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Destination: Las Vegas Story and photography by Nancy & Eric Anderson To Dorothy and Toto Las Vegas would come up like Oz, her final destination. To some, wandering in the wilderness, it might show as a tease, an oasis that was, in fact, a mirage. But to those driving a car for 350 miles it comes as a delight: a place where parking – even valet parking – is free and where, if you park at any casino along the East side of the Strip you can dump your car easily and safely, and buy a ten-day Monorail ticket. You won’t need your car until you’ve had your fill of all the shows and restaurants along the entire length of the strip. And by automobile, you have a benefit those arriving by air don’t have. For some unfathomable reason the Monorail doesn’t connect to McCarran International Airport yet, though it’s apparently the next priority. Despite talking heads on TV and pundits in magazines who have long felt the city had peaked (Life magazine had a cover story in the 1950s that wrongly predicted Las Vegas’ boom times were over), Las Vegas has always exhibited supreme confidence in its future. Even today where the city showcases 19 of the 25 largest hotels in the world, it has plans to add 20,000 more rooms by the end of next year. But change is happening. The 2008 recession is hurting. A cover story in US Today in June 2008 declared rates are about 10 percent lower this summer from a year ago and guests are not gambling (gaming) so much. In fact the news from Las Vegas is how successful upscale non-smoking, non-gaming resorts like Signature are becoming by offering fashionable accommodations and a sensitive high quality experience without providing a casino. Resorts
Silverton also has what the PR representative for Monorail said was the best steakhouse in Las Vegas, the Twin Creeks Restaurant. She got that right but Twin Creeks is much more than a steakhouse. It has undergone a $4 million renovation, the first location in the lodge to be upgraded. It is now an elegant, place with exciting menus and even boutique bourbons,. It has for example, 21 bourbons priced from $6 to $58 a shot (for a 23 year-old Pappy Van Winkle) and 14 single malt Scotches for $8 to $33 (for an 18 year-old Macallan). JW Marriott Las Vegas Resort, Spa & Golf Travelers to famed locations all have, of course, their favorite places for their heads at night. No doubt some glitterati want to be right there on top of the action, to see and be seen. Others might seek serenity or a refuge from heat and noise and from any guest competition to attract a waiter or any kind of service. The upscale oasis in Las Vegas lies 20 minutes north of the Strip in Summerlin, an area that has already caught the eye of fashionable developers. Marriott has 3,060 world properties in its stable but only 26 currently carry the hotel’s most prestigious designation with the founder’s initials before the resort’s name. A Marriott with the JW title surely endeavors to please as it has a reputation to maintain.
What’s to like? For starters 24-hour room service and WiFi internet access but we expect that in most luxury hotels these day. A casino if you want it. More than eight restaurants including the upscale Ceres where you can enjoy Mediterranean fare while gazing out at waterfalls and keeping a protective eye on the resort’s mother duck and her five little ones wandering outside, proud of their decision, like yours, to stay off the Strip. Guests, but not the ducks, can utilize the complimentary shuttle to the Las Vegas Strip, and benefit from the free shoeshine and daily newspaper. You may not need that since you have a car. Valet parking is free. There’s a grass-edged 11,000 sq ft swimming pool with a cascading waterfall and four 75 ft swimming lanes (an Olympic pool is about 164 ft). A 40,000 sq ft spa with 36 treatment rooms, plus a fitness center. The resort is particularly proud of its “Aqua Sulis” spa. Offerings include: Desert Stone heat therapy that goes back 5000 years to ancient India and Watsu massage based on a form of Zen Shiatsu in warm water that began in the early 1980s in Northern A nearby charm (10 minutes away) is the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Park If you can see those calico mountains at sunrise (they mostly face East) you will find the colors unbelievable. That would mean an early start to get there at the best time (the park opens at 6AM) but Hey! you’re not dragging in at midnight from the Strip. You were asleep like a baby much earlier because in this resort you’ve had a relaxing day. Attractions A flamboyant tribute to the extravagance of a pianist, still in the Guinness Book of Records as the highest paid pianist of all time. A dramatic extrovert, he never flaunted his sexuality. Some of his piano collection is on display: the 1920 Chickering Grand owned by George Gershwin, and the Steinway whose name he colored out with blue paint because the blue matched his robes and costume and his contract was with Baldwin anyway. Twenty of his more than 400 costumes are on exhibit: the gold lame jacket in which he opened at the Riviera in 1955, his King Neptune costume that weighed more than 200 lbs, his black diamond mink cape that took 18 months to make at a cost of $750,000. Perhaps the most poignant item on display was the slot machine he installed in his home so his mother could indulge her gambling needs. She would call him to say she’d just won $10,000. He would reply he didn’t have that much cash on him. She’d say she’d take a check. How could you not like a guy so gentle, one who so loved his mother? It’s hard to showcase something as small as an atom but this museum succeeds in recalling the poignancy of the late 1930s, the birth of such a terrible weapon and the angst a president endured before making the decision that saved more than one million US lives. The authors’ image bottom left (below) is courtesy of the Atomic Testing Museum.
