Steven Frayne

The magician formerly known as Dynamo on the tragedy behind his decision to reclaim his real name, and who he'd love to perform magic for

- Nick Reilly

You're going back to being Steven Frayne and dropping Dynamo. How did that decision arise?

A lot of it came from having a massive level of imposter syndrome, and that was heightened when I was in the midst of my illness [Frayne has Crohn’s disease] and my body was saying no. I was literally in the hospital bed, unable to do everyday tasks, let alone think about picking up a pack of cards and blowing someone's mind. I was such an oxymoron: on one side I was the guy who walks across the River Thames and levitates with the Shard, but here’s Steven who can’t even make a cup of tea. I reached a point where I thought, ‘Well, I need to focus on getting Steven right and I just need to forget the magic to a certain extent and everything that’s come before it.’

That was compounded by the deaths of my three greatest loves. My nana was the person who nurtured me, and then my two dogs — they all died in the space of one weekend. My dogs were partly my reason for getting up in the morning — mainly because they’d otherwise shit in the house — but that routine gave me an existence.