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March 28, 2024

Hits keep coming for ‘Showstoppers’; Michael Grimm unveiled at Silverton

‘Steve Wynn’s Showstoppers’ Press Conference

Denise Truscello / WireImage / DeniseTruscello.net

Vocalists Kerry O’Malley, Lindsay Roginski, Nicole Kaplan, David Burnham, Randal Keith and Andrew Ragone attend the press conference for “Steve Wynn’s Showstoppers” in Encore Theater on Saturday, Dec. 20, 2014, in Wynn Las Vegas.

‘Steve Wynn’s Showstoppers’ Press Conference

Director Philip William McKinley, Andrea Wynn, Steve Wynn and choreographer Marguerite Derricks attend the press conference for “Steve Wynn’s Showstoppers” in Encore Theater on Saturday, Dec. 20, 2014, in Wynn Las Vegas. Launch slideshow »

The Kats Report Bureau hit the Strip thrice over on Thursday, sitting in the morning with “Steve Wynn’s Showstoppers” director Phil McKinley at Tableau in Wynn Las Vegas and later watching consecutive shows at Windows in Bally’s and Foundation Room in Mandalay Bay.

During this trek along the boulevard, breakfast and dinner were served, a murder was solved, dancing was enacted, and we delighted in some yacht rock.

For those specifics, and more, read through this raking …

• Two numbers have been added to “Showstoppers” beginning Thursday night. Lindsay Roginski sings, “If They Could See Me Now” from “Sweet Charity,” and Randal Keith delivers “Once in a Lifetime” from “Stop the World, I Want to Get Off.” This keeps in line with Steve Wynn’s idea of moving numbers into the production as it evolves.

As McKinley said, exit surveys of ticketholders who have just seen the show indicate that they feel the show is too short. With the new numbers, the running time is closer to 90 minutes than the 80 or so that has been the norm in the show’s opening month. No numbers have been dropped as these two have been inserted. The cast is so advanced in rehearsing these new acts that an entire number can be completed, start to finish, in a single day.

“What I like most about this show is it’s just talent,” McKinley said. “The spectacle in the show comes out of the talent that is onstage. The singers, the dancers and the orchestra itself. I like the fact that there is something in town now that is based on talent. … I love the Cirque shows, and I love ‘Le Reve,’ but there is no substitute for the pure talent that we have in this show.”

Michael Grimm at Ovation Lounge

Bill Medley and Michael Grimm perform at Ovation Lounge at Green Valley Ranch on May 9, 2011. Launch slideshow »

• Michael Grimm is opening a new autobiographical music showcase, titled aptly “Grimm,” at the Silverton’s Veil Showroom beginning Saturday night (tickets start at $25, with VIP packages at $35 and $45, and are available at Silverton.com and by calling (702) 914-8557). The show promises “a visual and auditory journey of Grimm’s fairytale story.” That fairytale culminated in his winning Season 5 of “America’s Got Talent” in September 2010.

Grimm has hopscotched Las Vegas venues since winning that championship. Currently, he also performs regularly at Ron DeCar’s Viva Las Vegas Event Center, with his next show at that dinner club Jan. 24. He’s back at Silverton on Jan. 31, the same night the young singer he topped in “AGT,” Jackie Evancho, plays Reynolds Hall at the Smith Center. That marks the first time the two finalists of Season 5 will have played Las Vegas on the same night.

• “I Don’t Have a Clue” is the above-referenced show at Windows in Bally’s that I caught Thursday night. It’s performed at 6 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays at Windows, and it’s not long of that venue. The last night is Jan. 29, but is said to have a lead on a new room.

One thing to be said: The “Clue” show is performed from one of the most intricate and voluminous scripts of any production in town. It’s a lot for the cast to process and perfect, and they deliver ably. As you might have deciphered, the show is based on the popular board game and also the movie based on the board game. A different suspect, location and weapon used in the murder of “Mr. Bawdy” is selected randomly by dinner guests who mark off the characters, weapons and locations on scorecards throughout the show.

That element keeps the cast on its toes as even they are not sure which cards have been selected and tucked into an envelope onstage. They need to have a monologue ready for any conceivable outcome. Thursday it was the erratically disaffected Prof. Plummer (Ryan Remark) in the conservatory with the pipe. The rest of players deserve a shout: Breon Jenay (Milka Non White), Doug Pritchard (Sen. Greenback), Kellie Wright (Ms. Peacockney), Gret Menzies (Ms. Scarlatte), J.P. Raniola (Mr. Bawdy and the show’s director), Lou De Meis (Butler Bob) and Dominic Calandra (Col. Mustard).

Windows is a pretty room, but also pretty tucked away upstairs at Bally’s. Shows have a tough time building audiences there, and all I can say about this dinner experience is to clue me on the next opening night. I’ll pack a candlestick.

Click to enlarge photo

Guests John Acosta and Anne Martinez join Jon Celentano in a performance by Michael "Mack" Donald's Pleasure Cruise at Foundation Room on Thursday, Jan. 15, 2015, in Mandalay Bay.

• Quick list of songs in the setlist for the Michael “Mack” Donald Pleasure Cruise performance at Foundation Room in Mandalay Bay: “Hold the Line,” by Toto; “Ride Like the Wind” by Michael McDonald and Christopher Cross; and “The Pina Colada Song,” by Rupert Holmes. This is the city’s pre-eminent, and only, act based on the best yacht rock hits of the ’70s and ’80s. You know yacht rock when you hear it, but the loose definition is it’s songs to be played while yachting. Or while dressed as yacht crew in a groovy venue at Foundation Room.

Celentano brothers Jon and Jeff, along with veteran Las Vegas performer Rick Duarte, are the masterminds of this act, with Jon performing a better-than-credible tribute to McDonald. Thursday’s was the second no-admission show at Foundation Room, where director Steve Gray is booking a variety of events to cater primarily to members. But the Pleasure Cruise is open for anyone, provided you can handle the waves.

• More on John Payne and his plans, post-“Rock Vault,” now that the litigation between him and the show’s producers has been settled. I had noted previously that Westgate was not named in his original complaint, but the hotel was indeed part of the complaint he filed after being cut loose from the show. And Payne did meet with Westgate officials recently to cool the temperature after the legal settlement was ironed out, but don't count on a Payne production moving into the famous Westgate Theater (Elvis rocked that place, as you might know) anytime soon.

What Payne is presenting is “a musical that will explore new technologies and a not-seen-before format for a Las Vegas show.”

We are to be further educated about this show, certainly. My question: What about ferns? Will there be ferns?

Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at Twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow “Kats With the Dish” at Twitter.com/KatsWiththeDish.

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