What happened to Steve Wyrick?

[Magic Newswire]

According to the Las Vegas Sun ::

Magician Steve Wyrick made more than $54 million disappear while operating his own theater, according to a bankruptcy filing on Monday.

Wyrick listed assets of $93,157 against liabilities of $54,353,748 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court filing.

The magician, whose full name is Gale Steven Wyrick, abruptly closed his show in December at the Miracle Mile Shops at Planet Hollywood. The landlord, Boulevard Invest LLC, sued Wyrick for back rent in January and later foreclosed on the theater and lounge Wyrick which opened in 2007, at a cost then said to be $35 million.


The Complete article is here.

[Magic Newswire]

That was actually from the LVRJ.. Sorry.

[Magic Newswire]

By the numbers:
http://www.lvrj.com/living/magician-wyr ... 86334.html

[Magic Newswire]

There was a new article on Wyrick that came out today which seemed to me to have been written as a hit piece so I hesitated to post it but you can find it here: http://bit.ly/dnBeFB

In addition, Steve Wyrick was one of the earliest interviews that I did for the reincarnation of the Spirit of Magic Podcast. I think that he was number 6 or 7 in the series of 250+ shows that we have done since. Anyone interested can find it here: http://bit.ly/Wyrick508

[000]

Why call it a 'hit' piece? To (legally) accumulate $54 million of debts with assets of $93 000 seems to me like a stellular achievement.

[Kamal]

Fascinating stuff.

There's a "moral of the story" in there somewhere.

[CraigMitchell]

There's always 2 sides to every story ...

[000]

After Larry the liquidator has deducted his fee there ought be an interesting dividend payment for all the claimants. (% of cents on the $ that is)

[Brad Henderson]

There's always 2 sides to every story ...

In this case, maybe 54 million of them

[Terry]

If the facts of the story are true and these individuals kept sinking millions into a bad show, then they are to blame for their failed "business" decisions.

Again, if the story is true, Wyrick can only be blamed for putting on a bad show.

[Kamal]

Well, as I read it, a lot of the money was blown on non-show expenses (parties, jets etc).

[Terry]

Again, if these investors knew what they were doing, why didn't they have accountants overseeing such a large investment?

[Magic Newswire]

Wyrick hasn't vanished from magic. Watch for the rebroadcast of his episode of American Chopper on the discovery channel and then watch for him to re-appear in magic and on the Magic Newswire soon! http://bit.ly/cbfXTg

[Kevin Connolly]

Here's what I had posted for him.

http://houdinihimself.com/?p=1137

Kevin

[Magic Newswire]

Yeah.. that link was obviously posted everywhere. I posted it days after it first appeared because it was so obviously written as a hit piece. Not an article that I am proud to have shared via the Magic Newswire.

[Kevin Connolly]

That's why I labeled it as a possible hit piece minutes after it was published last week.

[Richard Kaufman]

The article may be extremely derogatory, but it echoes what I've heard from many other people.

I have repeatedly heard that Wyrick's show was the worst on the strip. Only one person told me it was very good, and I was shocked considering who it was (and he'll remain nameless unless he chooses otherwise).

I really heard nothing but awful things about the show over and over again. What I heard was so bad that I never made time to see it when in Vegas. When 50 people tell you that something is stinky, you generally don't go there.

When Wyrick appeared on the cover of MAGIC, people in our industry were genuinely shocked, and not in a good way.

[Magic Newswire]

It had an obvious and intentional slant - hence "Hit Piece" - It wasn't "neutral reporting" in my opinion, plus I have heard things about that writer that push me further in that direction, but I'm don't feel that I am at liberty to comment specifically at this point.

[David Regal]

When I did Celebracadabra a couple of years ago I saw Wyrick's show. By then it had been years since his rough start (which I never saw). I don't know Steve, only met him on the show, but I swear to you the show I saw was great. Not "good" - great. Much better than Big Name shows in Vegas at the time. Did he seem a lot like Copperfield? Yes - but it was a kind of "Copperfield" even Copperfield would not or could not do at that time. So, to my mind, he was doing a better Copperfield than Copperfield. The magic was strong, the stagecraft was clean, and Wyrick's stage demeanor was winning and ingratiating.

I have no reason to doubt people who have reported that the show was bad for a while. But it didn't stay that way. People may have more negative things to report, and as I say I don't know the man, but the show I saw was better than many other illusion shows in Vegas, and it did right by magic.

[Dustin Stinett]

Im going to try and go with the old adage, If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all on this one.

[CraigMitchell]

Whilst I didn't get to see the P/Hollywood version personally ... I received another good report about this version of the show from from someone else well placed in magic - this person saying it was way surpassing Lance across the road.

[Shawn Farquhar]

I saw three versions of the show. The first was Sexy Magic in the tent out back of a hotel in downtown Vegas. The show was terrible and the person sitting next to me fell asleep!

Then I saw the show in the converted room upstairs in Planet Hollywood. The folks next to me, on either side, had received "free" tickets as part of a time share presentation and they said the wanted money for the time they had wasted!

Then I saw the show in the Miracle Mile theatre and have to say it was great. Whatever he did to change worked. In fact I saw that show three times. I won't say it was perfect. Seldom are live shows perfect, but it was engaging, entertaining and yes a lot like the David Copperfield I grew up watching and loved. It was, in my opinion, not as good as Lance but it was still great. I have met the man once for just a brief chat and know nothing about the rest of the story, but give him credit ... over the years he did improve.

[Dustin Stinett]

Ive seen some really good Elvis impersonators in Las Vegas. Of course, the audience is well aware that the material they are seeing is actually someone elses.

