Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014 | 5:45 p.m.
Jeff Civillico is finding it easier to stage a charity production for his Win-Win Entertainment Foundation than it was a couple of years ago.
Well, maybe “easier” isn’t the right term.
“It’s a bitch,” Civillico says with a laugh. “That is the formal term.”
But, at least, Civillico’s high visibility as a Strip headliner at the place he calls “The Imperial Palace Quad Linq Showroom” is able to more readily collect headliners for his annual “Headliners’ Bash” charity show at the Rio’s Penn & Teller Theater. The event is set for 8:30 p.m. Friday after a silent auction at 6:30. Civillico was able to hook an impressive cross-section of talented and well-known performers in town.
Among those booked for the show: Clint Holmes, Kelly Clinton-Holmes, Human Nature, Matt Kazam, The Lon Bronson All-Star Band, cast members from “Menopause the Musical,” Skye Dee Miles, Frankie Moreno, Mac King, Melody Sweets and her castmates from “Absinthe,” Eric Jordan Young, Patrick Murray, Polynesian groups Tevakanui and Hot Lava: A Hot Experience! and artists from Cirque du Soleil.
The evening also will include video appearances by Rita Rudner, The Australian Bee Gees and Boyz II Men.
Building such a show requires Civillico to use all of the ample aptitude he’s honed in Las Vegas (and earlier) as a self-propelled headliner. A very funny guy and expert juggler, Civillico has grown from a specialty act in comic/magician Nathan Burton’s show to his own show at what is now the Linq Showroom in the spring of 2012.
“Being a single, four-wall headliner, doing what I’m doing, if I wasn’t involved in the business side, it would be a lot more difficult,” he says. “It’s not just the onstage component, there’s the catering and the sponsorships, making sure all the logos and file formats and sizes are right. … I put everything I have into this, but it is worth it.”
Win-Win is a foundation that connects entertainers to charities and funnels money for production costs to those efforts. The organization arranged for 13 such partnerships two years ago; now it has surpassed 60.
Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at Twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow “Kats With the Dish” at Twitter.com/KatsWiththeDish.
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