Imperial Palace Auto Collection This is one of the least expensive tourist attractions in Las Vegas. You just go to the desk at the Imperial Palace and ask for free museum admission tickets – which are willingly given. What used to be a vast display of some of the most interesting automobiles in history is now a showroom of expensive and exotic cars for sale. Sold is Adolf Hitler’s and in its place is the 1939 Chrysler Royal Sedan in which Johnny Carson learned to drive. Interesting but it doesn’t have the same historical impact. Many of the cars on display are for sale at prices from $1 million and up. Nevada State Museum and Historical Society It’s poorly signed and impossibly located about 20 minutes’ drive north of the Strip. That’s the bad news. The good news is that it’s moving in 2009 to the Springs Preserve at South Valley View Boulevard but it’ll still be up there off US 95, a long drive. Here are skeletons of mastodons, dioramas for Bighorn Sheep and exhibits showing Sin City’s past but it takes so long to find the darned place there’s barely time to explore its riches. Shows Legends in Concert (Imperial Palace)
It’s the second longest running show in town (after the Folies) and it remains popular because it’s well done with skilled performers and also because it’s modestly priced, something unusual in town. The admission includes one free drink as well. And legends is also laid back, friendly and fun. Precision dancing, high kicks, yellow feathers, silver sparkles, sequins, color, costumes, movement, mirrors, energy, elegance, lights, music. Ah, music. Songs from the past: The Lady is a Tramp, My Heart Belongs to Daddy, There’s No Business Like Show Business. They got that right. This is tasteful toplessness and stylish show business. And a juggler who bounces tennis balls off a xylophone in an impressive display of juggling and musical talent. The stage is huge and, with its stairs, recalls the Hollywood musicals of the 1930s. This is Busby Berkeley and Gower Champion territory. This is nostalgia time with a tip of the top hat tribute to Fred Astaire with dance numbers embracing A Fine Romance, Dancing Cheek To Cheek, I’m In Heaven and, of course, Putting On My Top Hat. Cecile B. DeMille is not forgotten either: Jubilee’s presentation of Samson and Delilah calls to mind his blockbuster 1949 movie of that name.
We can’t believe anyone would be sleeping. When the curtain goes up, it’s Bam! sensory overload: 4,000 lbs of feathers, 8,000 miles of sequins and a cast of 85, two-thirds female. At the finale all 36 dancers are on stage kicking high in what they call “their Killer” because it is so hard on their hips and heels. Headdresses weighing 17 lbs, costumes costing between $8,000 and $20,000 -- and in all 1000 of them, all designed by Bob Mackie, of whose creations it was said: “Thousands of rhinestones covering practically nothing.”
