When Jose Rafael gets up close, there’s magic all around.
Bottle caps vanish and then reappear somewhere else within seconds. Pens, cards, it doesn’t matter… Jose is the master of sleight of hand. At your table. Right in front of your unbelieving eyes.
“My specialty is sleight of hand,” a slight understatement by Jose the Magician, who performs table-side at Margaritaville and is on stage the last weekend of every month at the venue’s comedy night.
“My job is simple. I’m an entertainer,” he says. “I do magic table by table, when people order food and are waiting…” His tricks mystify and delight the clientele while their food is being prepared, and it’s hard to say who enjoys it more, the customers or Jose himself.
The three-time national champ from Santiago, Cuba, learned from his father, master magician Ayra, who is well-known throughout Cuba as an illusionist and a professor at the School of Magic in Santiago, described as the oldest in the country.
Jose did his first trick when he was six and was practicing sleight of hand by age 10. He is skilled in manipulation, card magic and using his own props or other elements that people give him.
“I do a lot of impromptu magic,” he says with a smile. “Sometimes you go to a place and you have no props, no deck of cards…so you maybe use a napkin or a cap.” With that, he pops the top off a bottle of hot sauce with one hand and within a blink, it shows up in his other hand, right in front of your nose.
“I love my job. I love when people are laughing and enjoying themselves. Most important for me is when people have fun,” he says.
Even at his skill level, Jose practices all day and sometimes into the wee hours of the morning. He takes his deck of cards, coins, whatever he needs, and practices new techniques.
“Every time you learn something new, you realise how much you need to learn,” he says.
“I look for new things all the time. Every show on stage is different.
“That’s my life. I breathe magic.”
Jose the magician
11am-7pm daily at Margaritaville
Jose also performs on stage at the comedy show, the last weekend of every month. Different show every time.
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