ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
The Amazing Kreskin has died. The famous magician who dazzled audiences with his mind-reading skills died yesterday in an assisted-living facility in Wayne, New Jersey. He was 89. NPR's Chloe Veltman reports.
CHLOE VELTMAN, BYLINE: The Amazing Kreskin became hugely popular on television in the 1960s and '70s with his many guest appearances on talk shows.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE TONIGHT SHOW STARRING JOHNNY CARSON")
JOHNNY CARSON: The Amazing Kreskin.
(APPLAUSE)
VELTMAN: It was Johnny Carson who gave Kreskin his amazing label. Here's the magician on "The Tonight Show" with Carson in 1974.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE TONIGHT SHOW STARRING JOHNNY CARSON")
GEORGE KRESGE JR: I can't go on an airline. Everybody says, it'd be amazing. How are...
VELTMAN: Kreskin is actually best known for a live stage trick in which he asked audience members to hide his paycheck somewhere in the auditorium while he went outside. And then he'd come back in and find it.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "THE AMAZING KRESKIN")
KRESGE: If I don't find my fee, I don't get paid.
VELTMAN: He described the stunt in front of a live audience in the 2005 documentary, "The Amazing Kreskin." The magician was successful thousands of times during his long career - but not always.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "THE AMAZING KRESKIN")
KRESGE: One time in New Zealand - one of the failures - I lost $51,000.
VELTMAN: George Kresge Jr. was born into a Polish-Sicilian family in 1935 in New Jersey. As a kid, he was inspired to pursue the art of mind reading by Mandrake the Magician. The crime-fighting comic book hero used hypnotic techniques to ensnare his adversaries. Fellow magician and longtime friend Mark Holstein says Kreskin soon became a master at intuiting people's thoughts.
MARK HOLSTEIN: His mentalism was really first-class - the gold standard for this type of performance.
VELTMAN: Kreskin became so well-known for this, Holstein says the media would come to him regularly for predictions.
HOLSTEIN: New Year's Eve was always a really, really busy day for him because every news organization wanted to hear what was going to happen in the coming year.
VELTMAN: Here's Kreskin on New Year's Eve 2010, sharing his predictions with Fox News.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Bottom line, are we going to pull out of this recession next year even more than we have already?
KRESGE: Not especially.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Really?
VELTMAN: Kreskin did occasionally cause upset for getting things wrong. In 2002, he predicted a mass UFO sighting over Las Vegas. Kreskin had pledged to donate $50,000 to charity if the UFOs didn't show. When they didn't, Kreskin refused to pay up. He defended his decision on the "Coast To Coast AM" radio show.
(SOUNDBITE OF RADIO SHOW, "COAST TO COAST AM")
KRESGE: Because of the success of the prediction.
VELTMAN: Kreskin insisted glowing green orbs were indeed spotted in the night sky after the cameras had left the scene.
Chloe Veltman, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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