Philip Morris: Magician, Inventor, Living Legend!

"Few people know that I was born on January 5th, 1935, the same day as Elvis Presley. And when I told that to a dear friend of mine, she told me that I look just like Elvis. When I mention to her that Elvis is dead, she said that was my point exactly!" - Philip Morris 1999

As a youngster in Kalamazoo, Michigan, Philip Morris was fascinated with the various traveling shows which would play the local theaters. Philip recalls that in 1943, when he was about 8 years old, "Blackstone the Magician came to town. He played the theater for seven days, and did three shows a day." The last night of the engagement, Blackstone invited some participants up onto the stage, and Philip bounded up out of his seat to volunteer. At that point, the famous Harry Blackstone stopped the show and announced to the audience that "This young man has been here at every single performance." Although young Philip had already been performing small magic shows in his neighborhood, the thunderous applause of the 1,000 plus fans hooked Philip Morris into show business for life.

MAGICIAN

This early ovation not only produced a lasting effect on young Philip Morris; it also had a lingering effect on Harry Blackstone! "As a small child, I would go to Colon, Michigan and one day I went over to Blackstone's house and knocked on the front door," Philip recounts. "He stuck his head out the window, and said, 'What do you want?' And I said, I'm a magician, and I wanted to say hello." Even though Blackstone had been sound asleep upstairs, he came down and let the young magician inside his home. "He showed me two or three card tricks and then he asked me to show him a couple of magic tricks. . . which were just terrible," Philip recalls with laughter. "Just absolutely terrible, but he said they were great." Philip told the elder Magician about his plans for the future and Blackstone offered some pointers. "I think that experience stayed with me over the years," states Philip who practiced hard and became an accomplished magician in his own right.

In the 1940's, Harry Blackstone Sr. was one of the most famous magicians in the world. Born Henry Boughton on September 27, 1885, he had established himself as a world-class magician by the age of twenty-two, with his own two-hour traveling road show. A flamboyant performer, Blackstone Sr. was known for working with very strenuous illusions in the early part of his career. As the years passed, he became associated with signature illusions such as The Buzz Saw Illusion, The Floating Light Bulb, and The Dancing Handkerchief. Blackstone Sr. passed away on November 16, 1965, and his outstanding theatrical tradition carried on through the performances of his son, Harry Blackstone, Jr. until he passed away on May 14, 1997.

Another element which shaped the fertile mind of Philip Morris, involved things of a 'spookier' nature. "I was always fascinated by the Ghost and Horror Shows that would come through town, and at the age of 15 years or so, I decided I was going to do a ghost show." On Halloween night in 1950, Philip booked the high school auditorium and did just that. With money he had saved and props he had collected, Philip Morris headlined his first ghost show, The Dungeon of Death, in a local high school auditorium. Philip had posters printed, rented the auditorium, and hitchhiked around town to distribute posters.

This first performance was so successful, that 2 months later Philip was able to book a large theater for his second venue! "I decided, that's what I wanted to do!" recalls Philip, who continued doing Ghost Shows for the next 27 years.

In the 1930's, a popular form of haunting stage performances started touring the United States. Known as Ghost or Horror Shows, these sometimes gruesome performances were little more than standard magic shows, in a new, more interactive package. They normally started out with a lecture on the spirit world, followed by a fast paced magical routine, slanted toward bloody dismembering illusions. The grand finale was the "Black Out," during which, each and every light in the auditorium was turned out. Much of the experience during this part of the show was in the person's imagination, helped along by nearby patrons and a few glow in the dark effects from the stage. When the lights were brought back up, a "B" horror film was started to settle the crowd. As newer, smaller movie theaters were built without stages, the Ghost Show died a slow death. Philip Morris performed his last Ghost Show on New Year's Eve in 1977.

Philip left Kalamazoo right after graduating high school in 1952 and took his act on the road with Lash Laroo, a famous cowboy movie star. "Lash and I just hit it off," Philip recalls, "and he invited me to go with him to the Michigan State Fair in Detroit." During the next year, Philip toured with the Lash Laroo Western Show, and was making enough money that he decided to send for Amy Strong, to join him on the road.

These high school sweethearts were married that same year, when Philip was only 18 years old. The last stop on the tour before Lash was due back in Hollywood for the filming of a motion picture, was a show in Charlotte, North Carolina. Philip and Amy were planning to go along to California when a theatrical agent offered Philip, now 19, a booking as a magician for what was to be about two weeks worth of work. Philip had planned to catch up with Lash after the engagement, but he never made it to the West Coast. Today, 45 years later, he still makes Charlotte his home.

Using Charlotte as a home base, Philip spent a great deal of time on the road in the early 1960's touring the United States and Canada with 'Dr. Evil's Terrors of the Unknown.' During the school months, Amy stayed at home raising the children, daughters Terry and Sandra and son Scott. During the summer, the whole family went on the road together. While Philip's daughters were part of the stage act, Scott preferred the business end of the endeavor and ran the concession stand. Now 40 years old, Scott remembers fondly that Philip always negotiated free soft drinks and popcorn for his children into the contract with the theaters he played. "When I was about 13 years old, we were touring the Ghost Show in Canada, and when we showed up at one theater, the manager had not passed out the flyers that dad had sent him to promote the show." Scott recalls, "So dad puts on the gorilla suits and he and I set off on foot handing out the flyers. I guess someone complained, because we were stopped by a Canadian Mounty, who insisted that dad take off the costume, and dad refuses! It was a publicity stunt for us, but they were serious! So they load us into a police car and take us downtown. They eventually let us go, but the press coverage we got of the arrest, sold out the 2000 seat theater we were playing."