In a statement issued to AP, Michael Jackson's spokesperson, Raymone Bain, offered some interesting quotes to offset the idea that Jackson is not bankable in Vegas. The statement noted: "Mr. Jackson did not move to Las Vegas to shop a Vegas show. Mr. Jackson is in Las Vegas because he likes the city and found it a convenient location to record with artists, songwriters and producers who are working with him in the studio." Yet, the sentence is sort of cagey, too: could shopping a show be an additional item Jackson was hoping to do here? A show in Vegas seemed very much an option being actively considered by Team Jackson during Jackson's recent dinner interview with Robin Leach.
But Bain's statement didn't end with denying Jackson was shopping a show. She added: "Mr. Jackson has been presented with numerous proposals---proposals which he has not solicited, but were presented to him, several of which include performing in Las Vegas. Mr. Jackson is currently reviewing and evaluating each proposal." Several unsolicited offers to perform in Vegas? Several? Of course, not one of these "numerous" Las Vegas (or elsewhere)offers was given specific mention. Are we talking headliner gigs at a MGM or a Harrahs resort? Or, maybe she means offers like the one I am making right now:
Dear Michael Jackson,
I recently bought a new home in Las Vegas. I would like to hold a housewarming party for my friends. I would like to hire you to come perform a concert at my party. I will pay you $20. This will cost me a bit more than the $15.47 it takes to purchase the double disc Essential Michael Jackson to play at the party. But I think it is worth it to have you there to do your famous Moon Walk for my guests. Please let me know ASAP. Yrs., Richard
Of course, cool things happen when you put Dennis Hopper in charge of a
film festival. Still, usually Las Vegas is all about climbing on bandwagons.
This is a town that never is the first to do anything. But today I am taking a
little civic pride in our film festival, CineVegas, for getting a jump on the
Academy in being all about Helen Mirren. Last June I was in the
audience covering at the Palms as CineVegas honored Mirren for her lifetime achievements with
the festival's Marquee Award. After the screening of a film in which she played
Ayn Rand, a Q&A was held between Mirren and a New York Times' film critic.
Mirren discussed playing Queen Elizabeth (a couple Queens Elizabeth, actually)
in great detail. She also talked interestingly about being a not young woman in a youth obsessed business. Today CineVegas has that Q&A (with the always cool Dennis
Hopper presiding in the background) up for all to see on its myspace. (Photo by Sarah Gerke)
I only interviewed Rothman once by phone, we exchanged a couple e-mails and
I never met him in person. I wish now I had let it be otherwise; I think I was
far too intimidated. No book has taught me more about Las Vegas than Rothman's
"Neon Metropolis: How Las Vegas Started the Twenty-First Century" (2002). To
recommend Neon Metropolis to you I've searched through the book this morning
looking for a section of its wisdom and insight about Las Vegas to give you a
taste. In his life, Rothman was a quote machine appearing in almost every
serious article or documentary about Las Vegas (and I mean EVERY). His
writing was on the same level as his speech: lively, deep and quotable. Yet,
going through Neon Metropolis this morning I realized that Rothman's amazing
sound bites are nothing compared to the magnified depths that come from his
carefully constructed chapters.
Even after only three years(and, Rothman's book came out five years ago) almost any other book about Las Vegas is no
longer about contemporary Las Vegas. It is about the past. Pick up a guide book from three years ago
and there is no Wynn, there is still a Stardust, Pure and Tao don't get a
mention and you won't get the slightest hint that Cirque has a Beatles show at
the Mirage. Yet, Rothman's Neon Metropolis reads like it knows (even if it
doesn't mention) all of these things about Las Vegas as well as what is coming
next. In 2007, from the master planned communities, to the history of the town's
golden era to the Vegas of the future, Neon Metropolis remains the single most
relevant book on the subject of Las Vegas. I guess what I am saying is that I am
going to resist offering one of Rothman's pithy quotes and just say that if you
have any interest in Las Vegas or take any pleasure in this blog I can not
recommend Neon Metropolis highly enough.
Finally, I remember the one time I interviewed Rothman, we spoke on the
occasion of a feud about the meaning of Las Vegas between intellectual
heavyweights Bernard-Henry Levy and Francis Fukuyama. After the interview was
over, Rothman said almost wistfully, "You know I really wish they would have
read Neon Metropolis." And, he was so right.
Frequently coverage of Las Vegas reads like a press release. Often there is a good reason for that: Journalists trust and depend on publicists too much. For example, yesterday I quoted a press release (with quotes) about the Crazy Horse Paris show at MGM adding Dita Von Teese as a guest performer that included this sentence: "Dita will perform her sensual ‘Le Bain’ bathtub act, evoking the spirit of the 1950s Crazy Horse star Candida, who lathered and bathed herself on stage more than 1,500 times." Today a variation of this sentence without quotes appears in both the Las Vegas Review-Journal and Las Vegas Sun.
"Von Teese will perform the sensual 'Le Bain' bathtub act made famous in the 1950s by 'Crazy Horse' fixture Candida, who bathed herself onstage more than 1,500 times as one of the high-water marks in the show's long history."
"She will perform her sensual 'Le Bain' bathtub act, channeling the spirit of the 1950s Crazy Horse star Candida, who perfomed it at the Paris club more than 1,500 times."
Of course, on some level we have to trust the publicists for information on some facts but something about how the more evaluative word "sensual" worked its way into both stories from the press release seems wrong.
