Some people come to Las Vegas to find their luck. Jen Kramer came to make the impossible happen, and she’s been doing exactly that since 2018. The only female magician headlining her own Las Vegas show, a Yale honors grad, and—plot twist!—a brand-new bride who said her vows on the very stage where she performs nightly, Kramer is truly a one-woman wonder. With The Magic of Jen Kramer at Westgate coming up on its 1,000th performance (April 24), Las Vegas Magazine chatted up the illusionist about marriage, milestones and the enduring appeal of magic.
You just got married at the Westgate Las Vegas. What was that like?
It was the best weekend of our lives. We got married on the stage where I do my show. Cami Christiansen, the president and general manager of Westgate, officiated alongside our rabbi, and the two other shows in our theater—The King Comes Home and Soul of Motown—both performed. Our Westgate family really came together. I do a quick-change act where dresses change in the blink of an eye—black, pink, green, red, then blue. We customized it for the wedding, and the last one was a long white gown!
Your show is approaching its 1,000th performance. When you stood on that stage for show No. 1, could you have imagined this?
Time has just flown by! I remember our very first show so vividly—family and friends came out, and Gloria Dea, the first magician to ever perform on stage in Las Vegas, came to support. She performed in 1941. To have her there on night one, and now to be approaching show 1,000—it just brings back everything. When I was a kid, it was my dream to have my own magic residency in Las Vegas. Now I’m here, and I couldn’t be more grateful.
When did magic grab hold of your imagination?
My Uncle Steve gave me a book called The Royal Road to Card Magic for my 10th birthday, and I became completely obsessed. My first gig was my little sister’s birthday party—I was 11, paid in pizza and thrilled with the arrangement. That book is still my most treasured physical possession. You just never know the impact one small moment can have on someone’s life.
What does it mean to be the only female magician headlining her own Las Vegas show?
Magic has historically been so male-dominated. You conjure up the image of a magician and you think of a man with a female assistant. But that’s changing. When I first joined a youth magicians’ group in New York, I was the only girl—20 boys around the table and me. That same group now has several young girls in it. It’s a microcosm of where the magic world is heading, and I find that genuinely thrilling.
What is it about live magic that screens and streaming simply can’t replicate?
Magic evokes wonder. It makes you feel like you’re 5 years old again. To me, it’s about genuine human connection—it transcends age, language, everything. I’ve done trips with Magicians Without Borders to rural India and Central America, performing for people where we don’t share a single word of language. And magic still connects us. That universality is something I’m endlessly captivated by.
Westgate Las Vegas, 5+. westgateresorts.com
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