The father and son magic act the Magic Castle is Mark and Greg Wilson. Both are world famous master magicians and Mark Wilson is the magic consultant for all 22 episodes of the series.
The hallways in Hon Chi Kai's (Joseph Wiseman) house which have been redecorated are the same ones used in some areas of the original USS Enterprise (NCC1701) in Star Trek TOS.
It is unclear who started the trend, but 7 years prior, The Jade Story (1967) already had "the Jade episode". 4 years later, The Jade Trap (1978) would reprise the theme. These are all episodes revolving around stolen, invaluable jade artifacts. For some reason, this became a "thing" in Hollywood, across several TV series. The Magician here combines the lost Jade theme with the "Chinatown episode", another theme that would see countless TV series have such episodes in that area and beyond, on American television.