DURHAM — When is a box not just a box? When it’s a metaphor in Richard Forget’s show, The Magic Box. “It suggests a whole bunch of things,” says the Whitby magician. “It can mean so much.” ...

To help pay for his undergraduate education, Elias Garcia-Pelegrin had an unusual summer job: cruise ship magician. “I was that guy who comes out at dinnertime and does random magic for you,” he says.

Pulling a rabbit from a top hat. Teleporting from one cage to another. Finding a coin behind a five-year-old’s ear. Magic has long inspired a sense of awe and wonder, but one portion of the population ...