What’s This Guy Got Up His Sleeve?

Who is the Masked Magician and why is he giving away trade secrets from the world of illusion?

The answers to these questions lead you on a twisted journey through the magic community, taking you from a New York City magic shop once owned by Houdini to a casino boat in Biloxi, Miss. Along the way you’re introduced to a cast of characters who seem lifted from an Elmore Leonard novel: a Dutchman named Peter Pit, known for his “Dancing Cane” trick; Jackie Flosso, the cantankerous proprietor of the Flosso-Hornmann Magic Co. in New York, founded in 1856; and the Masked Magician himself, who would meet a reporter for lunch if only he could eat through his mask.

Amid all the mystery, this much is known: The Masked Magician will be back on Fox tonight at 9, giving away more secrets to popular illusions, including Houdini’s death-defying “Water Torture Cell Escape.”

The show will be preceded at 8 by a repeat of the first installment of “Breaking the Magician’s Code: Magic’s Secrets Finally Revealed,” which originally aired Nov. 24 and was Fox’s highest-rated special ever, drawing more than 24 million viewers--bigger than the audience for any single game of last year’s World Series.

It’s the 24 million viewers that have magicians worried. Yes, they say, others have come forward in the past to reveal how magic tricks are done, but never with a network and so many viewers along for the ride.

And while they may have dismissed him as a charlatan at first, some magicians see the Houdini water escape stunt as an ominous sign--an indication that the Masked Magician will continue to tarnish sacred tricks to grab ratings.

Mike Darnell, senior vice president of special programs for Fox, says the show isn’t aimed at debunking magic acts so much as “pointing out, subliminally, that [magic is] more in the artistry.”

Still, Fox is spinning the series as though the secrets rival the truth behind the JFK assassination. Shot in an undisclosed location, the show features its star covered from head to toe in black, his face concealed by makeup and a fright mask. He never speaks. On the first special, the Masked Magician revealed how to make an elephant disappear, saw an assistant in half and pull rabbits out of a hat.

Why all the secrecy? Fox says the Masked Magician fears he would be blacklisted if his identity were discovered. But many in the magic community laugh at that, saying they know exactly who he is--a guy named Valentino, a Las Vegas magician who did a recent three-month stint aboard the aforementioned casino boat in Biloxi.

Of course, no one wants to go on record fingering Valentino. Phone calls to both Valentino and his manager, Dick Feeney, were not returned, although Feeney has denied previous published reports that his client is the Masked Magician. Asked if he was Valentino, the Masked Magician would neither confirm nor deny the claim.

But Peter Pit, the Dutchman who can make a cane dance on its own and works as a magic consultant for Siegfried and Roy, says he’s fairly convinced it’s Valentino.

“If I could sit next to him on TV for 30 minutes I would break him,” he declared, saying that he spoke to Valentino after the first special aired and told him to go on TV and “do a Jimmy Swaggart thing, cry and ask for forgiveness.”

Milt Larsen, founder of the Magic Castle in Hollywood, says leaks about Valentino originated from sources on the show and spread quickly through the magic community. Larsen, though, is less concerned about the magician’s identity than stopping Fox from airing further specials.

“The Secrets of Magic Revealed” isn’t going to put a top illusionist like David Copperfield or Lance Burton out of business, Larsen says, but it will affect the emerging pro, the magician who saws an assistant in half as a grand finale in his act.

“He’s hurting the person who saves up $6,000 to buy that illusion,” Pit agreed. “It’s not hurting Copperfield, it’s hurting the magician in Kansas City who’s going to perform at a school assembly today.”

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In full disguise, the Masked Magician appeared recently in the Century City office of his public relations firm, Rogers & Cowan. (“How do you know the person in the disguise was the Masked Magician?” Stan Allen, editor of Magic Magazine, would ask later, questioning the authenticity of the interview. “It could have been anybody. It could have been the producer’s brother.”)

Whoever he was, the Masked Magician said he is well aware of the anger his specials have inspired among colleagues. But he deflected criticism that he’s doing this for a fast buck, saying he hopes his specials will bring newcomers into the magic field, opening up a heretofore closed society.

“Magicians going back to Merlin were secretive because they wanted people to believe they had magic powers,” he said. “They wanted to maintain their stature. . . . Early on, I had that same mentality. But one problem I’ve always had as a part of the magic fraternity is all this secrecy. Magicians are protective over magic in general, mostly because they believe they’re not going to have a job if there are other magicians around.”

Personal questions, of course, were off limits. The Masked Magician would only say that he’s been a professional for 25 years and that he’s toured nationally and internationally with his show. He wouldn’t answer any questions that might trace him back to Valentino: Did he work the Palace casino boat in Biloxi around the holidays last year? Does he know Peter Pit?

“I’m leading a double life,” he said. “There’s a witch hunt for me. Other magicians have accused different people, but they’re sort of drawing at straws.”

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There is one subject on which the Masked Magician and his critics agree--that there’s more than one way to pull off a classic trick. In the first special, for instance, the Masked Magician levitated an assistant by propping her on a hydraulic forklift, which was hidden behind a black curtain.

“But how many magicians can travel with a forklift to make a girl float in the air?” argued Magic Magazine’s Allen. “There were a few effects [shown] that will force magicians to put things in the warehouse for a while, but to get into that top circle of magicians, you have to have something no one else has.”

Still, there is plenty of anger to go around. Bill Smith, who builds illusions for magicians at his Magic Ventures in Las Vegas, is so convinced the Masked Magician is Valentino that he’s vowed never to build another prop for him. Others use sad analogies; giving away magic’s secrets, they say, is like telling kids there’s no Santa Claus.

“[The special] isn’t about promoting magic, it’s more about degrading it,” said Burton, a top Las Vegas magician who was featured in the recent PBS special “The Art of Magic.” “It’s like saying, ‘These magicians aren’t here to entertain you, or dazzle you or make you laugh, they’re just here to rip you off.’ ”

If Burton sounded merely perturbed, others were apoplectic, including an angry Jackie Flosso, the Manhattan magic store owner, who launched into a tirade that simultaneously debunked the Masked Magician and evoked Variety founder Sime Silverman’s obituary for Harry Houdini.

“Magic is about presentation, it’s about showmanship!” Flosso said. “You think Siegfried and Roy worry about this guy? They make $10 million a week, for Christ’s sake!”

And then there is Penn Jillette, of Penn and Teller fame.

If any magician would be capable of seeing the Masked Magician’s antics as a kind of subversive performance art, it would be Penn, who with silent partner Teller burst onto the magic scene in the 1980s with an act that simultaneously dazzled the audience and lampooned the sanctity of magic by explaining how a trick was done.

What irks Penn about “The Secrets of Magic Revealed” is not that the show gives away secrets but that the show suggests magic tricks can be boiled down to a one-sentence gimmick that anyone can understand.

“When you want to give away magic tricks, you have to give away methods that are beautiful, and that’s a bigger part of the lie,” he said. “The way you protect yourself is by having your secrets be ugly.”

Penn then elaborated. It was a complicated explanation that covered the music of Bach and Beck, the difference between pornography and real sex and something you could call “the ‘Aha!’ principle.”

“Look,” he said finally, “there’s nothing earthshaking here and there’s nothing bad. It’s just a TV show on Fox.”

A TV show, says the Magic Castle’s Larsen, that magicians will continue to boycott.

“Magicians by and large will be watching ‘Home Improvement’ [tonight],” he promised.

* “Breaking the Magician’s Code 2” airs at 9 tonight on Fox (Channel 11).