Anecdotes

Famous for his astounding ability to throw playing cards, and is listed in the Guiness Book of World Records for throwing a playing card a hundred and ninety feet at ninety miles an hour. From ten paces he can throw a playing card into the flesh of a watermelon.

Ricky Jay had a consulting firm (together with Michael Weber) called 'Deceptive Practices' that advised movie, TV, and theater directors on various illusions, magic secrets, and con artistry techniques that may be needed during their productions. Their services were used for example by director Christopher McQuarrie on Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015). McQuarrie wrote after Jay's death: "I was blessed to have the legendary Ricky Jay as a consultant on Rogue Nation. An off-handed comment he made inspired the climax of the opera sequence. It's safe to say it would not be the same scene without him. He was the greatest of a vanishing breed." [Nov.25, 2018].

Stephen Fry wrote after Jay's death: "He had the chops alright. Saw him and his '52 Assistants' (in an air conditioned tent to keep his fingertips dry) and was blown away. Impossible feats. His book "Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women" a masterpiece" [Nov.25, 2018].

He is noted as one of magic's expert card technicians. He was the curator of the Mulholland Library of Conjuring and the Allied Arts.

Jay was the grandson of Max Katz, a Brooklyn-based accountant and amateur magician who, as the head of a magician's society called the Knights of Magic, introduced his grandson to the world of deception and misdirection.

Director David Mamet cast him in 7 of his feature films.

Jay also employed his encyclopedic knowledge of illusion and con artistry to write several acclaimed books about the history of magic, and as a sideline, worked as a consultant to film studios on matters of deception and illusion.

In 2005, the Christine Burgin Gallery in Manhattan hosted an exhibit of his "extensive collection of material related to the history of deception" - particularly his collection of 'spirit' photographs. In conjunction with the exhibit at the Burgin Gallery, he also gave a talk at the Metropolitan Museum of Art called "Sleight and Shadow.".

Serious scholar of unusual performances and the author of 'Learned Pigs & Fireproof Women' which chronicles the bizarre performers found in circuses, sideshows, and other odd places - a copy of which appears prominently amongst Stanley's volumes on a table in Magnolia (1999). Also the author of 'Extraordinary Exhibitions', 'Dice: Deception, Fate & Rotten Luck', 'Jay's Journal of Anomalies', and 'Cards as Weapons'.

Sleight of hand expert.

Son of Shirley (Katz) and Samuel Potash. His grandparents were all Jewish emigrants, from Russia on his father's side and Poland/Austria on his mother's.