“We are the longest continuing show in the United States,” cracks Michael Holly, a juggler and comedian at the Tropicana’s Folies Bergere, “with the possible exception of Cher!” He starts his routine slowly. “I have to wait till the steroids kick in,” he says with a grin. He holds up a large packet of M & Ms and starts to open it. “I’m going to juggle with an M & M -- or as they call them in Australia” (holding the packet upside down) “W & Ws.” He holds up a tiny M & M and awkwardly picks up two large bowling balls. He juggles with all three. He says he can see the crowd is unimpressed so what should he juggle with? “A chain saw!” comes the shout from the back seats. “You from Texas?” he asks. “Come on, what should I juggle with?” “Fire!” somebody calls out. “That’s a fine thing to shout in a crowded theater,” he replies. “No, I’m going to juggle with something that’s really dangerous: an old sandwich bag and its contents from when I was in the 4th grade.” And so it goes: light relief at the Folies. But it’s not the jugglers and comedians who have kept the audience coming for 50 years in Las Vegas, it’s the showgirls. No one can kick higher than a Las Vegas showgirl and here they come: male dancers in black T shirts, black suits and sunglasses and the female chorus in butterfly costumes and scarlet headdresses. The show is about women and their role over the decades. It starts romantically with an 1850 beautifully costumed ball then changes focus to the New Women of 1920, flappers and vamps dancing to the song “Anything Goes.” Twin contortionists give the cast a break then it’s 1930 and Gershwin and Cole Porter and Hollywood’s discovery of syndicated dancing with mirrors on the ceiling to show kaleidoscope patterns to “Dancing in the Dark.” Next comes 1940, the Big Band era, the debut of the pinup, the birth of the bikini. The “Sophistication of the 1950s, the Rock & Roll period of the 60s, and the “Love & Peace of the 70s” arrive, all exciting historical times The finale, of course, is La Belle Époque 1900 with the Folies’ version of the Cancan that scandalized and mesmerized Paris when it was first performed in working-class ballrooms in Montparnasse around 1830.
True. On stage, he has a very easy style. He produces doves from candlesticks and six beautiful assistants from his suitcase. “You should always travel with a six-pack,” he says. He turns napkins into budgiegars, transfers bars of gold from a safe into a gold costume for his assistant, produces a Corvette from the blue then it vanishes. Ducks and geese appear from nowhere. Children in the audience are suspended in space. And in “The Magic Zone,” a one-act play with murder and mayhem that unfolded like a French Farce or a scene from the “Twilight Zone,” he uses virtually all his cast including his marvelous funny juggler, Michael Boudeau, in a six-minute romp where people appear and disappear faster than you can deal with. KÀ is described as “the epic tale of twins on a perilous journey to fulfill their shared destiny.” It’s helpful to know that because this further example of how the famed Cirque du Soleil is beginning to dominate Las Vegas is the first company product to try and tell a story. And how does it do that? First, by political enemies separating the twins. Then each ventures on a voyage of discovery fraught with danger. We see barges, acrobats, soldiers and experts in martial arts throwing spears and shooting arrows as well as a shipwreck with beautiful representation of drowning and salvation. There are sea monsters crawling in the sand. Then the stage turns upright and the sand cascades off like a waterfall. Their home becomes a flying bird that pirouettes in space and flies to safety.
Yes it could be confusing so just settle in for the ride. We get a bird’s eye view of a battle scene, prisoners imprisoned in rolling cages, a magic flute, an acrobat with a baton in a performance cheerleaders would die for, cartwheels, high wire jugglers and trapeze artists. There’s smoke and fire, scorpions, centipedes, lovers, cone heads, factory slaves, maypole dancers, and a marvelous exhibition where two acrobats skip, dance and jump from heights atop rotating Ferris-like wheels. It’s all hard to follow and any description will, of necessity, be incoherent. Watching KÀ with its diverse points of visual interest is like trying to find that guy with the red-striped shirt in the game, “Where’s Waldo?” KÀ is about costumes and music, the confrontation of good and evil, the triumph of love, the symbolism of faith, the rewarding of good deeds. KÀ in ancient Egypt was thought to be part of the human soul, one of the five parts that formed a person, the spiritual duplicate that accompanies a person through life. The concept produces a colorful, exciting, fast-moving spectacle that suggests a far away place with exotic strange people in a performance that lingers long after the curtain comes down. So much has been written about The Phantom of the Opera, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s 1986 musical based on the original 1909 novel by Gaston Leroux. We wonder what can possibly be said that’s new; after all it’s the longest running Broadway show in history and the most profitable entertainment of all time, out-grossing even the box office take of James Cameron’s Titanic.
