Question of the Day - 18 September 2021

Sixty-one-year-old "master magician" Lance Burton is enjoying semi-retirement these days.

According to Las Vegas Review-Journal entertainment columnist John Katsilometes, he sold his Las Vegas mansion last November for $4 million and moved back to Columbia, Kentucky. However, he’s keeping his hand in, “performing occasional shows across the country” and in England under the guise of Lance Burton & Friends.

Reached at his 100-acre Bluegrass State spread by Katsilometes, Burton explained background noise on the call by saying, “I’m cleaning the doves’ cages.” (Anyone who can fly a car can multi-task while on the phone.) “Yes, they came with me and I never trained them to clean up after themselves.” In addition to doves, Burton keeps cows and chickens.

Burton was as good as his word that he would cease playing the Strip after MGM Resorts International closed his eponymous theater in the Monte Carlo (now Park MGM) in September 2010.

At the time, Burton said, “To me, there's something poetic and satisfying about completing a circle. You start out, you do your thing, and eventually come back.” That “eventual” comeback included making a long-cherished movie project, Billy Topit, in which a Las Vegas magician who performs at children's birthday parties convinces the woman of his dreams to be his assistant, while the local Mob guys try to make him disappear permanently. Burton directed and starred in the 2015 film. 

He also did some oft-postponed world traveling, for sightseeing purposes. As he explained to Katsilometes, “Most entertainers travel the world before they get to Vegas. I did my career backwards. I came to Vegas at 22 and got to go around the world to see new places after my time on the Strip.”

So finished is Burton with Sin City that he even turned down an offer from Caesars Entertainment to headline the Colosseum.

He’s certainly earned the rest, having played the Strip nonstop since a 1982 debut in Folies Bergere at the Tropicana. A 28-year run on the Strip is nothing at which to scoff. Burton calculates his tenures at the Trop (nine years), Hacienda (five years), and Monte Carlo (14 years) as adding up to somewhere between 15,000 and 16,000 shows.

Styling himself a “gentleman farmer,” Burton wrote to fans, “I never made it a secret that my plan was to retire back to my ancestral home, my grandfather’s farm in Kentucky. There is plenty of room for all my animals and maybe a few more. It is quiet and peaceful there. I am looking forward to planting a small garden in the spring and maybe getting a few chickens, so I will have fresh eggs for breakfast.” It sounds like he got his wish.

As for the Burton castle in the Black Mountains of Henderson, it went from a house of magic to a home of pot. It was bought by Tarek Tabsh, co-founder of Oxford Cannabinoid Technologies. Burton came down 10% on the sale, initially asking $4.4 million for the custom-built house inspired by classic horror movies. Tabsh acquired a three-story six-bedroom manse and 10 acres of land. Of his Black Mountain aerie, Burton told Katsilometes, “I wanted this horror-film look. [Architect Colin Summer] loved that idea, ran with it, and came up with the design on his own. He needed very little direction. It was a beautiful, interesting place to look at from the outside, very comfortable on the inside. I loved living there.”

And now he loves living the quiet life in Kentucky.