The Magic Castle in Hollywood is really a glorified restaurant these days, but it’s also the private clubhouse of the 5,000-member Academy of Magical Arts Inc, a group that promotes stage magic “with particular emphasis on preserving its history as an art form, entertainment medium and hobby”. It can be way too serious about keeping secrets and stuff, but from the look of its website, the members also love to party.

The imposing building itself was the 1908-vintage home of banker and property tycoon Rollin Lane, whose vision of a Hollywood bedecked with orange groves and ranches wilted in a drought. His family cleared out in the 1940s and lots of other people lived there until 1960, when “Truth or Consequences” writer Milt Larsen bought it and, over the next three years, turned it into a magicians’ club.

Circa 2002 its “Houdini Seance Room”, where they try to beam in Harry every Hallowe’en, was transformed into “the Houdini Chamber”, with a towering, chandelier-trimmed, 13-faceted dome above the seance table. Of course, the closest Houdini ever got to the place was when his star was unveiled down the hill on Hollywood Boulevard, long after he died.