“It’s a de Kolta chair!”

That’s the thought that sprang to my mind in 1989 as I was riveted on the finale of the Phantom of the Opera at the Majestic Theatre on Broadway. The Phantom had just sat down on the throne in his underground lair and covered himself with his cape so that only the outline of his form was visible. As Meg Giry ripped the cape away, the audience was stunned — the Phantom had vanished with only his mask left on the chair. A magical ending to a magical musical.

The vanish was a classical illusion invented by French magician Buatier de Kolta in the 1880s. The Victorian era (1837-1901) is regarded as the Golden Age of Magic, in which this ancient art form was transformed from street buskers baffling onlookers with sleight of hand tricks and performers dressed in wizard costumes pretending to possess supernatural powers, to artists attired in elegant evening clothes perplexing audiences in theatres with amazing illusions based on scientific principles.

The pivotal figure in this transformation was Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin, celebrated as the Father of Modern Magic. Originally trained as a precision clockmaker, he turned his mechanical genius to building illusions, entertaining audiences in a theatre he opened in Paris in 1845.

Here he performed such effects as the “light and heavy chest,” in which a wooden box with a metal bottom, easily lifted by a young boy, was placed centre stage. A muscular volunteer from the audience was then invited to lift the box, but no matter how much he struggled, he could not. Robert-Houdin........

© Montreal Gazette