Comedy Showgirl Jade Simone Went from Dancing in Dallas to Doing Magic with a Dragon

Jade Simone grew up in Dallas with dreams of becoming a professional dancer, but she found something and someone much sillier along the way.

"It's funny how life takes you," Simone says. "I studied and studied to be a ballerina and then I'm doing physical comedy in a magic dragon show."

Simone stars with Piff the Magic Dragon, the world's only performing and talking dragon magician, who rose to global fame as one of the finalists on the 10th season of America's Got Talent. She's on the road or appearing nightly at The Flamingo Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas as a showgirl comedian — or comedian showgirl, depending on how you look at it.

Either way, she's carved out an interesting career for herself as Piff's (aka John van der Put) showgirl and wife. There's clearly something more to her stage presence that projects beyond her pretty face: Simone has a manic and upbeat personality that plays beautifully off the gruff, toned-down attitude of Piff.

"I always say when the left side of his cheek goes up and the eyebrow goes up, that's when the charm hits," Simone says about Piff. "He's grumpy but he's not. He'll give you that snide remark and the left side of his cheek will go up and that's always funny."

Simone studied in the dance conservatory at the Booker T. Washington High School of the Performing and Visual Arts with the goal of a dance career. She immediately left for New York City after graduating to start finding a way into showbiz with the knowledge and contacts she had accrued in Dallas.

"I took classes and I auditioned for one-off shows and I got cast in that and I was really missing home," Simone says. "So I came back home to Texas, did a couple of summer workshops at [Southern Methodist University], worked with the Dallas Theater Center and did some of the summer plays with them and you just kind of get auditions and gigs."

She also did some commercial campaigns and signed with the Kim Dawson Agency. These classes and jobs inspired her to try something new and different: comedy and burlesque dancing.

"That's where everything kind of made sense," Simone says. "With burlesque, I was not only able to be a dancer, I was able to be an actress and a comedian. Burlesque is kind of like another art form of drag in its own weird way. If you look at the drag queens, they do all that: sing, act and dance."

Her comedic burlesque act earned numerous awards and kept her busy with shows. These shows gave her a place to hone her dancing and comedy skills, preparing her for an important meeting leading to a show that would take over her career.

Legendary magician Lance Burton introduced Simone to Piff when Burton needed to fill a guest spot for a charity show. Piff spotted her in a dance show called Sizzle of Las Vegas, where she did her comedy burlesque act, and he insisted they work together in his magic show. Pioneering magician Johnny Thompson later suggested her character would make a good addition to the show.

"We met on that show and I broke all my rules: never date a performer — and that went all down the drain and we went to dinner the next night and we just celebrated eight years together," Simone says. "I was like, 'I have the coolest boyfriend ever.'"

Simone joined Piff's show as a cheerleading showgirl playing off Piff's gruffness alongside his magic chihuahua Mr. Piffles, who just turned 15 and once had Donny Osmond serenade him with "Puppy Love."

"When I first started the show, I was only doing a three-minute dance number in 2015," Simone says. "What happened after America's Got Talent when he went on the road, he said you have to come on the road or we'll never see each other, and I would open for him. I would warm up the crowd, do a little bit of stand-up and he would come on and do all of his magic."

Simone's rolel expanded and morphed into Piff's main show over the years into what she says he calls "the girl with the dragon to-do list."

"I started to learn more magic with him," Simone says. "He would teach me more and the character started growing into not necessarily a magic assistant but a character who happens to be a magic assistant."

The two are still performing together on tour and nightly at The Flamingo in Vegas. They released a full-length special called Reptile Dysfunction, now available on their YouTube channel. Simone says Piff is working on his first book of magic.

"I'm a Texas girl and we can be a bit loud and a bit overexcited, and my true Texas spirit comes out of my character," Simone says. "I love playing it. There's always those characters I would get cast as because I have a certain figure. I would be the girl in the sexy outfit and I would always be, 'No, I'm really funny. I can be more than the sexy girl in the outfit.'"

Simone says her role in Piff's show and life lets her be every part of herself.

"It's one of my favorite things I've ever done in my whole career," she says. "I'm having an absolute blast on stage every night."