Jon Tai

12/20/2024

It’s a tax write off.

08/31/2024

Thanks for being my scene partner Chicago.
See you two more times.

08/21/2024

07/27/2024

Just about three and a half years ago, I took a leap into the unknown and reached out to a theater in Chicago to say hello. The folks at the theater took a leap into the unknown and said hello back. And so began the “Missed Connections” journey, a virtual play with magic presented over Zoom during the heart of the pandemic.

Today I walked into their physical space. And a new journey begins.

I am so excited to share this story with you.

“Road Signs”
Co-created and Directed by
Aug. 4-31

Tickets on sale now.
Link, as ever, in bio.

07/20/2024

5 years (and change) later.

On March 7th, 2019, Joe Wyman Brown shot my first tintype. We were strangers, brought together a few weeks prior by luck, by timing, by a damn good breakfast sandwich (thanks !), and by the willingness to say hello. When I met him, it was the 2nd time I had ever sat down at the Pear & Pickle sharing magic, and I was 2 months and 19 days into being a full-time magician.

On March 27th, 2019, he was there (with ) at the very first time I shared close-up magic at of the .

On March 30th, 2019, he was there taking photos of a milestone in my life—a memory I still look back on fondly despite the changes that come with time…and despite my regret that I didn’t invite him to join for dinner after. But, to be fair, I didn’t really know him all that well yet. Even so, he was there.

I was there on April 26th, 2019 at his second show, finding my legs doing magic for a crowd while some guy in the back was a jag and got all in a huff about all this nonsense going on.

On October 2nd, 2019, we were there together at the Pear having a last coffee and brekkie sammie before he departed in earnest on his vanlife journey.

It’s today, July 19th, 2024. I’m sitting on a purple couch in Aiden and Becca’s home in Estes Park, Colorado, back at the sharing “Road Signs” once more. Joe was here with me—one of those few times a year that our wild and winding paths happen to snake into each other and intersect briefly. He just left yesterday, shortly before my performance last night.

Two nights ago we stood outside the Stanley Hotel after “13”, the Séance show by Hannibal ()—a beautiful and wonderfully human piece of theater by the way if you ever get the chance—and we stood on the landing at the bottom of the steps, feeling the crispness of the air, looking up at the night sky, and I said to him, “We are rich.”

Thank you.
To Joe.
To you.
For being the richness in my life.
My heart is full.
And I journey on.

05/16/2024

There are a little over 7.9 billion people on this planet today. Over the course of an average lifetime each of us will get to meet about 80,000 of those people. And sure, that still sounds like a lot. But out of those 80,000 people we meet in the checkout line, going through the drive-through, sitting next to us on an airplane, we will only ever actually get to learn the names of about 600. That’s an entire lifetime of human connection.

And on one hand, I realize that can sound like a bummer of a statistic–a reminder that there’s so much of the world we’ll never get to know. But maybe we can see it as a reminder of something wonderful. That the people we do get to know are special. That every meaningful relationship we ever have is not a dime a dozen, but a statistical improbability. And that every name we get to learn is part of each of our own personally unique slices of humanity.

Looking forward to getting to learn some names tomorrow.

05/15/2024

Sitting in a high school cafeteria sharing close up magic with a bunch of high schoolers is not how I would have ever expected to spend my birthday…but what a delightful way to spend my birthday =). Thanks for all the well wishes. Thanks to my family and to my friends who are family. Love you ❤️

P.s. Asked one of the high schoolers I met today what year she was and she said 2008 and I was super confused until I realized she was referring to her ***birth year***. Dear lord.

11/07/2023

I am not cool enough to fully appreciate how cool this is.
That’s not humility. That’s me saying I am literally too ignorant to know half these people and their body of work.
But what I *do* know from others who are way cooler than I am is…oh, what a body of work to be sharing a stage with.
It’s probably for the best that I’m too uncool to be totally starstruck and unable to act like a normal human being.
Looking forward to being a normal, dumb human being, doing fun things on a stage with other humans doing other fun things.

City Winery NYC
Sunday 11/12
Link to tickets in bio.

08/06/2023

“The people you love become ghosts inside of you and like this you keep them alive.”

4 more chances to hit the road.

“Road Signs” at at . Link in bio.

08/05/2023

This set is the work of an incredible team of people. Who brought a kind of care and imagination to this project far beyond what I ever would have expected. There’s no such thing as a “one man show,” and for that, I am grateful =)

5 more chances to hit the road.

“Road Signs” at at . Link in bio.

07/31/2023

These are my parents. They came to see the show! It was, as you can see, adorable.

8 more chances to hit the road.

“Road Signs” . Through 8/9. Link in bio.

07/30/2023

The view from the dressing room -> The view from the bedroom.

11 more chances to hit the road.

“Road Signs” . Through 8/9. Link in bio.