For his next trick, this Charlotte area magician will beguile the home crowd

Since mid-November, Blumenthal Art’s Blume Studios has hosted a mesmerizing world of magic, where a range of local and regional performers entertain crowds at the North American premiere of The Magicians Table.

Originated in London’s West End, The Magicians Table is a speakeasy-style magic experience, where dressed-up guests sip on craft cocktails as they watch seasoned illusionists perform, close-up, at intimate tables. The show began Nov. 19 and was recently extended through Feb. 15, 2026.

The show’s theme revolves around the wake of the recently departed Dieter Roterburg, a renowned carnival owner. The audience doubles as the dearly beloved guests, gathered to pay respects as they watch a cast of Roterburg’s favorite magicians read minds and perform gasp-worthy tricks.

“There’s a good mix of mentalism and magic at the table,” said Jason “Doc” Docherty. The 49-year-old Lincolnton native has made a 25-year career of magic, including performances at the iconic Magic Castle in Los Angeles. For decades, he has practiced magic for private parties and big-name clients, from Carowinds to the Charlotte Hornets.

“Personally, I love card magic, so I do some card tricks,” he said. “It’s not a ‘pick-a-card’ trick. Rather, it’s really more about moving cards from one place to another, and it’s very, very magical.”

The magic begins

Docherty’s infatuation with magic sparked at age 9, when he received a magic set as a gift.

“My mom and dad came back from a trip, and brought me an Addams magic set,” he said “It had 10 or 12 tricks in it, plus a book that had about 50 more that you could do at home.”

Docherty pointed to classic tricks, like the ball and vase, plastic cups and balls, and a printer that would roll out a bill. Around that time, he also encountered his first up-close magician at a circus traveling through Lincolnton.

“I was probably 10 years old, and I remember going into this separate area, where a magician had a crowd drawn,” he said. “He had his sleeves rolled up, and he took a cigarette and put it in his hand. It was lit. He made a fist and put it in the side of his fist and blew on his hands. And that cigarette was gone.”

The trick mesmerized the young Docherty.

“That trick further confused me, and I thought, ‘There’s got to be something to this.’ ” After that, whenever he would join his traveling salesman dad on business trips, he would stop in LaRock’s Fun and Magic Outlet, a staple in the Charlotte area.

“Any time we traveled anywhere, the first thing I would do is flip through the yellow pages to see if there was a magic store in the town,” Docherty said.

Starting out at Carowinds

Docherty’s first big break came one summer when Carowinds hired him to perform tricks in an open-air theater called Troubadour’s Roost. He was just 17, and he worked alongside another magician.

“Usually, we had a pretty good crowd, because the summers were hot, and it was a good place to come and relax in a rocking chair,” he said. “We would do our own announcements over the PA system backstage to tell people that the Marvelous Magical Mayhem Show would begin in 15 minutes.”

He performed five- and 10-minute sets of general magic, like rope tricks and making a dollar bill travel from one side of the room to the other. “It was just your basic stuff,” he said.

“I was learning at the time, and it was prior to when I really got into heavy sleight of hand.”

Docherty also performed a trick where he stole someone’s watch; then, of course, he gave it back. One time when he performed the trick on a young boy, it fell flat.

“He was about to walk away and had turned around, and I said, By the way, here’s your watch back,” Docherty said. “It freaked him out really bad. The kid started crying. That was my first lesson in how magic affects people.”

He never performed that trick again.

Finding magical inspiration from the best

For Docherty, David Copperfield’s 1990s television specials were always appointment viewing.

“I would also record Harry Anderson on ‘Saturday Night Live,’ and ‘The World’s Greatest Magic,’ which came on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving,” he said. “It was just awesome.”

When he was 18, around Christmas, he received a package in the mail that included a new book published by Paul Gertner, one of the top close-up magicians in the country. “It explained every piece of magic that he had come up with,” Docherty said. “I still have the book to this day.

It’s inscribed, ‘Your uncle watched me practice all these tricks in high school.’ That was intense.”

Docherty’s uncle went to school with Gertner, and eventually, that connection led to Gertner inviting Docherty to his Pennsylvania home.

“I got in the car, drove all by myself to Pittsburgh, and he took me out to lunch,” Docherty said. “We went back to his house, and he performed all the tricks that I’ve seen him perform on his videos and on Johnny Carson.”

Gertner spent nearly four hours with the young Docherty, sharing anything he could about close-up magic.

“I’ll never forget that,” Docherty said. “It was just amazing to see, and that was the point that I knew that there’s another world that I didn’t know existed in this world of magic, and that was it.”

Magic as a career

After the Carowinds experience, Docherty got curious about radio.

In 1995, he attended broadcasting school and eventually landed radio gigs as a board operator, live producer, and DJ for a range of stations, including 1110 WBT, 106.5 The End and Magic 96.1.

He moved to Myrtle Beach to work for a rock station for a year. All along, he practiced magic whenever he could, for small groups, at comedy clubs, and even busking on the streets.

By the 2000s, he had taken the jump into full-time magic a couple of times. But he also got married and had two children, so family demands kept those pursuits at bay for a while. He spent a lot of time street performing in Asheville, where his friend Craig Stone made a lasting impact on him.

“He told me that it was OK to be myself. He reminded me that I’m not getting paid for this and I don’t have anybody to report to, so just to go out there and create my own alter-ego, my own character,” Docherty said. “That really got me out of my shell.”

In 2019, his hard work culminated in an invitation to perform the following year at the Magic Castle, Los Angeles’s famed magic venue and home to the Academy of Magical Arts. The exclusive venue operates largely on an invitation-only basis and often hosts Hollywood celebrities.

Docherty performed at the venue in 2020, just before COVID shut down performance venues. From his greatest professional high, he hopped on a plane for home. Since then, he’s been back four times.

Today, in addition to performing, he also owns the Asheville Magic Company, which produces ticketed shows in town. “A dream of mine would be to own a magic venue one day, and have a destination where people can come to see magic and have a good time.”

As for The Magicians Table, Docherty encourages even the hesitant to give it a try.

“This is not birthday party magic. It’s not your uncle doing magic tricks. These are real professionals that take magic very seriously,” he said. “It’s an immersive experience from the get-go with so many different types of performers, and also very cool and engaging characters on stage that make it a really fabulous evening.”

Want to go

“The Magicians Table” is open now through Feb. 15 at Stage 2 of Blume Studio, 904 Post St., Charlotte.

Tickets start at $79.99.; go to blumenthalarts.org/magicianstable.

More arts coverage

Want to see more stories like this? Sign up here for our free, award-winning “Inside Charlotte Arts” newsletter: charlotteobserver.com/newsletters. You can join our Facebook group, “Inside Charlotte Arts,” by going here: facebook.com/groups/insidecharlottearts. And all of our 2025-26 Fall Arts Guide story can be found here: charlotteobserver.com/topics/charlotte-fall-arts-guide.