You will never see magician Tony Venetico saw a woman in half.
“Or putting her in box and making her disappear. Stage magic is great, but it’s not for me,” the South Elgin resident said. “Most of my shows are small audiences … I can be doing really close up magic in their face with a deck of cards.
“When you’re far you can’t really see the trap door or curtain or things like that. But when people are doing magic right in in their face — which is my favorite kind of magic — to me that causes the impossibility and wonder that really kind of makes adults be kids again in many ways,” Venetico said. “Which is why adults are my favorite audience to perform for.”
After two sold-out performances there in 2017, Venetico returns to Vero Voce Theatre in St. Charles for three shows Feb. 2-4. Performances are at 7 p.m. Feb. 2-3 and at 1 p.m. Feb. 4. At press time, the Feb. 3 show was sold out. All three shows are rated PG-13.
“It’s geared to be an adults-only type of show. We’re calling it PG-13. Not that it’s necessarily going to be completely inappropriate, but when you have adults in the room you can be a little more risque with some of the content,” Venetico said. “It’s definitely not a children’s show, or a family show.
“Because it’s all adults, we will be doing magic, we’ll also be venturing into mentalism and mind-reading,” he said. “When you have adults in the room we can hopefully be injecting other thoughts hopefully into other people, or being able to read what other people are thinking and be able to have a really great time with that.”
While Venetico was interested in magic at a young age — collecting books and DVDs and learning the secrets — it’s only been the last three years that he’s been actively performing.
“I’m fairly new, but I’ve also been very fortunate to have my business explode where I work several weekends a month doing private parties,” he said.
An assistant middle school principal in Winnetka, Venetico performs for private and corporate parties and events on the weekends. For the last two years, he has also volunteered with Open Heart Magic, a not-for-profit organization that brings magic to hospitalized children.
At Venetico’s previous shows at Vero Voce, he collected donations for Open Heart Magic and sold tickets for their spring raffle.
“We made over $1,000 that we were able to donate to Open Heart Magic for all the hospitals they serve,” he said.
Venetico, who volunteers his time at Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, plans to do the same at these three shows.
“We’re hoping we can have a successful three-night run, but also make some money to help change some children’s lives in the process,” he said.
The three shows at Vero Voce will be completely different from those he performed there in 2017, and will include a variety of prediction effects and card tricks, he said.
“It’s very audience-participating. So there’s very few tricks that I’m down there by myself. There’s audience members coming down for almost all of them,” Venetico said. “We’re going to have an animal for one of the tricks, without giving too much away. It’s going to be a very fun night.”
Kathy Cichon is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
The Magic of Tony Venetico
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When: Feb. 2-4
Where: Vero Voce Theatre, 951 State Ave., Suite F, St. Charles
Tickets: $15 adults; $12 students/seniors
Information: 630-584-0139; www.verovoce.com