Websters Dictionary lists the definition of MAGI as, "A Persian Priest or wise man, another definition is sorcerer, or related to magic. Cesareo Pelaez was born Oct 16th, 1932, he was destined to be a magi from the start. He would fulfill that definition being a wiseman, sorcerer, the kind related to our magic.
Cesareo was certainly many things to many people: teacher, professor, instructor, coach, director, mentor, friend, magician, and magi. I'm sure he was other things as well. He was leader of sorts to a 'rag tag' group of individuals who got together in the late 1970s to pool their resources to buy a theater. What? Yes you read that right, buy a theater! And again, whether they realized it or not, their next endeavor would be working creating, building and then performing in a magic show, a theatrical magic show, a must-cast magic show unlike anything that has been on the stage for 50 years. If you are a newbie to the world of magic, the theater that was purchased was The Cabot St. Cinema Theatre, the show they created was Le Grand David and his own Spectacular Magic Company. In time they would purchase a second theater, The Larcom Theater, and produce a second completely different show, Le Grand David in Concert. And though the show was his idea, he wasn't even the STAR, he turned that over to David Bull, who would be Le Grand David. Cesareo chose the stage name, Marco the Magi.
Oh, and in case you're wondering, this show of theirs continued for 36 years, up until the year when Cesareo passed. He died before the Season was over. But the company chose to finish out the season in tribute to their leader and friend.
It takes a special person not only to come up with such things, but to motivate others, outsiders, to pick up that dream as well and run with it. That was Cesareo.
He was one of two people I met in the world of magic that had a life-changing affect on me. And oddly, it wasn't so much the magic that had anything to do with the life change. It was just something he said to me that seemed to clear out the fog and cobwebs of confusion. I know if it wasn't for Cesareo, there would be no blog today. Without his encouragement, I wouldn't have started painting again. At least not as soon as I did. Without his encouragement, I wouldn't have begun to write.
So today I say, Happy Birthday to my friend who left us back in 2012.
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