[Gary Kosnitzky]

Magic shows are on the decline in Las Vegas.
I like any magic show we can get these days.
It's good for magic and therefore it's good for all of us.

Where is Laraf already?

[Chris Aguilar]

My wife went to Vegas with her family a while back (I couldn't go due to work obligations). They wanted to see a magician and ended up seeing Wyrick. To my surprise (since I had a lot of preconceived notions about the guy and his act), each and every one of them (about 10 people) said they loved his show.

[Terry]

Chris - what do a bunch of laymen know? Apparently more than a good number of know-it-all magicians.

The magic "community" is such a small niche market that continually does it's best to destroy anyone who achieves any kind of success.

[Dustin Stinett]

Terry,

Im curious about something. Hypothetically speaking, lets say that you are a standup comedian working small clubs but doing well. Now, imagine that someone (for exampleonly hypothetically speaking of course [ahem]Robin Williams) pinched one of your jokes and used it on the Letterman show. How would it make you feel if, though several of your colleagues who knew better came to your defense, others called them know-it-alls and accused them of wanting to destroy his success because the general audience enjoyed Robin Williams joke?

Oh and on Mr. Wyrick: No magicians can possibly destroy his success. The simple fact that his show failed proves that there was no success to destroy.

Dustin

[Chris Aguilar]

It seems that Wyrick's show (his more recent one from the looks of it) got fairly good reviews.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/steve-wyrick-re ... -las-vegas

http://www.lvrj.com/neon/7219651.html

http://www.ratelasvegas.com/entertainme ... s/e36.html

[Gary Kosnitzky]

It seems that Wyrick's show (his more recent one from the looks of it) got fairly good reviews.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/steve-wyrick-re ... -las-vegas

http://www.lvrj.com/neon/7219651.html

http://www.ratelasvegas.com/entertainme ... s/e36.html

It boggles my mind why you would list these links and say he got fairly good reviews.

[Chris Aguilar]

It seems that Wyrick's show (his more recent one from the looks of it) got fairly good reviews.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/steve-wyrick-re ... -las-vegas

http://www.lvrj.com/neon/7219651.html

http://www.ratelasvegas.com/entertainme ... s/e36.html

It boggles my mind why you would list these links and say he got fairly good reviews.

I'm boggled that you're boggled. Did you actually read the links? Sure there are a few bad reviews, but an obvious preponderance of of the total reviews are favorable. Not all raves mind you, but at definitely in the plus column.

Interestingly, Wyrick scores better overall reviews on the yelp site than Copperfield. I've never seen Wyrick's show, but I will say that my experience with DC's show about 5-6 years ago mirrored a lot of the less laudatory comments.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/steve-wyrick-re ... -las-vegas
http://www.yelp.com/biz/david-copperfie ... -las-vegas

Am I saying that Wyrick is somehow superior to DC? Probably not. But it does seem obvious that a fair percentage of people out there seemed to enjoy his show and found it a good value.

[Gary Kosnitzky]

Except for Mike Weatherford's review.
All the other 'Anonymous Comments'are not bonafide reviews.

[Terry]

Terry,

Im curious about something. Hypothetically speaking, lets say that you are a standup comedian working small clubs but doing well. Now, imagine that someone (for exampleonly hypothetically speaking of course [ahem]Robin Williams) pinched one of your jokes and used it on the Letterman show. How would it make you feel if, though several of your colleagues who knew better came to your defense, others called them know-it-alls and accused them of wanting to destroy his success because the general audience enjoyed Robin Williams joke?

Oh and on Mr. Wyrick: No magicians can possibly destroy his success. The simple fact that his show failed proves that there was no success to destroy.

Dustin

Dustin,

From what I've read, Copperfield helped Wyrick so his influence would be seen just as anyone is influenced by learning magic from DVDs.

None of us are innocent when it comes to bashing magicians who are working and for some reason, we don't "get" it. Working magicians are there to entertain all people and not just magicians.

I don't get David Blaine's appeal, but that is due more to the demographic he performs to and it is younger than my age group. He has performed some really good stuff on TV, but I don't get the look or performing style. Again, it is aimed for the younger demographic.

In today's economic world, ANY magician working and chasing their dream is a good thing.

What does it say about us as a magic "society" to celebrate when they don't succeed?

[Chris Aguilar]

Except for Mike Weatherford's review.
All the other 'Anonymous Comments'are not bonafide reviews.

[censored].

Yelp, ticketmaster and many other sites are reviews from people who obtained a ticket, saw the show and then spent additional time to share their thoughts. It is a legitimate venue for people to review shows/restaurants/etc.

I might have been as mindlessly dismissive as you if I hadn't heard the good reviews from my own family and had read the online reviews with an open mind.

If you need "bona fides" reviews, can you tell me why you wouldn't accept a review from someone like our own Dave Regal(a professional TV writer/producer and reviewer in Genii) or the decidedly non anonymous Shawn Farquhar?

Should I send you the names of my ten family members who enjoyed the show? Or would you dismiss their opinions of the show because they aren't newspaper or tv reviewer?

Any reasonable person can google reviews online, ask people who have actually seen the show, etc. and it's pretty evident that many people enjoyed the show and found it a good value.

There's a very decent chance that I might have personally not enjoyed Wyrick's show. But it would be very dishonest of me to deny that many people out there certainly did.

[Chris Aguilar]

I would add that, on balance, the Weatherford review (while not a rave) was certainly more positive than negative.

[Dustin Stinett]

Terry,

What makes you believe I am talking just about David Copperfield? (I'm not.) Do a search and you will find my past comments on Mr. Wyrick. I will not rehash them here. Frankly, I've already given this gentleman more of my time than he deserves.

Dustin