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Local magician performs in D.C.
Monday, January 22, 2001 By Adrian McCoy, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
One could say that magician Paul Gertner played a small role in making the eight-year Clinton administration disappear.
The O'Hara resident was among about 10 of the country's top sleight-of-hand artists who performed at Thursday's Inauguration reception and dinner festivities in Washington, D.C., for the incoming Bush administration. The magicians performed tricks for small groups of guests at the black tie event at Union Station.
Gertner, 47, had a bag full of tricks geared to the election theme. In one, he used a deck of cards with markings on the side and got them to spell out "BUSH-CHENEY." In another, he turned a $100 bill into $1,000 -- a useful stunt for a new administration -- and changed money into small folded paper elephants, which were given to the guests as souvenirs.
"In these situations, you find a certain number of tricks that work well," Gertner said.
Gertner and his colleagues also devised tricks using ballot cards, but the topical tricks were vetoed by one of the evening's hosts.
"They asked us not to do it, just in the event someone would take it the wrong way," he said.
Gertner saw plenty of familiar faces in the crowd: Colin Powell, Muhammad Ali, Ben Stein and Kelsey Grammer.
"It wasn't as much of a Hollywood entertainment crowd as you would get with a Clinton event," he said. But, he noted, "People were certainly ready for a party."
Gertner was bitten by the magic bug at age 10. By the time he was 16, he was serious about practicing sleight of hand.
While a graphics design major at the now-defunct Ivy School of Art, he had a part-time job hanging paintings for the Westinghouse Electric corporate art collection. He'd do occasional card tricks for executives he met there, and they started hiring him for company events and meetings. One job led to another -- for other local companies and eventually for companies across the country.
Now, he performs magic at trade shows, sales meetings and product launches. He owns his own company, the Etna-based Paul Gertner Group, which produces magic shows for the business and entertainment industries.
Although he's still based here, his reputation extends far beyond his home town. He has performed on the Johnny Carson show, "NBC's World's Greatest Magic" and on HBO. In September, he was featured in a Wall Street Journal article on corporate magic.
Gertner is best known locally for "Ten Fingers: A Play of Magic," a one-man magic show he did at City Theatre in 1998.Recently, he developed a new magic show for corporate clients called "The Magic of Thinking." It's a creativity presentation used at meetings and conventions.
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