What was not missing were the spectacular stage settings and the sumptuous sense of a Victorian opera hall with velvet curtains and organ music, box seats used for props and performers, and the subtlety of the stage direction that had actors positioned as if in a tapestry or painting. This was not only music for the ears but a visual feast. in one scene as Christine sang the chorus was being instructed in dance by the ballet mistress, the whole scene looking like paintings by Degas. The costumes for the masked ball, the great visibility from just about all seats and the awe-inspiring acoustics absolutely delighted the senses and made this visit to the theater specially created by the Venetian an enchanting event. Much has been written about the creation of the complicated and high tech Opera House chandelier for the Las Vegas show but in our opinion its descent had nothing like the impact of the contrived collapse of the chandelier at Her Majesty’s Theatre in London. The melodies are familiar. Would the Phantom now seem old hat? No, popular musical scores can live for ever. Phantom was a stunning production and the epitome, the height of set design -- literally the height -- as even the clouds moved across the sky in the rooftop scene. It would be hard to find anything so different from Phantom with its opulence and lavish sets than the minimalistic stage settings of Mamma Mia!. And the cacophony of ABBAS sure contrasts with the melodious music of Lloyd Webber. Now running in its eighth year on Broadway, it is showing long legs in Las Vegas, a destination where some stage productions have not lasted well. It premiered here in 2003 and is now the longest running full-length Broadway show ever to play the Las Vegas Strip. The settings seem austere and basic but, when rotated seamlessly to become the patio of a Greek island home in Scene 2, they capture, effortlessly, the required tone -- and off we go in this great adventure of a girl’s search for her father on the eve of her wedding.
It’s all very 1970’s from the costumes worn with bell bottoms, platform boots, beehive hairstyles, miniskirts and wet-look vinyl to the pulsating ABBA music itself. Not everyone cares for this anapestic music with its unusual beat. The actors seemed to disappear into their characters as if they really were all friends growing up together on a small island. The cast was enthusiastic and young. The dancing was animated, the chorus giving the impression they were enjoying it as much as the audience. And how much was that? Their passion was contagious: the cast got a standing ovation. STOMP OUT LOUD (Planet Hollywood) Hub caps, brooms, neon, road signs, old refrigerators, and pots and pans. And trash. Now we know why we got such a good price on 101, row C, seats 14 and 16. We are under a balcony and one of the performers is clearing up and cheerfully dumping crumpled paper trash and emptying plastic water bottles on us. They are all clearing up: the stage fills with characters dressed like janitors on a bad day: torn jeans, ankle boots, striped stockings, wool caps. They wear dreadlocks or punk red hair unless, of course, their heads are shaved. Some have tattoos. Some look as if you wouldn’t want to meet them in a dark alley. They scowl at each other and sometimes at the audience. It’s a hoot and slowly then faster, indeed faster the show unfolds.
STOMP OUT LOUD is hugely successful. There is no dialog, just the performers’ self-deprecating humor, their incredible timing and interaction to show how, in music, percussion is king, and how precise dynamic choreography and dancing did not die with Fred Astaire. This is a show that starts with a janitor’s arrival on stage with a broom. He sweeps the floor with a simple long handled brush. He stomps the edge of the brush on the floor. He develops a rhythm. He is joined by other who embrace the rhythm. It quickens and becomes a frenzy of floor drumming, the performers moving, swaying, dancing and thumping the floor and interchanging brushes in rituals as disciplined as any from the Radio City Rockettes. The scene fades and is immediately replaced by others: sequences of jingling and tossing keys, clicking cigarette lighters, flapping newspapers, snapping fingers, clapping hands, stamping feet. The synchrony of performers drumming in harmony whether it be on cardboard boxes, oil drums, plastic bottles, Dixie cups, inflated plastic bags, tin mugs, metal trash cans, plastic water bottles, dust pans, or empty water coolers. No writing could convey the frenetic activity on stage. Or the fact that it is hilarious. This is visual comedy beyond slapstick or French farce. It would be a cliché to say this show had everything in it except the kitchen sink. It would also be untrue: one of the scenes had four performers standing with kitchen sinks suspended from their necks. They had varying amounts of water in each, so the percussion and sound was different – and funny. Advice? If you wear hearing aids, leave ‘em at home. If you have dust allergies, bring a handkerchief and don’t sit in the front row. If afraid of heights – that is, being under them – don’t sit in 101.C12-14! Gene Kelly and Gene Krupa would have loved this show. We did!
