Steve Valentine Quotes

Magic is like special effects live, and I love to perform, so it sounded like doing magic tricks were a good way to entertain people.

If I had auditioned for 'Merlin' on magic alone, I don't think I'd have got it. Like any kid, I probably had a magic kit, but it's not something I ever pursued. I've never watched a magic show like David Copperfield or used him to base my character on, but I really like David Blaine and Darren Brown. They are doing wonders.

If you want to talk about magic, the stuff that blows me away is the stuff that's done close up.

I'm a big Penn & Teller fan. But I myself was never very good; I was a teenage magician who performed at kids' parties. I can still perform a vanish, credibly, and I still, in special circumstances, will make a balloon animal.

All David Blaine is is a good-looking magician.

I started performing when I was 9 or 10, doing magic.

I've always done magic as a hobby. I've done it professionally, too.

My interest in magic was kindled by Steve Martin, the comedian I'd gone to high school with.

I'm not a big fan of doing it because I get really frustrated because I can't do any of the tricks, but I love to watch magic.

I am a street performer as much as I am a stage performer. Yes, I have a television show, but every trick, every 'Mindfreak' you see, I can do live.

There are performers who have built their whole career doing magic on TV and can't really perform live at all - don't really have jobs and skills.

My goal was becoming the next David Copperfield. I learned how to be a performer by emulating him as a kid - his formula of just talking to people onstage, being free to improvise, being charming and witty with a crowd, together with great, beautiful magic.

I always wanted to do magic tricks - I feel like that could be the the next wave.

My interest was magic, believe it or not. I became an amateur magician and did something like 400 magic shows through my teen years.

He spent hours and hours and hours practising these conjuring tricks. It's just such a curious thing.

If people are fans of 'Mindfreak,' they are going to be so excited with 'Believe.' They are actually going to see those illusions that people think can only happen with trick photography.

Penn and Teller love the very intellectual side of magic. Me, I'm more fun than them. They never look like they're having fun. They look angry.

When I was six years old, I fell in love with magic. For Christmas, I got a magic box and a very old book on card manipulation. Somehow, I was more interested in pure manipulation than in all the silly little tricks in the box.

It was just like a digital fixation with cards and math and science and then I started to look at images of great magicians from Houdini down the line.

I had a magic kit. I never really followed through on it, but I had my phase of wanting to do it, sure.

I definitely went through my magic phase. I think all little boys do at some point or another - they get fascinated by magic tricks.

For the most part, any serious magic show is not using very much technology newer than theatrical lights.

I never quite know how to describe what I do. I normally just say, 'Oh, I'm a magician', which probably puts fairly naff ideas in people's minds but is pleasantly conversation-stopping.

I'm a magician. A lot of people don't know that I've won awards. I used to do big stage shows.

Harry Collins was the first magician I ever saw back in 1965 when I was five years old. He was doing a magic show and I was the volunteer from the audience.