The First Humanoid Robot Magician on the Las Vegas Strip
As the world debates whether robots will replace human workers, a magician in Las Vegas has already cast one in his show
As the world debates whether robots will replace human workers, a magician in Las Vegas has already cast one in his show.
HACKED, a new technology magic and mentalism experience opening mid-July at Ivan Kane's Forty Deuce inside Mandalay Bay, will feature what is believed to be the first humanoid robot to perform as a magician on the Las Vegas Strip. He will not assist. He will not stand in the background. He will share the stage as an equal.
His name is Navitron. Alongside British technology magician Keelan Leyser, he will walk out in front of a live audience and perform. Together.
HACKED is Leyser's creation -- three years in the making, built around the questions that define this generation. Can you trust what you see? Would you know if a deepfake was sitting right in front of you? When did your phone become more important than the person next to you? Where is all this technology actually taking us? Can technology predict your future? And what happens when a robot learns your job faster than you did?
In HACKED, all of those questions get answered. Live. Through mind reading, illusion, and a little bit of magic.
The show is a three-way performance -- funny, surprising, and built to be impossible to forget. Leyser is joined on stage by Navitron and by L.I.L.A. -- an intelligent A.I. character with her own voice and personality who responds to what is happening in the room in real time. She watches. She listens. She talks back. The three of them operate as a team, and no two performances will be identical.
What Las Vegas has never seen before is this: a human performer, a humanoid robot, and a live A.I. character sharing a stage with genuine presence, genuine timing, and genuine impossibility.
The show runs approximately 70 minutes at Forty Deuce, the iconic room created by Ivan Kane inside Mandalay Bay. For HACKED, the venue operates as the LAZER CORP showroom -- a fictional 1980s technology corporation with one stated mission: to change your perception of reality. HACKED is all ages and family friendly. If Black Mirror, Mr. Robot, and The Matrix built an illusion show, this would be it.
HACKED opens alongside the US release of Leyser's new book. Unseen: Blind Spots and Why We Miss What Matters Most, co-written with neuropsychologist Dr. David Lewis and published by Bloomsbury Sigma, explores the psychology of blind spots and why we fail to see what is right in front of us -- the same territory the show puts on stage. It publishes in America on June 16th.
In a world full of technology, is there still a place for magic? I say yes. The thrill for magicians today is to make magic surpass our current technological reality. But what HACKED ultimately celebrates is the feeling an audience gets when they witness the skill, the practice, the years of craft, the vulnerability, and the electricity of a human performer standing live in front of them.
About Keelan Leyser
Keelan Leyser is a British-born magician, mentalist, and digital illusionist, and one of the world's leading pioneers of technology magic. Inspired to become a magician at the age of four after watching Lance Burton perform in Las Vegas, he went on to become British Magical Grand Prix Champion and British Champion of General Magic.
He has appeared on over 100 television shows across more than 60 countries, starred in his own BBC1 documentary, and delivered his keynote "Reimagine the Impossible" for Microsoft, Intel, Google, and BP. He has performed for King Charles and the royal families of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.
Now based in Las Vegas, Keelan brings nearly three decades of mind-bending innovation into his most ambitious creation yet: HACKED.
Leyser is also the co-author of Unseen: Blind Spots and Why We Miss What Matters Most, published by Bloomsbury Sigma. Available now in the UK and in the US from June 16th.
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