The Magic Palace was a Canadian television series, produced and hosted by Dale Harney, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, which was an inspiration for a generation of magicians. In an age before YouTube and the Internet, the show gave viewers a broad sampling of magic acts from North America and Europe in an unprecedented scale.
Almost lost to history, it is now one of the most important collections of magic performances. Magicana is delighted to share this material and, perhaps, inspire another generation of magicians all over again.
Message from Dale Harney
After over three decades, it’s a privilege to be able to welcome people back to The Magic Palace. My heartfelt thanks to Magicana, David Ben, Julie Eng and the Slaight Family Foundation for their vision and technological wizardry which has given these superb performances a new place in the spotlight. The magic is truly timeless. For those who are taking a trip down memory lane, welcome back. To those who are tuning in for the first time, I think you’re in for a real treat.
—Dale Harney, 2016
Message from Magicana
This exhibition is an ongoing and continually-evolving project and we welcome your support in continuing to improve it as a resource. A comprehensive list of episodes and performers does not exist (as far as we know at least) and we are on the lookout for episodes we do not have. The video we do have is of varying quality, so if you have a cleaner version, we would welcome it for the archive. We are also searching for background information on the tricks performed by the performers and where and when they may have been published so that we can add this data to the exhibition. If you have this information, and would like to share it with us, please contact us
here.
There is a treasure trove of magic to be found and of fond memories to be rediscovered, so now it's time for you to enter The Magic Palace.
—David Ben, Artistic Director