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resort on the other end of the strip called, of course, Trump. But Signature comes with a Vice President and manager with better credentials than our Donald -- namely one Frederic Luvisotto, Swiss trained so the three towers run efficiently like a Swiss watch. And if the tranquility gets to you and gives you itchy feet the easy access to the MGM Grand is a real plus. Your Signature concierge apparently carries clout: getting great tickets for KÀ, for example, is a breeze as is a reservation for one of the MGM Grand’s new restaurants, Michael Mina’s Sea Blue, with its “jet fresh” seafood. You need to give yourself time at Sea Blue, the meal is a show in itself. Pencils are provided and planning menu sheets so you can truly customize your salad components or even the entire meal. Chef Stephen Hopcraft believes what makes Sea Blue’s items special (such as the very best crab legs we ever tasted) is they begin with fresh, never frozen fish specially jetted from Alaska, start their grill with mesquite charcoal then use an apricot wood-burning grill which they lower as the wood burns down.
California. Nearby lies the celebrated 
Where could you see in one night, on the same stage, Tina Turner, The Blues Brothers, Dusty Springfield -- and an Elvis who would make the King himself proud of the impersonation and the performance. And of course Jay Leno is the MC? With Leno exploring the thought: you can get a McDonalds credit card but, if you don’t pay their charges, what are they gonna do? put a McLien on your assets? And if obesity is the new disease, could we all call in to work to say we’re staying home today, we feel a little chubby?
Jubilee is not cutting edge theater. It’s been putting on essentially the same show since it opened in 1981 at a then prohibitive cost of $10 million. The spectators have seen the same Samson and Delilah production all those years and the lavish Sinking of the Titanic has entertained the audience from the opening night. Says Paula Allen, a Jubilee principal dancer as she leads a backstage tour, “We’ve been sinking the Titanic for 27 years. It won’t stay sunk.” Paula looks fondly across the 10 story-high stage that is half the size of a football field (in 1981, one of the largest stages in America) and says, “We may be called the dinosaur by new show producers, but they’re all gone and we’re still here.” She continues, “But it’s not the same show every night. It’s live, so things happen. The audience is different. We see you.” She turns to a couple from California and warns them, “We see you if you are sleeping!”
Magicians live and work in a virtual secret society. They honor their own. When The Great Dante retired in the late 1940s he selected Lee Gabel as his successor. Gabel retired in 1959 and in 1994 chose Lance Burton to succeed him as America’s premier magician. The Monte Carlo, at a cost of $30 million, built Burton a special theater in 1997 and he has been performing there ever since. “Lance is a classical magician and a classy act,” says his publicist, Wayne Bernath. “He does it all. He’s laid back and loves his audience.”
The production has been edited down to about one hour short of the performance time of the original show in London. Having seen the show both in London and Los Angeles we wondered if we’d feel cheated by the Las Vegas shortened version but, no, we felt the pacing was better and the story line improved by the editing. We hardly noticed what was missing.
Not everyone’s cup of tea, not subtle theater like KA where you have to puzzle out what’s going on. This in your face show is a performance by young women who are comfortable with their sexuality, confident of their appearance and who enjoy being provocative. The audience was a mixed one of all ages, some vocal with their enthusiasm and encouragement as if they were poster boys for What Happens in Las Vegas Stays in Las Vegas. Crazy Girls began in 1987 and is the longest running cabaret show in Las Vegas. It is also one of the least expensive shows – and the plot is not complicated because there really isn’t one! 
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© 2003-2025, Eric Anderson
Eric G. Anderson
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Eric Anderson