Mark, Nani and Allakazam Re-visited……..

A Few Glimpses of one of Magic’s Most Iconic Duos—Mark Wilson and Nani Darnell.

A few years ago I got to write a two part cover story for Vanish Magazine about Mark Wilson and Dani Darnell. While I was very aware of what a tremendous influence Mark’s pioneering television show Magic Land of Allakazam had been on so many magicians in the United States. I only arrived in California in 1974 and missed seeing the show or I am sure I would have been a big fan—I love seeing good magic on TV.

I thoroughly enjoyed getting to spend some quite extensive interview with both Mark and Nani while preparing for the articles. I was excited to do so and enjoyed the process immensely, both of them are not only charming and gracious but they are so damn interesting! I also really enjoyed getting a personal tour around their extensive offices and warehouse in Valencia, Ca. If you have the mind to, you can find the full article in the back issues of vanishmagazine.com I think you will enjoy it and also learn some useful insight from Mark’s illustrious career.

During the course of our meetings I snapped some photos of their fabled magic warehouse to help prepare the visuals for our story. I have to emphasis how unbelievably cool the warehouse is to any visiting magician, It is jam packed with amazing and historical magic effects (The classic sawing in half train) and highly person/professional memorabilia (The original curtain from Allakazam.) Every room holds fresh surprises, packed boxes and travel cases and I had a blast exploring the impressive facility.

I thought it might be fun to add a blog entry with some of my “field photography” in the hopes that it will be of some interest to my readers. If you want to really relive some memories, or discover a hidden gem in magic’s history, I should mention that you can purchase DVDs of them of the “Magic Land of Allakazam” series at http://www.markwilsonmagic.com/allakazam-dvds.html

Enjoy the photos…