Friday, Sept. 10, 1999 | 9:50 a.m.
Hot nights, a tepid island atmosphere and just fair food fare make for a lackluster luau.
The "Hawaiian Hot Luau -- Imperial Style" with Rozita Lee's "Drums of the Islands" opened eight years ago at the Imperial Palace, and not much seems to have changed since.
With the renaissance the Strip is currently experiencing this simple show could be a respite, a return to simplicity, but it lacks in a few key areas: food, atmosphere and comfort. Some authentic Polynesian dishes, a few tiki torches around the crowd and a realignment of the seating might make this a worthwhile event amid the flash of other Las Vegas shows.
The poolside show's doors open at 6:30 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays. For the $26.95 ticket price, the Imperial Palace boasts an "extravagant Polynesian-style seafood dinner buffet" with unlimited mai tais and pina coladas.
The show runs through mid-October, which may just give the hotel enough time to make some changes.
The buffet was slightly above standard fare -- heavy on well-prepared cold salads and, of course, roast beef and pork, which were moist and delicious -- but the food didn't add to the luau experience as it should.
The atmosphere is one of, well, a wedding reception gone bad. Strangers sit facing each other at long tables that run perpendicular to the stage, which is too far away for guests seated in the back to see the muscular movements and comedic ad-libs of the talented dancers.
Instead, those sweating in the back 40 eventually turn to the sparse table decorations -- whole pineapples set in deep, black ashtrays with plastic flower leis wrapped around the prickly fruit -- to entertain themselves. By the time the "fireknife" dancers come out with flaming torches, guests are fanning themselves with paper plates left over from dinner.
Although it takes place poolside, the only glimpse of the cool water is on the way to the hot food. If it were set in a more open configuration, it might be less stifling and more enjoyable to those squinting by the bushes to see one of the celebrity impersonators from the hotel's "Legends in Concert" show make an appearance onstage.
The show starts out quiet with blue print-clad Hawaiian dancers lulling the audience as the buffet line starts its slow conga by the light of the heat lamps.
Rozita Lee, the evening's emcee, asks the typical lounge show questions of the audience: "Any birthday's out there? Anniversaries? Special occasions?" She pulls willing celebrants onto the stage to learn a Hawaiian dance. Throughout the show Lee makes personal announcements to audience members such as, "Mike, your wife just wants to say ... she loves you."
The show picks up speed just as diners get hyped up on the large selection of desserts and coffee. It's at this point that the show finally feels like a luau with conch shells blowing and the lighting of the tiki torches behind the expressive dancers.
Tourists may enjoy "Hawaiian Hot Luau." Buffet-jaded Las Vegans? Not so much.
