David Coperfield
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Career and business interests
At age 18, he enrolled at Fordham University, and was cast in the lead role of the Chicago-based musical The Magic Man (written by Barbara D'Amato and directed by Holland, MI's John Tammi) three weeks into his freshman year, adopting his new stage name "David Copperfield" from the Charles Dickens book of the same name. At age 19, he was headlining at the Pagoda Hotel in Honolulu, Hawaii.Copperfield's career in television began in earnest when he was discovered by Joseph Cates, a producer of Broadway shows and television specials. Cates produced a magic special in 1977 on ABC called "The Magic of ABC" hosted by Copperfield, as well as several of the "The Magic of David Copperfield" specials on CBS between 1978 and 1998. There has been a total of 20 Copperfield TV specials between 1977 and 2001.
Copperfield played the character of Ken the Magician in the 1980 horror film Terror Train. He also made an uncredited appearance in the 1994 film Pret-a-Porter. Most of his media appearances have been through television specials and guest spots on television programs. His illusions have included making the Statue of Liberty disappear, flying, levitating over the Grand Canyon, and walking through the Great Wall of China. Copperfield has been seen worldwide by more people than any other magician in history, including Houdini.
In 1996, Copperfield joined forces with Dean Koontz, Joyce Carol Oates, Ray Bradbury and others for David Copperfield's Tales of the Impossible, an anthology of original fiction set in the world of magic and illusion. A second volume was later published in 1997, called David Copperfield's Beyond Imagination. In addition to the 2 books, David also wrote an essay as part of the "This I Believe" series from NPR and the This I Believe, Inc. Also during 1996, in collaboration with Francis Ford Coppola, David Ives, and Eiko Ishioka, Copperfield's Broadway show "Dreams and Nightmares" broke box office records.
Copperfield notes that his role models were not magicians and that "My idols were Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire and Orson Welles and Walt Disney ... they took their individual art forms and they moved people with them ... I wanted to do the same thing with magic. I wanted to take magic and make it romantic and make it sexy and make it funny and make it goofy ... all the different things that a songwriter gets to express or a filmmaker gets to express ...."
On 7 May 2009, Copperfield was dropped by Michael Jackson from Jackson's residency at the O2 Arena after an alleged row over money. Copperfield wanted $1 million per show.
In August 2009, Copperfield is scheduled to bring his show to Australia.
International Museum and Library of the Conjuring Arts
Copperfield owns the International Museum and Library of the Conjuring Arts, which houses the world's largest collection of historically significant magic memorabilia, books and artifacts. Begun in 1991 when Copperfield purchased the Mullholland Library of Conjuring and the Allied Arts, which contained the world's largest collection of Houdini memorabilia, the museum comprises 5,000 cubic feet and approximately 80,000 items of magic memorabilia, including Houdini's Water Torture Cabinet and his Metamorphosis Trunk, Orson Welles' Buzz Saw Illusion and automata created by Robert Houdin.The museum is not open to the public; tours are reserved for "colleagues, fellow magicians, and serious collectors". Located in a warehouse at Copperfield's headquarters in Las Vegas, Nevada, the museum is entered via a secret door in what was described by actor Hugh Jackman as a "sex shop" and by Forbes as a "mail-order lingerie warehouse". "'It doesn't need to be secret, it needs to be respected,' he said. 'If a scholar or journalist needs a piece of magic history, it's there.'"
Musha Cay and the Islands of Copperfield Bay
In 2006 Copperfield bought eleven Bahamian islands called Musha Cay. Rechristened "The Islands of Copperfield Bay," the islands are a private resort. Guests have reportedly included Oprah Winfrey and John Travolta, and Google co-founder Sergey Brin was married there."Magic Underground" restaurant
David Copperfield's Magic Underground was planned to be a restaurant based on Copperfield's magic. There was a sign on Hollywood Boulevard during the late 90s indicating the restaurant was coming soon. Signs were also located around Pleasure Island and signs outside Disney-MGM Studios. A Magic Underground restaurant was also going to open in New York's Times Square. Plans also included eventual expansion into Disneyland in Anaheim, California, as well as Paris and Tokyo. The restaurants were to have magic props and other items on the walls of the restaurants while magicians would go around to tables doing sleight of hand tricks.There was also to be a larger stage for larger stunts. The restaurant in Times Square was 85 percent completed, but, amid disputes between the creative team and the financial team, and enormous cost overruns, finances dried up from the investors, so the project was cancelled, and Disney cancelled the lease. Copperfield had none of his money invested in the project; however, the investors reportedly lost $34 million on the project, and subcontractors obtained $15 million in liens.
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