We were lucky to catch up with Murray Sawchuck recently and have shared our conversation below.

Murray, appreciate you joining us today. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

My whole family was in the Railway business or Forestry business so jumping into doing magic tricks for a living was like being the black sheep of the family, giving up a 401K, Pension plan for walking on stage nightly and hoping people would pay money to see me entertain them.

I started at 7 years old and by my early teens I was doing 3 – 5 shows a weekend in Vancouver, British Columbia where I am from and I have never looked back! We just celebrated my 23rd year headlining on the Las Vegas Strip!

The reason I took the risk is because I could always go back and get a corporate regular job, as they will always be there but to jump out and make a job for yourself with your dream is so much harder but the rewards are so much greater! Most people work 52 weeks a year and look forward to 2 weeks a year off but when you do something that is your passion you don’t work a day in your life… so you really take 52 weeks a year off like a vacation.

I use my form of M.A.G.I.C.

Motivation
Attitude
Gratitude
Investment
Conquer

Using my method of M.A.G.I.C you can conquer anything!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Murray SawChuck aka. Murray The Magician is the king of Reality TV and one of the most sought after VIRAL MAGICIANS with over 6.5 Billion online views. He has been on over a twenty five reality shows and a regular headliner on the Las Vegas Strip. Internationally acclaimed award winning magician with over 30 awards to his name, Murray SawChuck who dazzled the judges and 22 million people as a finalist on “America’s Got Talent” and currently appears as a regular cast member as the Magic Expert on the History Channel’s #1 rated series “Pawn Stars.” You can also see him on CW’s Masters’ of Illusion, Fool Us, Brain Games, and again on this season of Pawn Stars!

Murray’s star power has exploded onto the entertainment scene with the charisma, personality and talent of an entertainer born to be on stage and screen, after his successful run as a semi-finalist on NBC-TV’s “America’s Got Talent.” The #1 network summer series was viewed by over 22 million fans nationwide. Murray dazzled the judges on America’s Got Talent by producing a Ferrari from thin air, transforming a girl locked in a cage into a 450 pound tiger and did the largest trick ever on “AGT” by vanishing an entire 1918 steam train locomotive in mere seconds. All of these illusions took place before a “live” and national “TV” audience, and brought standing ovations from the judges.

Murray also uploads 1 – 3 videos a week on his ever growing YouTube Channel ‘MagicMurray’ with over 6.5 Billion Online Views showcasing pranks, magic and teaching tricks!

Murray also just wrote and released his first Children’s Book published by Amazon and Kindle called “At Night Time We Are All The Same Size”, just in time for the holidays!

Murray co-starred on the popular VH1-TV series “Celebracadabra” highlighting pairs of magicians and celebrities who competed for $100 hundred thousand dollars and the title of “Best Celebrity Magician.” He has guest-starred on the comedy TV series “Reno 911” and NBC-TV’s “Last Comic Standing, TLC’s ‘4 Houses’ , ‘What Not To Wear’, and Discovery’s ‘Battle of The Strand’, Gordon Ramsey’s Master Chef & Hells Kitchen, Hallmarks “Home & Family”, Discovery’s ‘Top Gear’ , ABC’s Happily Ever After, Access Hollywood, Dogmaster 101, Netflix’s GLOW.

Murray has performed in concerts worldwide, and has headlined at the historic Magic Castle in Hollywood, California and currently just celebrated his 12th year anniversary headlining at Tropicana Resort Casino in Las Vegas you can see him on CW’s Masters of Illusions and History Channels – Pawn Stars.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I have been a magician since I was 7 years old but during 2020 when Covid hit the world we all had nothing to do as the Las Vegas Strip FROZE… I always loved landscaping and designing out various rentals homes we have and our own house from building fireplaces, ponds, flower beds, grass etc. So I started a landscaping company called Dirt 2 Dreams Landscaping and has been going strong since 2020. Also with Vegas growing so quickly there is always yards that needs help. My thought I would stop that business once the worlds came back but we kept growing it so when I am not walking on stage I am our designing peoples backyards, where I get to use my creative skills in another way.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I met a kid at the time named Seth Leach at my show at the Tropicana who later reached out to me on social media and said your magic is great but no one is watching it online, “I can make you go viral”. So he retooled my magic tricks and put them in scenarios that would get attention, so we did a big series on pranking police officers, parking attendants, bad parking, handicap parking and homeless videos. These things are great for human interest and gave the magic bit of a twist and we started getting millions of views. If you want to make viral videos really figure out what makes humans tick and create something that will attract them. You’ll see the views with a bit of hard work! www.youtube.com/magicmurray has all my viral videos.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.murraymagic.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/murraysawchuck
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MagicWithMurray
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/murray-sawchuck-7b1013b3/
• Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/murraysawchuck
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/magicmurray
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/murray-the-magician-las-vegas?osq=Murray+The+Magician&override_cta=Request+pricing+%26+availability

Image Credits

Shane Oneal
Jen Rosenstein
Gabe Ginsberg
Ethan Miller