I think the toughest thing about being an actor in a film is to be with a director who doesn't know what they want. And that can be really, really frustrating.

I never talk much about my family, but my grandfather was friendly with these guys, with magicians and ventriloquists on the highest levels, and I was just interested.

I think a lot of people just assumed I came to L.A. to do more television and get into show business.

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.

The pain is bad magicians ripping off good ones, doing magic badly, and making a mockery of the art.

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.

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.