When the Guggenheim came to the Venetian in 2001 there was great care taken
to preserve the integrity of the venerable art institution in order to protect
the museum's reputation from accusations of "Going Vegas." But things have not
gone as planned with the Guggenheim's fortunes here. The first sign of
failure was that the huge exhibit space designed by architect Rem Koolhaas
closed after one exhibit. That space is now the theatre for the vastly more
middlebrow Phantom of the Opera.
Of course, that still left the boutique Guggenheim Hermitage (a partnership
between the Guggenheim and the State Hermitage Museum in Russia) at the
Venetian. Yet, there have been sporadically persistent rumors, always
denied, that the Venetian was thinking of closing even the Guggenheim
Hermitage. Certainly the museum has had a hard time finding a niche here; for
example, a Robert Mapplethorpe exhibit was the most recent attempt to connect
with Vegas tourists. I doubt it worked.
Now, Kristen Peterson reports in the Las Vegas Sun that the Guggenheim,
while somehow still involved in programing the exhibits, has laid off many of
its Vegas employees. Instead, The Venetian is stepping in to start running the
Guggenheim Hermitage. According to Peterson's story "Both Guggenheim and
Venetian officials are being tight lipped about what that will mean for the five
year old museum." Still, unless you are an art lover, the one quote she gets
from a Venetian spokesperson on the topic is priceless. The Venetian's Ron Reese
says on the issue of the future operation of the casino's Guggenheim Hermitage:
"It will be similar to how we would run our retail and food and beverage
operations." Hamburgers or Picasso: it is all the same in Vegas.
Heidi FIeiss wanted to build a stud farm in Paurump. Her idea was to
simply change genders and run things just like
the female prostitutes live at the legal brothels in Pahrump. In her mind this
would be a place where large groups of men would live in isolated and lockdown
conditions as they wait for visitors to show up and offer them a little
love. The Fliess stud farm project never happened. But, in an odd way, it looks
like Pahrump may be getting that big house packed with men after all.
Dita Von Teese will be a guest performer in the Crazy Horse Paris topless show at
MGM between April 15-20. A celebrity star is certainly a good move for this very
traditional topless show that, while significantly better than similar old
school competitors like Crazy Girls, really can't measure up to the new
generation of erotic entertainment shows on the Strip like Zumanity and
Fashionistas. Both those shows offer a vastly more contemporary take on
sexuality as well as demonstrating more creativity than topless chorus lines and
solo chair dances. Ah, but they don't have Dita Von Teese. According to the
press release:
"Keeping in line with the Crazy Horse Paris tradition, Dita will perform
her sensual ‘Le Bain’ bathtub act, evoking the spirit of the 1950s Crazy Horse
star Candida, who lathered and bathed herself on stage more than 1,500 times.
She also will perform a second seductive surprise act and will be joining the
Crazy Horse dancers in the revived finale 'We Are the Girls of Crazy
Horse."
In other Celine Dion news, Norm in his column this morning reports that her
6 year-old son, Rene Charles, (whose every breath Dion updates a
breathless press on) has started humming to her. She says the first tune the little
prodigy pushed through his lips was the Doors song "Hello, I Love You." One
question: if he was humming can Celine be sure he wasn't performing the Kinks "All Day and All
of the Night"? Either way, this shows better taste than listening to the music of mom.
The controversy continues to rage over the behavior of fans and the
reaction of locals to NBA All-Star Weekend. In the Sun yesterday, Joe Schoenmann
(a former colleague of mine at Las Vegas Weekly) looks at the race issue
(raised on the Buffet last week) noting: "The subtext of all this--generally
spoken in code--is that many of the visitors were black." In the article, MGM
Mirage spokesman Alan Feldman implies as much about the local reaction noting
the term "these people" used in some commentary sounds a lot like code for
race. And, it does. But local journalist Damon Hodge (a current colleague
of mine at Las Vegas Weekly) who frequently covers sports, gangs and crime in
Vegas and who also walked the Strip on NBA All -Star weekend had a very
different perspective. Hodge told the Sun that he saw plenty of out of town
thugs who clearly came to Vegas looking for trouble that weekend, and Hodge
added he hopes never to see anything like NBA All-Star weekend hit the Strip again.
Interestingly, most everyone who Schoenmann quotes who feels that racism was
behind the local response to All-Star Weekend is identified by him as white in the
article while everyone who says that race wasn't the issue only that the crowd
was packed with thugs behaving badly is identified as black. Jason Whitlock,
a sports columnist for Kansas City Star, who was here covering the event put it
this way in the Sun article: "I don't put this on Vegas. I'm black, I love black
people--but this thing, the amount of disrespect I saw, this was ridiculous."
I tuned in to the Academy Award's last night just in time to catch the syrupy
performance by Celine Dion of "I knew I Loved You." The Vegas headliner managed
the near impossible: make the music of Italian composer Ennio Morricone sound
like a B-side to "My Heart Will Go On." Of course, Morricone has written some
amazing music. Who doesn't feel their pulse start picking up speed when hearing
the theme from "The Good the Bad and the Ugly"? And, if you want to see how
deep and far out his music can be explored and interpreted by other
artists, check out John Zorn's wild takes on Morricone compositions. Of course,
there is no substitute for the original scores, and for that there is the fantastic two
disc "The Ennio Morricone Anthology: a Fistful of Music" that came out in 1995.
