Bayside magician dispenses best medicine

They say that laughter is the best medicine. If that is true, then Bayside-based magician Michael Raccuia is a one-man medical breakthrough.
Raccuia, who books himself as well as other performers, bands and DJs through his company, Magic Touch Entertainment (www.magictouchent.com) has been practicing the art since he was 16-years-old.
“Magic Mike” as he bills himself feels “blessed” when he gets a chance to donate his services for sick kids, as he did recently, giving a free show at Schneider Children’s Hospital in New Hyde Park.
“Kids are so pure,” Raccuia said, with a trace of Brooklyn in his voice that time has not made disappear. “Watching the wonder in their faces is the best part.”
He has signed on to do shows in February and again in March at the facility on the campus of Long Island Jewish Hospital, on Lakeville Road.
“It’s so easy for me,” he said, explaining that “Bayside is an ideal neighborhood - convenient to everywhere, except maybe south Jersey.” Before moving to Queens six years ago, had lived in Staten Island, which was convenient to Atlantic City, “but almost no place else.”
Raccuia kept up a steady stream of patter during the nearly two-hour lunchtime performance for a handful of very young patients in the third-floor day room, employing all the classic techniques of misdirection and distraction to keep his youthful audience captivated and amazed.
Of course, there’s the occasional zinger in the monologue for the entertainment of the grown-ups (“This is one I call the ‘Mother-in-Law Trick’ because it uses an old bag”) but the repartee was consistently light-hearted and innocent.
Pam Carlton, a music therapist and special events coordinator at Parker is very high on Raccuia’s performance. “We schedule special events to try to normalize the environment for children who may have never had an extended hospitalization,” she said, admitting that the magic show made things happen that weren’t exactly normal.
As the show progressed, the kids lost awareness of the hospital garb, the bracelets and even the tubes some of them were wearing - even the quietest among them started getting into the show.
Raccuia kept them engaged, by continually calling for one or more volunteers to “assist” him, as he plied the tricks of the trade, including the “force” where the volunteer picks a card - which just happens to be the exact card the magician wants them to pick, or the “switch” which is usually done at the exact moment a disarming comment is made.
“So, (to a girl) you say you’re five years old… are you married?”
And so it went, with the kids getting swept up in the magic of the moment, as Raccuia performed his sleight-of-hand and “gimmicks” tantalizingly close to the audience, yet never giving himself away.
Even when he agreed to “show the secret” of a certain trick, after swearing-in the kids as magician’s assistants, so as not to violate the Magician’s Oath, Raccuia had a trick up his sleeve.
After revealing to his assistants how he used a plastic egg with a hole in it to contain a silk handkerchief he made “disappear,” he carefully peeled off the “hole” and then broke a very real egg into a glass - leaving the kids who were standing just inches away astounded.
As he wrapped up his performance, and before he packed up his wands, cards and paper flowers, Raccuia thanked his audience for the chance to entertain them and pulled his final “switch.”
“Thanks for having me. If you enjoyed the show, tell your friends you saw Magic Mike and if you didn’t enjoy it, tell them you saw David Copperfield.”