Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Notes: Heat rises from Mirage; Zowie Bowie keeps it real at GVR; AIDS charities prep for events

2010 Stars and Stripes Foundation at The Mirage

MGM Resorts International

The Mirage President Felix Rappaport welcomes The Stars and Stripes Foundation to The Mirage on Nov. 12, 2010.

Zowie Bowie Opens at Monte Carlo

Zowie Bowies Chris Phillips and Marley Taylor perform during the gala premiere of Vintage Vegas at the Lance Burton Theater at the Monte Carlo on Sunday night. Launch slideshow »

X Burlesque's Fourth Anniversary

X Burlesque's fourth anniversary at the Flamingo on April 7, 2011. Launch slideshow »

Broadway Bares

Emcees Holly Madison and Josh Strickland host Broadway Bares Las Vegas, the first benefit striptease show featuring performers from the Strip, on Sunday, May 24, 2010, at Planet Hollywood. Launch slideshow »
Click to enlarge photo

Zowie Bowie's Marley Taylor and Chris Phillips at the grand opening of Wayne Newton's Once Before I Go at the Tropicana on Oct. 28, 2009.

Click to enlarge photo

X Burlesque's fourth anniversary at the Flamingo on April 7, 2011.

Notes compiled on the streets of VegasVille, where we found something to write about at Mirage, Green Valley Ranch, Flamingo and elsewhere:

• Anyone who expected Felix Rappaport to act as a mere caretaker as president of the Mirage is mistaken. By the end of the year, expect major changes, some of them mere renovations and other massive overhauls, to the hotel’s restaurant lineup. In the offing is a new restaurant partnership with a heretofore-unannounced celebrity with culinary underpinnings. Not just a famous person stamping his or her name on a new eatery, but someone with a deep background in the restaurant industry. There are planned upgrades to Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden, including a marketing campaign targeted to locals who might take that “secret” a bit too seriously.

What can be reported at the moment is an expansion of the entertainment lineup at Terry Fator Theater. Gone is the title “Icons Of Comedy,” the series that has featured such comics as Jay Leno, Ray Romano and Lewis Black. It’s now “The Mirage Master Series,” which expands the scope of shows in the theater to include Steve Martin and his Steep Canyon Rangers banjo/comedy act, and the multimedia one-man show by Larry King. Expect some adventurous booking in the Fator Theater in the coming months. Romano is in town Friday and Saturday, Black is back April 22-23, and Martin’s show -- which should be something special if only because Steve Martin is onstage -- is April 29-30. King’s audio/video storytelling showcase is June 11. There will be a lot of energy, and not just from that searing volcano out front, from the Mirage this year.

• Chris Phillips trotted out the latest version of his “Vintage Vegas” retro show, under the familiar title Zowie Bowie, on Sunday at Green Valley Ranch’s Ovation showroom. All the players in the now 5-year-old Zowie Bowie saga were onstage: Phillips, his ex-fiance Marley Taylor and her boyfriend, trumpet player and band leader David Perrico. Boy was this was a fun show, sort of like a daytime drama set to old Vegas standards.

The chief criticism that I, and many others, had of the old “Vintage Vegas” at Monte Carlo is that the onstage banter of Phillips and Taylor was hardly convincing. They kept joking about this long-planned yet far-off marriage, which was somehow hard to buy. We have since learned why.

But in the new show, the often-snide conversation between Phillips and Taylor is actually pretty funny. At one point, without prompting, Taylor turned to Phillips and jabbed, “Who’s your latest 23-year-old girlfriend? You traded me in for two 20-year-olds, right?” Understandably, Phillips leans heavily on a short glass of Crown Royal (which he’s somehow mixing with Patron for a particularly lethal cocktail) to a degree that he’s putting up Dean Martin consumption numbers. This ever-present prop adds some Rat Pack credibility to a show that is, musically and otherwise, a genuinely good time.

Phillips and Taylor project a genuine love-hate relationship, at least onstage, and after the show, all three joined in meeting and greeting the audience, which was filled almost entirely with friends and family. I really enjoyed Perrico’s role in this whole drama, as he did his best to keep the show’s rudder straight in the face of all the chicanery. At one point, Phillips tried to engage Perrico, who responded, “I just hope the check clears.”

“Vintage Vegas” is mostly Phillips’ affair these days, with Taylor listed as a featured guest. Her and Perrico, fronting the David Perrico Group, are off performing their own original compositions (maybe next at the Las Vegas Hilton), so everyone gets to pursue his or her passions. As Zowie Bowie closes in on five years in Vegas, somehow this all makes sense.

• A revamped “X Burlesque” celebrated its fourth anniversary at Flamingo Las Vegas last week, and the show continues to improve under the guidance of X Empire overlords Matt and Angela Stabile. In the audience at Thursday’s VIP anniversary show was RM Seafood at Mandalay Bay proprietor Rick Moonen enjoying the production to apparent delight.

“X Burlesque” is the show where audience members are so close that those seated up front are often just inches from getting clipped with a flying elbow or 4-inch heel from the pole set in the middle of the intimate showroom, but I’ve never known anyone to complain.

• Note for the weekend: Frankie Moreno is performing at Golden Nugget’s Rush Lounge this weekend, Friday and Saturday, and again April 22-23. The only reason you’d check out Moreno would be to catch a terrific show that could easily be in any Vegas showroom. I keep hinting that Moreno is going to break out something big, and here’s another hint: Watch for him.

• Two charity events benefiting AIDS research and treatment are scheduled for this weekend and next. The annual AIDS Walk, led once more by Rio headliners Penn & Teller, is set for Sunday at World Market Center. P&T are the grand marshals, with Jabbawockeez at Monte Carlo, the cast of “Jersey Boys” at Palazzo, comic Hal Sparks of “Icons of Comedy” at the Hilton, the Vegas glee club On With the Show and The Tap Dancing Twins from “Vegas! The Show” at Saxe Theater all scheduled to take part. Sign-ins are being taken for teams and individuals at 8 a.m., followed by the opening ceremonies and entertainment at 9 and the walk itself at 10:30. (Go to afanlv.org for information.)

Set for midnight April 24 is the second “Broadway Bares: Las Vegas,” again staged at the CHI Showroom (or, more recognizably, the “Peepshow” theater) at Planet Hollywood. All proceeds will be donated to Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, a leading nonprofit organization dedicated to fighting the disease.

Producer Jerry Mitchell, who brought “Peepshow” to Las Vegas, started the event in New York, and last year’s offshoot drew a surprisingly large crowd in its first performance at Planet Hollywood. Performers from “Peepshow,” “Le Reve,” “The Lion King,” “Sirens of T.I.,” “Viper Vixens,” “Zumanity,” “Naked Boys Singing,” “Bite,” “Jubilee!” “Matsuri,” Bazaar Entertainment, “Vegas! The Show,” “Centrifuge at MGM,” Feel the Music Entertainment, “Jersey Boys,” “Strip the Play,” the Vegas production of “Rent,” those late of “Folies Bergere” and various Cirque productions have been rehearsing for the show.

Tickets are $20 (and are tax-deductible), with up-close VIP seats priced at $50, and are available at the CHI Showroom box office, BroadwayBares.com and BroadwayCares.com. It’s a rollicking good time, as we say.

Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow "Kats With the Dish" at twitter.com/KatsWithTheDish.

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