So Many Weird Worlds: A Conversation with Ricky Jay

For fifty years, Ricky Jay has studied, archived, and reënacted the work of card hustlers, cannonball catchers, and performers from the far reaches of entertainment history. His new book, “Celebrations of Curious Characters,” pairs engravings, mezzotints, and broadsheets from his famed personal collection with short writings adapted from his popular radio show, “Jay’s Journal,” which ran on KCRW, in Los Angeles. As Mark Singer, who profiled Jay for the magazine in 1993, once said, “If anyone deserves to be called incomparable, it’s Ricky Jay.” After chatting with him earlier this week about writing, card-throwers, David Mamet, and his love of all things curious, I’d have to agree.

_You first performed magic at age four. When did you start studying its history?
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[#image: /photos/590953c6019dfc3494e9e517]It was a natural assimilation. I mean, 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. First I was drawn to the idea of learning how to do magic, but quickly wound up making that transition to learning about it. And it never occurred to me that I could study magic or theatre in college, and I have a very spotty academic career to say the least, but since around then I’ve spent lots and lots of time in libraries, acquiring this odd information and building a collection of printed material and images.

_Your earlier books, like the rare and coveted “Cards As Weapons,” are assemblages of stories, oddball art, and fake news items. They somewhat resemble early issues of McSweeney’s, who published this book.
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Yeah. I think it’s a shared interest with Dave [Eggers], this thing of wanting to see the material presented in a really nice way. It’s just been something that I do. For a while I was publishing “Jay’s Journal” as a magazine, actually doing a letterpress magazine with tipped-in colored plates, and needless to say making no money, but when it was collected as a book (“Jay’s Journal of Anomalies”), it was very well-received.

_You designed “Curious Characters” with Coco Shinomiya, who designed Bob Dylan’s last album cover. Will you work together again?
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I actually just came from a lunch with Coco. We’re having custom wrapping paper made from one of the images on the book—from the story “Blind Faith,” about Margaret M’Avoy [who lost her eyesight from scarlet fever, but could reportedly see through her hands]. It’s the end paper for the book. No matter how bad it gets, if suddenly I’m dispossessed, they can still say about me that he had his own wrapping paper.

_For every page of text, there’s a corresponding full-page image from your collection. How much thought went into the visual parts of the book?
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It was a very big part of it for me. The art was very seriously considered. Some of the pieces, I was thinking about how to present them visually before I even started writing. One of the things that makes this book so unusual is that it exists in so many weird worlds. In the world of the spoken thing, as they were spoken pieces, and a literary piece, and a visual piece. So I hope that they complement each other.

_You’ve narrated movies and been an interviewer for NPR, but this audio project was a first. What was it like writing something to be heard?
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That’s a good, legitimate question, particularly for this. I always read what I write out loud and I did that long before any radio thing. My editor finds that unusual. I know of other writers that do it—I guess no other of her writers—and I don’t know if that’s because I came to writing from performing. I mean, I take writing very seriously, but I’ve always done that. I’ve always read out loud, very carefully. I think about it a lot. About how words sounds. And how they’re gonna appear. And I gather that my language is unconventional in terms of radio, but the reception to these pieces on the radio was very good. But I think it’s unusual fare—the idea that you’re supposed to dummy down things to an audience is pretty ludicrous. Somebody might not understand one specific word, but they’ll probably understand it in context and they certainly can, if they’re intrigued, look it up.

_Was there a time when you started writing out the patter of your stage act?
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I certainly was performing before my writing was published, because I was performing when I was very young. And the thing is I’m very comfortable on stage, so a large portion of my act did come from ad-libs. But like most comedians, I would tape shows or have people take serious notes and go back and think about things and how they worked and try to refine them. Then use ad-libbed material and eventually build it all into more precise routines, and then write other material to amend that. This strikes me as an honest response.

_David Mamet wrote the introduction to “Curious Characters.” The two of you are longtime friends and collaborators. How did you meet?
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It was a situation where I was performing for him, which was unusual I suppose because I don’t do many private things, but this was a request to do something for him specifically. I was very excited because I was obviously already a fan. Meeting him though was kind of … How do I put this? It was like talking to an old friend within fifteen minutes. David not only had an interest in cons but in unusual performers and acts. There was just such a lovely kindered interest in the arcane and curious. Jules Fisher, the famous lighting designer, was also responsible because he had wanted to do a vaudeville theatre in New York, and wanted David and Mike Nichols and I to be involved. We all eventually did meet. It was a lovely idea, but it still hasn’t happened.

_For better or worse, you’re perhaps best known as the guy who throws playing cards. How does card-throwing fit into the history of magic?
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Magicians from the nineteenth century threw cards distances, but I think I’m the first one who made a thing about using them as weapons. But when I was doing college shows I used to talk in my stage act about a book I wrote called “Cards as Weapons” that didn’t exist at all. And then one day it occurred to me it would kind of be amusing to write that book. So I wrote that book, and then people didn’t think that was real. People would get the book and think “This is just a made-up book and nobody actually throws cards at incredible speeds with accuracy, penetrating watermelons and such.” It kept working on levels of disbelief.

_The watermelon act is arguably your most famous.
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What I was proud of most in that act was the writing. More than the physical act of throwing, it was a written piece of material. A line like “I know what you’re saying, ‘Sure, this man can penetrate the rich, red interior of said melon, but can he penetrate the even thicker pachydermatous outer-melon layer?” That’s the perfect example of a physical action, a written piece, and most importantly the way it all works together. It’s that blend I’m really kind of looking for.

_You have performed and studied the work of outsiders, weirdos, and anomalies for basically your whole life. How did it feel to recently appear on “The Simpsons”?
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I guess … good. I love the variety that I’ve been able to deal with in terms with my own life and interests, and I love the idea that if someone approaches me with some sense of recognition that I honestly don’t know from what it’s going to come. If it’s from the Simpsons or a film or a piece that I’ve written or a performance that they saw or a movie. I love that surprise. It’s quite wonderful.