Chris and Ryan: The magic life

For magicians Ryan Makowski and Chris Zubrick, life as an on-stage duo began with a double-booking. Years ago, the two then solo performers both appeared for a show at Michigan State University after campus staff unknowingly hired two magic acts for the same night. Yet rather than squabble over the limelight, the two hastily put together a two-man act and took to the stage.

“And the rest is history,” Zubrick said in an interview Tuesday, reclining in his seat beside Makowski at the Hyatt Hotel’s Sandcastle Dinner Theatre, where they now entertain crowds each week.

Raised in Michigan, Zubrick and Makowski each had magical childhoods of a sort. Ryan took to doing magic tricks at age 6 with a kit full of props and a regular captive audience at family reunions and get-togethers.

“The props just kept getting bigger and bigger,” said Makowski. “And I started to get better at it.”

By age 10, Makowski was doing paid magic acts at birthday parties and a year later, after submitting a home video for a contest, the Kellogg’s corporation invited him to perform in a Las Vegas competition as one of America’s top five “most magical kids.” Makowski saw his skills develop further in his high school years and, indeed, the props got bigger. He conjured a tiger on the stage at his high school graduation.

Zubrick came to magic in much the same way. Starting with the tricks he learned off of cereal boxes, he soon began honing his skills at home.

“For me, it just stuck and I never got out of it,” he said.

Spellbound by a magician he had seen able to make white doves seemingly appear and disappear, Zubrick at age 7 begged his parents for one of his own birds so he could practice the act himself, only to raise more than a dozen doves later in his house as his talents flourished and the scale of his dove performance grew. After high school, Zubrick found work at an amusement park in Japan, entertaining his first international crowds with classic magic tricks.

“Magic crosses barriers,” he said. “It’s what I love about it.”

Makowski echoed those sentiments.

“When you’re entertaining children, you see that sense of wonder on their faces,” he said. “For adults, you can see it takes them back to their childhoods.”

Chris and Ryan began performing on Saipan last year, playing to tourists and locals under the multicolored lights of the Sandcastle’s stage. Complete with elaborate dance numbers—the magicians had some coaching, they confessed—and special effects, the show is as visually dazzling as its tricks are tough to decipher.

While classics like the dove act, levitation and sleight of hand are all key to the show, the two are now crafting some new additions to their performance. After receiving a letter from a local girl who said she has never seen snow, for example, the two began developing a performance designed to “make that girl’s dream come true,” Makowski said, by creating an indoor snowstorm from only a crumpled paper snowflake. Taking a new twist on sawing a woman in half, the two are also experimenting with a plan to have themselves “cut” in half. So how are the tricks done?

“Very well,” said Zubrick, smiling coyly. “Okay, can you keep a secret? Well, so can I.”