By JOSEPH FITZGERALD

MILLVILLE -- It’s true what they say about a good magician never revealing his secrets.

Dennis Pimenta, a professional magician from Millville who has been performing magic for more than 40 years, says magicians don’t actually take a sworn oath not to reveal their secrets, but that it has always been the unspoken ethic of those in the magic brotherhood.
“When I joined the International Brotherhood of Magicians 30 years ago, I didn’t take actually take an oath, but it’s implied and it’s well known in the magic community that a good magician never reveals the secrets of any illusion to a non-magician,” Pimenta says.
However, it is considered permissible to reveal secrets to individuals who are determined to learn magic and become magicians, which is how Pimenta, 62, got his start.
A working magician since the age of 17, Pimenta, who goes by the stage name, Dennis the Magician, has been enamored with the art of illusion since he was a kid growing up in Tiverton, R.I.
Pimenta was only 8-years-old when he caught the magic bug. A friend of his father, amateur magician Richard Botelho, used to perform card tricks and other sleight of hand techniques that would leave Pimenta and all the other neighborhood kids with mouths wide-open in amazement.
“I used to watch him all the time and one day he gave me some rings and other things from his magic kit to play with and that’s when it all started for me,” Pimenta says.
When Pimenta was a young teenager in the early 1960’s, James “Mark” Wilson was a big name in magic and is widely credited as the first major “television magician” who established the viability of illusion shows as a television format.
Wilson created the first magic show to be videotaped and nationally syndicated — the original black and white Magic Land of Allakazam, which debuted on Oct. 1, 1960 on CBS and aired every Saturday morning on that network for two years. During its peak it was one of the top shows in the Nielson ratings for Saturday morning and has been cited by a number of famous magicians as an early inspiration.
Pimenta never missed an episode and credits the show with inspiring him to become a professional magic man.
“I modeled my act on a lot of what I saw on that show,” says Pimenta, whose repertoire these days includes more than 300 effects.
His shows, which can range from just him alone for 30 minutes to a full 2 and-a-half-hour stage show with four assistants depending on a customer’s budget, consist of magic, comedy, live animals and audience participation.
Pimenta’s peers in the magic community say he’s learned his craft well over the years.
Earlier this week, the local assembly of The Society of American Magicians awarded Pimenta with the Bob Porter Award at a ceremony in Auburn, Mass. The award, named after the late magician and longtime Willard S. Smith Assembly #16 member, Bob Porter, is the highest award the local assembly gives for performance excellence, vast magical knowledge and experience. Pimenta has been a member of the society for the past three years and is vice chairman of the Ashland, Mass.-based chapter, which has about 30 members. Harry Houdini was actually the first president of the local chapter in 1929.
“It was a complete surprise,” says Pimenta, who didn’t know anything about the award until it was announced at the assembly’s banquet that night. “I’m truly honored to get this kind of recognition from my peers.”
“Dennis lives and breathes this stuff,” says Willard S. Smith Assembly #16 President Peter Lentros. “The difference between him and some other people is that magic isn’t just a hobby or something he does for fun. He’d rather do this more than anything else. The advantage Dennis had in getting this award is that magic is a passion for him.”
In 1964, at the age of 17, Pimenta performed his first paid magic show for the St. Christopher’s Church Womens Guild in Tiverton. He remembers the experience like it was yesterday. “I was pretty nervous, but I was able to pull it off,” he says.
Since then he’s done thousands of shows ranging from small birthday parties to full two-hour stage shows. One of his biggest shows was before a thousand people at the Venus de Milo in Swansea, Mass.
Behind every good magician is a dependable and beautiful assistant. In Pimenta’s case, that person is his wife of 37 years, Janet, who got involved in the act in 1978.
Pimenta’s 36-year-old son, Edward, also assists for certain shows - usually the longer shows that require more assistance.
“He doesn’t have any aspirations of becoming a magician, but enjoys helping me out when I need the extra assistance,” Pimenta says.
While magic was never a full-time gig or able to sustain Pimenta to the point where it could pay the bills (he worked for Sears and Roebuck Co. for more than 30 years and is now semi-retired working as transportation coordinator for the Blackstone Senior Center) it’s treated him well over the years.
In his prime, Pimenta and his wife, who moved to Millville in 1991, were doing 80 shows a year. These days, Pimenta is wowing audiences one or two times a month.
“I pride myself most on the amount of repeat shows that I did over the years,” says Pimenta, who until about 15 years ago performed annually for the Dartmouth Fire Department’s Halloween and Christmas parties, the Town of Wareham Recreation Department and the New Bedford Whaling City Festival — the largest festival in Fall River and New Bedford.
He’s also done hundreds of charity perfomances - for no pay - for the local branch of the Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon, the American Diabetes Association, Brigham & Women’s Hospital, among many others.
Along the way, Pimenta has made a name for himself throughout New England. He was voted Magician of the Year in 2001 by New England Magical Entertainment Group, and in 2004, he was voted #3 for Best in Theater Entertainment in the Blackstone Valley’s Reader’s Choice Awards. 
“We specialize in organizational functions such as outings, picnics, retirement and Christmas parties, also library and school functions,” Pimenta says. “My shows are totally self contained. I bring everything needed for the show — tables, sound system and curtains. People of all age groups enjoy my show.” 
Pimenta never reached the level of stardom and celebrity enjoyed by magicians like David Copperfield or Doug Henning, but that was never his goal, anyway. All he ever wanted was to be a working magician and bring some joy to people’s lives.
And he’s been doing exactly that for 40 years.
“I love to see the reactions on people’s faces when I do my show,” he says. “Some people sit there smiling and enjoying it, and others get upset because they can’t figure it out. When I’m doing a show my goal is to make my audience forget about their problems. If I can get someone to forget about the daily headaches in life like paying the bills - even if its just for a half-hour — then I’ve done my job.”
At age 62, Pimenta shows no signs of slowing down. “I’m going to keep going at it as long as I can,” he says.
In the meantime, he’s preparing for the eventuality of taking a young apprentice under his wing — his 10-year-old grandson, Dakota, who is already showing a strong interest in magic. If that interest is still there in a couple of years, Pimenta will pass down the knowledge he’s aquired over the years to his grandson.
“I’ve already given him a few things to play around with and he’s already showing signs of being a good magician,” he says.
Today, the art of magic is enjoying a vogue, driven by a number of highly successful performers such as David Copperfield, Lance Burton, Penn and Teller, Derren Brown, Barry and Stuart, Dorothy Dietrich, Greg Frewin, Herbert L. Becker, and many other stage and TV performers. David Blaine, a modern magician who incorporates street theater in his performances, and Criss Angel, an American magician, illusionist, musician, escapologist, and stunt performer who is best known for starring in his own television show, Criss Angel Mindfreak, are two of the more popular magicians in recent years.
Magic, Pimenta says, has captivated humans for thousands of years. “People have always liked the mysterious and things that can’t be explained. That’s why magic will be around, in one form or another, for a long time to come.”
For more information about Dennis the Magician or to book a performance or show, call 508-883-3575 or visit his Web site at www.magician.org/member/dennisthemagician