Tara Conner snubs crown from Vegas club

Former Miss USA Tara Conner was set to be crowned Miss Jet 2008 on Saturday night.

Miss Jet is a heavily advertised promotion for the Las Vegas nightclub Jet at Mirage that began last year to coincide in Vegas with the Miss America pageant.

But the event did not happen as planned. Conner did not come to Jet to get crowned. From what I hear, her management pulled her out of the party at the last minute.

This is not the first time in Tara Conner's brief career that she has left a Vegas club in the lurch.

In December 2006, she was to turn 21 at a highly publicized party at Pure at Caesars. Conner canceled at the last moment after a controversy erupted over her alleged underage drinking in New York. She also entered rehab.

But the rehabbed Conner has not stayed away from Vegas. On the contrary, she has become part of the Vegas club scene. In December she celebrated her 22nd birthday by going to Pure. This was also the anniversary of canceling on Pure for her previous birthday. But that night too resulted in a miniature controversy over how much or if Conner drank.

So, after ditching Jet, which is owned by the Light Group, this weekend, Conner has now canceled events on both the major players in Vegas nightlife: Pure Management Co. and Light Group.

My guess is that Tara Conner has worn out her welcome as a nightclub hostess in Vegas.

No word yet as to who will be taking her place as Miss Jet 2008.

(Photo by Sarah Gerke)

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12:19 PM PT, Jan 28 2008 in Jet Nightclub | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Jet, You Know, Like the McCartney Song

Looking at the Rolling Stone magazine Vegas package I notice one boo-boo in the magazine's list of "Trendiest Nightlife Bottle Clubs." These would be the places where the price of a table is a really, really, really overpriced bottle of something. Anyway, Rolling Stone singles out for praise a nightclub the magazine refers to as The Mirage at The Mirage, describing the vibe as "candlelike lighting and intimate side rooms make this young-crowd favorite feel like the ultimate make-out playroom — with cocktails!" That would be a fair description of Jet, the only nightclub at the Mirage.

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02:22 PM PT, Sep 26 2006 in Jet Nightclub | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Red Carpet at Jet

I don't do a lot of red carpet VIP work because the interviews are shallow, the fans are loud and the celebrities tend to be people I have never heard of. But change is good and so I went to the red carpet opening at Jet, the new nightclub at Mirage.

There is a system to this. First the celebrities are feted. In this case that ceremony was observed at Stack, the new restaurant at Mirage. Then one at a time, they are sent to work on the carpet line- signing autographs, posing for pictures and doing interviews at decent intervals so they won't feel the hot breath of another celebrity closing in on them.

What's key though is not the red carpet (which hardly anyone notices), but the backdrop wall that plasters the Jet and Mirage logos over and over so that no cropping can remove the promotional value of every picture taken. Most stars turned out to be pretty good sports. Lance Bass almost had to be pushed off the carpet and into the club. Shannon Elizabeth was the best when it came to signing autographs. And, of course, hate them or love them the Hilton sisters stole the show making the fans scream extra loud and the cameras snap extra fast. Then there was the one poor sport: Leonardo DiCaprio. DiCaprio entered swiftly, almost sprinting the carpet, with a hat pulled snug on his head as he ducked down and surrounded by a posse. He looked less like a guy going to a nightclub than someone who had just been indicted.

More pics after the jump

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