Author Spotlight
Libby Marsh
Junior Addy Sullivan spreads two full decks of cards on the lunch table for her friends, juniors Sophia Brockmeier and Catherine Beltrame. Catherine draws a card from one deck, then holds hands with Sophia. Catherine “telepathically” tells Sophia what card she picked, and Sophia then draws a card from the second deck.
Addy asks various questions about the card like, ‘What suit is the card?’ ‘Is it red or black?’ Then the two reveal their cards. And somehow, they’re identical.
“I’m really impressed all the time,” Catherine said. “I don’t know how she does it, and she has a good presentation with it as well. She really makes up the whole vibe of the trick.”
This deception is just one of the endless magic tricks Addy has created on her own with her method she calls “Occultist.”
Addy gained experience performing in front of her peers beginning in middle school and after mastering the art of card tricks, she has made it past the first three rounds of auditioning for America’s Got Talent.
She sent in her first audition tape in early January and has since crafted an act for the show, had a call with the producers and sent in a final audition tape. She finds out if she’s going to Hollywood on March 11.
Addy grew up watching AGT with her family and when she realized auditions were coming up in January, she decided to try out — as a joke at first. But after making it past the first round of auditions she began to take it seriously and realized she had a shot at going on the show.
Going on AGT will also give Addy the chance to spread the art of magic. At the end of each of her tricks, either her family or friends are astonished. What they initially think is a silly joke or a simple sleight-of-hand appears to be true magic.
“That’s why I love it,” Addy said. “If I can give someone the chance to believe in magic, that magic just might be real, then I’ve done my part. I guess that’s also another reason why I’m going on AGT too, is really just to help people, possibly, maybe just believe that there’s just a sliver of magic out there.”
Her first time learning magic tricks was in 2020 when her older brother Finn gave her a magic set, including a deck of cards. During the COVID-19 quarantine, with nothing better to do, Addy began to learn magic and started watching YouTube videos to learn more tricks.
Coming back to school in-person her eighth grade year, she performed magic tricks for her peers during lunch, bringing people together and making them happy through her talent, according to Addy. This year, following the district-wide phone ban, Addy has started performing tricks in class more, carrying a pack of cards in her backpack at all times.
“Magic, it’s kind of like music,” Addy said. “It almost brings people together. I just wanted to make people happy while doing it.”
While Addy has the option of using a gimmicked coin or a gaffed deck of cards for a trick, she prefers using a regular deck of cards, relying on her mastered sleight of hand to pull off her tricks, as well as psychology. Addy uses psychology to figure out what card someone has drawn or to convince a spectator to draw a specific card from the deck.
“You want everything to be inspectable after so they can really be like ‘oh my gosh, I have a connection with this person,’” Addy said. “It’s a lot of psychology, actually, believe it or not, when it comes to magic. I’ve created a method that is so devious, almost.”
After a couple of years learning tricks online, Addy began to use her knowledge of magic to create her own tricks. Taking inspiration from magic shows like Penn and Teller, she developed her own tricks from the ones she saw and built off of them. Addy is constantly thinking of magic and coming up with new tricks.
“My main thought is always like, ‘If someone were to do a magic trick on me, what would I think is really cool?’” Addy said.
After passing the first round of AGT auditions in late January, Addy started coming up with two or three new tricks every day.
“She’s not in her room all that often, but when she’s in her room alone and she doesn’t want to be bothered, that’s when [her brother] Ryp and I are like ‘let her cook, let her cook,’” Addy’s mom Lindsay said.
After spending hours mastering a new trick, Addy will go to perform for her “test group” — her parents and younger brother, Ryp. She performs the trick, careful not to spoil it, and immediately after, Lindsay tells her to ‘do it again.’ Addy works to perfect her tricks and ensure everyone is surprised at the end, but according to Lindsay, her test tricks for her family never fail.
“It’s such a hard art form and at its very core it’s meant to be a silly joke, but I really want the world — and I guess that this is also what I’m going on AGT — to take magic seriously and respect the art,” Addy said.
Leave a Reply