Mario Marchese is enamoured with his 3D printer. The multi-talented children’s magician talked about a number of topics in this delightful interview with Herb Sher following a lecture at the Parent Assembly of the Society of American Magicians in New York, but kept returning to the subject of his beloved printer. Marchese seems to see the device as more than a tool to print props, but almost as a physical manifestation of his philosophy:

I restored a 71′ Volkswagen Transporter, like the knobs in the Transporter I 3D printed, because I can! You know that’s what it comes to. When you learn how to make something, you start to understand something, when you understand something, it’s like this peace, the fear just goes away. I always tell kids this at the end of my show. I tell them to grab all the money in the world, put it in their pocket, get the biggest toy, hold on to it, and then I say to them, “look at that toy. It can break, you can lose it, someone can take it away from you, but when you learn how to make something, when you learn something new, no one can take that away from you.”       

“It’s a symbol of more than just 3D printing ,” he continued. “It’s a symbol like everything is temporary.”

Marchese continued to talk about how transient things, and indeed, life can be, and how his show is about capturing the moment. 

“Everything dies,” he adds, cheerfully. 

That sounds dark, but it fits perfectly with the Marchese’s manic, slightly-twisted stage persona. His dialed-up intensity and off-kilter presentation makes for a killer act. Observe: 

Personally, I’d like to be as passionate about anything as Mario Marchese is about his 3D printer.