The real secret of magic lies in the performance.

There is a safe spot within every tornado. My job is to find it.

Magic was a thing that, when I did it, it made all the kids go, "Ah, that's cool."

All the lawyers and the business stuff is work, but actually creating stuff isn't work. It's good effort. It's hard work. But, it's not work. It doesn't feel like work because the result is very rewarding.

I got to watch Frank Capra, in his eighties, in action. You read all the stories about Frank Capra fighting with the head of Columbia, Harry Cohn, "It's my way or the highway." I got to watch that. He lambasted me, "You cannot do this. You will fail." Finally, after another hour of conversation, I convinced him to help me write the speech.

As I did more of that, I realized, "Well, maybe I should do more magic."

Later, when I was at Caesar's Palace, and [Joe and Gil Cates] were trying to get me to have opening acts for the show, they gave me a list of people, and Rosie O'Donnell was one of them. I said, "I don't really need any opening acts. I have funny stuff in the show, and I do a lot of comedy and stuff."