Until now.

Meet Jenny Alexander. Jenny has been practicing magic for seven years, and has been performing full-time as a magician for the last four. She’s the first woman in Las Vegas entertainment history to headline as a solo magician - a feat she’s very proud of, as well she should be.

Born and raised in Media, Pennsylvania, a small hamlet about 30 miles outside of Philadelphia, Jenny comes from a fairly ordinary background. She sang in the church choir, and acted in school plays, but never really saw stage entertainment or magic as a career possibility.

“When I was five,” Jenny recalls, “I was going to sing in the children’s choir at church. I remember my grandmother saying, ‘Now you sing real loud so we can hear you up there.’ Well I guess I just screamed my head off, and my family jokes that it was the beginning of my career.”

Magic, however, wasn’t a large fascination for Jenny when she was a child. In fact, she says she was shy child for the most part. It wasn’t until she was enrolled at Western Maryland College that Jenny thought about entertainment as a career.

“Where I went to school,” explains Jenny, “we had to declare a major by our junior year. I thought about physical therapy or political science, but I finally went with theater. I had been in theater in high school, I really loved it, and I knew I could do it, so that’s what I majored in.”

While in productions at Western Maryland, Jenny developed a real sense of what it means to be a professional entertainer, having learned the ins and outs of stage work. She became a magic enthusiast as a result of having to learn a few parts for her role in Anton Chekhov’s “The Cherry Orchard.” And finally, she met her future husband, Scott Alexander, while starring in Steven Sondheim’s “Into the Woods.” Scott himself was an amateur magician who had been interested in magic for years. The two clicked and soon developed a working partnership.

After graduation, Jenny and Scott put together a magic show and hit the college circuit. The experience proved to be an invaluable training ground.

“Working colleges really taught me a lot about the business,” says Jenny, who prides herself on her sense of professionalism. “I perfected what people in the business call a one-nighter, where you go in, set up, perform, tear down, and leave in a single night.”

It was during a swing through Florida that Jenny and Scott got their first real break. While visiting the Boca Raton Resort and Club, the pair met with club owner Bill Malone, a well-known figure in the magic business. After seeing a few tricks, he offered the pair a job as resident magicians, a job that had them entertaining guests and corporate officers that often visited the club on business conferences.

After nearly a year in Florida, however, the urge to move on to bigger and better things began to beckon. Jenny and Scott figured Las Vegas was the only logical fit.

A lot of professions have a vocational epicenter, a place where people go if they want to succeed in a given field. Wanna break into movies? Head to Hollywood. Wanna engineer the next computer revolution? You gotta maneuver through Silicon Valley. Wanna work in publishing? Better learn to love the Big Apple. But if you want to get to the top in magic, there’s one place you’ve got to be - Las Vegas.

So after sending out some promotional videos, the pair was contacted by Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas and told they had a gig waiting for them if they could be ready in two weeks. They jumped at the chance.

“We had to uproot everything and move out to Vegas,” says Jenny, who laughs about making the big leap now. “We had never been out west before, and I didn’t know what to expect, with Vegas being in the middle of the desert. But it’s been a great move for us.”

Jenny admits to being a little overwhelmed when first starting out in Sin City.

“The act really wasn’t of Las Vegas caliber when we arrived. So it was a time of really growing and improving very quickly. I learned a lot about perfecting my act in a short time,” she recalls.

Working at Caesar’s Magical Empire, Jenny and Scott worked out their act doing between four and six 30-minute shows a night, five nights a week. The duo started putting new elements into the show, some of which they developed through interaction with other Las Vegas magicians.

“There are well over 400 magicians in Las Vegas,” says Jenny, “In fact, they have a meeting on Wednesday nights, and some of the big names will show up. It’s a pretty supportive atmosphere, but it’s definitely a competitive environment.”

About a year ago, another change saw Jenny begin a solo act at the Union Plaza Hotel, which is in downtown Las Vegas, with her husband Scott’s blessing. Her show, called Hot Trix, has taken magic performance to another level. Blending exciting physical magic, sleight of hand, dancing, and music in a tantalizing, sexy atmosphere, Jenny has created a unique show. Comedian Pete Barbutti, who holds the record for the most appearances on The Tonight Show, gives Jenny a chance to catch her breath as he takes the stage during part of the show. Jenny’s signature magical feat, which she calls A Snowstorm In China, is a romantic, exotic, eye-catching trick that always wows the audience.

Having gained a strong foothold in Las Vegas as the only female magician to headline at a hotel/casino, Jenny is now further honing her skill, continuing her hectic performance schedule, and contemplating where to go next. One possibility involves producing a television special, which would highlight her magic skills and unique status as the queen of modern magic.

Despite the illusory nature of her work, one thing is clear: With her hard-earned success and a no-limits horizon, Jenny Alexander won’t be performing a disappearing act anytime soon.