The Magical Life of Harry Maurer

https://go.rallyup.com/pinehurst?NCK=8559692863&ContactID=22060327002 I woke up this morning and saw an email promoting this auction from Pinehurst Resort & Country Club, and I thought to myself -- "What a wonderful idea!": During this time of "Social Isolation" where country clubs (and others) are shut down, this is a promotion that will keep club members engaged during this crisis, auction off many things that will bring members to the club when this epidemic is over and more importantly help employees who have been furloughed. As of this writing, the site has already raised over $70,000 -- and as far as I can tell this auction started just today! This is something other clubs can easily model! And not just County Clubs (although their members may be in a better position to bid at higher levels), but this could work for theaters, schools, restaurants -- and with a little thought can be adapted to help nearly any business! Give it a try! HA...

Available on Amazon.com I am proud to say that my business book for Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses is now available on Amazon! "Show Business" is two words -- and with over 30 years in the BUSINESS of entertainment, I have learned things and found tools that can make ANY business more successful! The book contains 50 free and low-cost software, programs and online tools to help businesses grow. I started collecting these resources for my own business, and although I have many programs that I pay top dollar for, I do what any new business proprietor, solo business owner or entrepreneur would do: Before I invest a lot of money in something I “think” I might need, my first step is to research and find a low-cost solution to my problems and I test them out to see if they will solve the problems that I am trying to solve. At times, the programs I find are too simplistic, unreliable, or too cumbersome to warrant using them, but there are many times when I find a...

Watching these political debates makes me realize that I’ve had some very interesting political experiences being a magician… In Houston, I have performed fundraising events for Mayor Bill White and fundraising events with First Lady Barbara Bush. On the national stage, I presented exclusive dinner entertainment for Vice President Walter Mondale’s Presidential fundraiser. After one particularly surprising trick, he smiled at me and said “Hey — We need more of your Magic in Washington! While performing for six months in Bal Harbour, Florida, the Mayor of Miami Beach surprised me by presenting me with “The Key to the City of Miami Beach” which hangs proudly in my office right now. One night during that six-month run, Speaker of the House “Tip” O’Neill was in the theater audience and after the show, he wanted to meet me and the big, fun guy that he is gave me a good slap on the back while we laughed about the show. But my favorite memory was on a very exclusive cruise ship in E...

Years ago I was asked to present a show and “lecture” for Johnson & Johnson. I presented the lecture after my show and it dealt with how people perceive magic and how people are fooled.  It was fun and it was a hit (people mentioned it to me years later)… but I put the lecture aside for years and didn’t give it much thought. After many years, my wife encouraged me to resurrect the lecture.  I took the few notes I had (I save everything!) and developed it into an even more fascinating lecture called “The Perfection of Deception” a talk and PowerPoint presentation about magicians who changed history. I began by presenting the lecture — first at civic groups, then on cruise ships, and then — even though I am a professional entertainer, I joined “Toastmasters” where I tore apart the speech and rewrote it improving the speech by adding more and more information to the presentation and watched it get amazing reactions. Don’t think you can be surprised by a...

There are a few books that I am mentioned in — many of them are “technical books” on magic; one non-fiction book about a producer who I worked with that was murdered in a high profile case; a biography of Bob Fosse (When Bob Fosse died he left $60,000 for a “party” for his friends — I was one of the entertainers at his wake!); and a compendium of magic in which I am listed as one of today’s “Modern Wizards” in a book by James Randi called “Conjuring”… (By the way — “Alfie The Wonderdog” is the West Highland Terrier in the photo below who traveled around the world with us entertaining in casinos and aboard cruise ships around the world!) (Reprinted with permission) Above: The Playboy Clubs gave Harry Maurer his start in magic, and now he is a Las Vegas and Atlantic City regular with his fast paced Comedy-and-Magic act. ————– HARRY MAURER  – This man works all the time.  Harry Maurer is booked as far ahead as he can see, and that’s to be expected, jud...

September 11th… When the twin towers fell, Carol-Ann and I were entertaining on a cruise ship in Europe and it was frightening being away from home with such tragedy happening and very little news available to us at sea.  Our contract finished shortly afterward and our flight home was diverted to avoid certain air space. I was scheduled to entertain in Las Vegas the following week, but all flights were grounded and we had no idea whether or not we would be able to do our contract. The day before I was to open at the Tropicana, planes were finally allowed to fly and I took my flight, and when I reached Las Vegas I discovered that the casinos had laid off something like 20,000 employees — but ironically, Vegas was packed!  (these are gamblers and they figure the odds of them being “hit” are pretty slim) I was performing 2 shows a night at “The Comedy Stop”, and after my second show I was heading to the elevator to go back to my room when a lady rushed up to me…. S...

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 ...