From the Archives: Oz Pearlman

Given Oz Pearlman’s recent notoriety, I figured it might be fun to dig into the archives and see what I’d written about him on my old site. This was back in the early 2000s, when he was mainly known as Penguin’s product demonstrator. And apparently I’d just seen him in a live NYC show—an event I have absolutely zero memory of.

I wrote:

I don't know how anyone could imagine that having Oz Pearlman demonstrate a trick is a good marketing strategy. What am I missing? Am I the only one in the world who thinks that guy is a total tool? I used to think he was in on the joke; that he knew how lame some of those tricks are and he knew how lame his performance was. But then I saw his "magic" "show" at a "theater" here in New York City, and I realized he's just really a shitty performer. He has some technical skills, but those are offset by a miserable sense of showmanship and stage presence. Oz, get a director, and get a fucking writer too. If you have $35 dollars to blow in the city, I urge you to check out his show. It's such a grim deal. It's like watching Faces of Death and you're seeing a monkey get his head bashed in with a hammer and you're thinking to yourself, "How can I find something so repellent and fascinating at the same time?" In an art-form that many people already consider to be meaningless, an Oz Pearlman show has to be the most meaningless facet of magic on the planet. Remind me not to go to shows that cost $35 and starts at 5 in the afternoon.

So if you’re thinking, “People only trash Oz now because he’s wildly successful,” please note: I was two decades ahead of the curve. I thought he was garbage when he was a nobody. And yes, the critique I made recently is the same one I made back then too. He needs a writer.

Other than that, I mostly just mentioned him in passing on the site.

I suggested his name was confusing. “Oz” already has a magical connotation: Wizard of. And that’s pronounced Ahz. Him making people pronounce his name Ohs was going to be nothing but headaches for him. I suggested he use a different pronunciation entirely: Ooze. As in, “There’s some ooze coming out of my anal pustule.” Looking at him, that felt like the one people would naturally gravitate toward.

Another time, I wondered what was going on with his mouth in this demo and said, “He's talking funny, right? Not funny like what he's saying is amusing, lord no. But funny like, oh I don't know, like he had a zit on his lip and somebody popped it with a baseball bat.”

Or when there was controversy about Oz stealing this Dave Harkey effect where someone runs their finger along a straw and Oz makes it melt where they stop. I came to Oz’s defense and said, “I truly believe that Oz really did invent this trick independently. I've heard that in order to generate realistic expectations, he often creates tricks where women must stroke something that's .5 cm in diameter.”

Now, you might say, “Who’s the joke really on here, Andy? Oz is on 60 Minutes, and you’re still talking shit about him on a blog.”

Look, I’m doing exactly what I want to be doing. Oh, “Oz was on 60 Minutes”? Big deal. So was I. For decades. You don’t recognize my style? A guy named Andy? With a lot of opinions?