum in Paris who’s mop handle “accidentally” breaks through the painting of the “Mona Lisa”. He doesn’t know what to do, so he races into the curator’s office, finds a photo of the Mona Lisa in a book, races it over to Minuteman Press on his scooter and blows it up on the “color copier”. The next scene shows patrons gathered around the Mona Lisa all going “oooooh” while the janitor leans proudly on his mop! The second idea for a commercial was...

We developed our “Parlor Show” years ago on the deluxe cruise ships as a fun-filled pre-dinner “Cocktail show”. A “Parlor Show” is “Close-up Magic” (Micro Magic) presented in a more formal setting.  It is a very strong show — so strong in fact that cruise lines now insist that I include it in my program! Many of you know that some of the ships on which we entertain draw a very select clientele who pay in the neighborhood of $1,000 per day (per person) to sail on these ships for two or three weeks at a time! Sailing as a passenger on one of these cruises was Walter Cronkite. I have so many memories of seeing Walter Cronkite on the nightly news when I was a child. To this day I can vividly remember his broadcast the moment that we first landed on the moon! I knew he was on the ship and I wanted so much to meet him, but our paths didn’t cross. The night I presented my “Parlor Show” — my most intimate show — I saw Walter Cronkite sitting in the back of the room watc...

See Full article online at: http://voyagehouston.com/interview/meet-harry-maurer-comedy-magic-harry-maurer-cypress/ _________________________________________________ Today we’d like to introduce you to Harry Maurer. Few people have an idea of what they would like to do when they grow up. Harry Maurer was lucky to know from an early age that he wanted to be a professional magician. Not a “birthday party” children’s performer, but a world-class professional magician entertaining in casinos, aboard cruise ships and at major corporate events around the world. But how do you take such a fun job and make a career out of it? As a child, Harry was determined to be a magician and performed his first of many nightclubs shows at the age of 13. By the time he reached High School, with the permission of his teachers and school Principal he had managed to re-arrange his class schedule so that he could leave school early each day to perform the matinee and evening shows at a...

Although I am mentioned in a few non-fiction books (including Bob Fosse’s biography), this past year, unbeknownst to me, author David Heenan included me in an entire chapter of his book “Hidden Heroes”. It is a book about ten sets of extraordinary people with distinctive personalities in various fields from business and education to entertainment and sports who, although may not be instantly recognizable by name, each has made a difference by succeeding in the shadows. In part, Heenen writes: “While most folks are tongue-tied when called upon to make a public presentation, Harry Maurer is the exception.  For the better part of three decades, the loquacious comic magician has found sanctuary as a successful opening, backup or supporting act setting the stage for such stars as Joey Bishop, The Supremes, Frankie Avalon and Rosie O’Donnell.  His quick-witted stage presence and ability to prop up leading headliners in various venues ranging from Biloxi to Brunei win hi...

Not too long ago, a client in Florida called me and contracted me to perform three different evening shows at three different events! He explained that the reason he wanted “different” shows was because many of the same people would be attending the various parties. Interestingly enough, two of the performances were on a stage, and one was at a private dinner. Much of the work in a professional performance is in the planning and design stages that the client never sees. I divided and structured the material into three completely different 45 minute shows that would each have “a beginning”, “a middle” and “an end” and each would contain some real stunning routines. Each show was designed to work in the appropriate environment, and each show was a hit! One gentleman who attended all of the shows came up to me after my final show to tell me how amazed he was — not just in the shows — but in the fact that each show was completely different! It’s an extreme example of why we h...