Teller

Teller (born Raymond Joseph Derickson Teller,

Early and personal life

Teller was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of Irene B. (née Derrickson; 1908–2004) and Israel Max "Joseph" Teller (1913–2004). His mother was Methodist, and Teller was raised as "a sort of half-assed Methodist".

In 1965, Teller graduated from Philadelphia's Central High School.

At some point, Teller legally changed his name to the mononym Teller, his family surname. He had reportedly been using the mononym professionally at least since some time before the 1975 formation of the Asparagus Valley Cultural Society. By December 2000, he reported that his own parents were calling him Teller.

Teller (age 59) poses for a photo hanging from a tree in Love Park (2007). Teller taught Greek and Latin at Lawrence High School in Lawrenceville, New Jersey.

Health In 2018 and 2019, Teller had three back surgeries over 18 months. In late September 2022, he underwent quadruple-bypass heart surgery.

Career Performing

Teller began performing with his friend Weir Chrisemer as The Othmar Schoeck Memorial Society for the Preservation of Unusual and Disgusting Music. He met Penn Jillette in 1974, and, with Chrisemer, they became a three-person act called Asparagus Valley Cultural Society, which started at the Minnesota Renaissance Festival and subsequently played in San Francisco. By the January 1975 Penn & Teller performed with Robert Davidson's Aqueous Fowle jazz/rock band in New Brunswick, NJ. and hsi Summer Intime Cabaret in 1976 In 1981, Jillette and Teller began performing exclusively together as Penn & Teller, an act that continues to this day. On April 5, 2013, Penn and Teller were honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the live performance category. The following day, they were recognized by the Magic Castle with the Magicians of the Year award. Teller's trademark silence originated during his youth, when he earned a living performing magic at college fraternity parties. He found that if he maintained silence throughout his act, spectators refrained from throwing beer and heckling him and paid more attention to his performance.

Writing Teller collaborated with Jillette on three magic books, and is also the author of "When I'm Dead All This Will Be Yours!": Joe Teller – A Portrait by His Kid (2000), a biography/memoir of his father. The book features his father's paintings and 100 unpublished cartoons which were strongly influenced by George Lichty's Grin and Bear It. The book was favorably reviewed by Publishers Weekly. Teller's father's "wryly observed scenes of Philadelphia street life" were created in 1939. Teller and his father's "memories began to pump and the stories flowed" after they opened boxes of old letters that Teller read out loud (learning for the first time about a period in his parents' lives that he knew nothing about, such as the fact that his father's name is really Israel Max Teller). Joe's Depression-era hobo adventures led to travels throughout the U.S., Canada and Alaska, and by 1933, he returned to Philadelphia for art study. After Joe and Irene met during evening art classes, they married, and Joe worked half-days as a Philadelphia Inquirer copy boy. When the Inquirer rejected his cartoons, he moved into advertising art just as World War II began.

Teller is a co-author of the paper "Attention and Awareness in Stage Magic: Turning Tricks into Research", published in Nature Reviews Neuroscience (November 2008).

In 2010, Teller wrote Play Dead, a "throwback to the spook shows of the 1930s and '40s" that ran September 12–24 in Las Vegas before opening off Broadway in New York. The show starred sideshow performer and magician Todd Robbins.

Directing In 2008, Teller and Aaron Posner co-directed a version of Macbeth which incorporated stage magic techniques, for example in the scenes with the Three Witches. In 2014, Teller and Posner co-directed a version of The Tempest, which again made use of stage magic; in an interview Teller stated that "Shakespeare wrote one play that's about a magician, and it seemed like about time to realize that with all the capabilities of modern magic in the theater." In 2018, Teller and Posner co-conceived and directed a brand new production of Macbeth at Chicago Shakespeare Theater in Chicago, Illinois. In 2022, the Round House Theater staged Teller and Posner's adaptation of The Tempest and made a video recording of it temporarily available for purchase, to stream.

Teller directed a feature film documentary, Tim's Vermeer, which was released in 2014. He and Jillette served as executive producers, with distribution by Sony Pictures Classics.

Books

Film and television Year Title Role Notes 1986 My Chauffeur Abdul 1987 Miami Vice Ralph Fisher Season 4 Episode 8: "Like a Hurricane" Long Gone Hale Buchman Jr. 1989 Penn & Teller Get Killed Self Also writer 1995;1997 The Drew Carey Show Geller Season 1 Episode 6: "Drew Meets Lawyers"Season 2 episode 17: "See Drew Run" 1997 Sabrina the Teenage Witch Skippy Season 1 episode 1: "Pilot"Season 1 Episode 13: "Jenny's Non-Dream" 1998 Dharma & Greg Mr. Boots Season 1 Episode 20: "The Cat's Out of the Bag" Babylon 5 Zooty Season 5 Episode 8: "Day of the Dead" 1999 Home Improvement Self Season 8 Episode 15: "Knee Deep" 1999;2011 The Simpsons Self Season 11 Episode 6: "Hello Gutter, Hello Fadder"Season 22 Episode 18: "The Great Simpsina" 2000 Fantasia 2000 The Fantasticks Mortimer 2003–10 Penn & Teller: Bullshit! Self Also writer 2004 The West Wing Season 6 Episode 8: "In the Room" 2010–24 Hell's Kitchen 4 Episodes 2010 Fetch! with Ruff Ruffman Episode "You Can't Teach an Orange Dog New Tricks 2011 Penn & Teller Tell a Lie Also writer 2011;2015–present Penn & Teller: Fool Us Also creator 2012 Atlas Shrugged: Part II Laughlin 2013 Tim's Vermeer Self Also director and writer 2016 Director's Cut Rudy Nelson 2018 The Big Bang Theory Larry Fowler 3 Episodes 2020 How It Really Happened Self Episode: "Siegfried & Roy Part 1: The Tiger Attack" 2021 History's Greatest Mysteries Episode: "Houdini's Lost Diaries" 2022 Young Sheldon Pus Episode: "A Clogged Pore, a Little Spanish and the Future" 2023 Mrs. Davis Magic consultant 2026 Stuart Fails to Save the Universe Alternate version of self Episode: "Spoiler: Gary Dies"