Surrey-based magician Billy Hsueh impressed American magic duo Penn & Teller on their Fool Us TV show, but ultimately didn't fool them.
Pre-recorded on stage in Las Vegas, he entertained with a bartending trick where he turned water into wine and also one fruity martini using a "special" tea pot made in Taiwan, where Hsueh was born.
Show host Brooke Burke was his customer for the so-called ImpossiBilly-ty trick, which expanded on Charles Hoffman's "Think-a-Drink" vaudeville act from a century ago.
Afterward, Penn Jillette says he wasn't fooled by Hsueh's magic, denying him the chance to perform with the duo in Vegas.
"You know, Billy, I don't particularly like Think-a-Drink as a trick, but I love your version," Jillette raved on his CW Network show. "It's really, really nice. You have so much personality and you're so funny all the way through, and you absolutely delivered on your promise.
"We believed that Brooke really tasted alcohol, really tasted the drinks," Jillette added. "And you really did, in a certain sense, turn water into wine.… But we think we did follow your innovations, as brilliant as they are. We think we had a pretty good idea how that was being done. I loved this routine, and you're a wonderful performer. But in this case, I don't think you fooled us."
Video of Hsueh's nine-minute performance on Fool Us was posted on his Youtube channel on Friday, April 4, the night he was performing card tricks at the Flapper Lounge in New Westminster.
A longtime Surrey resident, Hsueh (pronounced Shway) has performed internationally over the past 18 years.
In mid-July, Hsueh will be off to Italy to represent Canada at the FISM World Championships of Magic, considered the “Olympics of Magic.”
He co-founded the Cabaret of Wonders, staged monthly on the fourth Tuesday at the Hidden Wonders Speakeasy theatre, located behind a fake storefront in New Westminster.
Also, Hsueh is a past-president of The International Brotherhood of Magicians, a 15,000-member organization founded in 1922.
