Las Vegas Sun

April 18, 2024

John Katsilometes on how Wayne Brady draws inspiration from his daughter, one of the more vocal fans at his show

Never let it be said that Wayne Brady does not put on a family show. He does - for his family. In the audience at Brady's high-RPM "Making It Up" performance Saturday night at the Venetian was his 4-year-old daughter, Maile, whom Brady says has been an inspiration since before she was even born.

In an interview published in Jet magazine from February 2003, just before Maile's delivery, Brady said he wants his daughter to have the self-confidence he lacked as a youth.

"I was teased horribly as a child and beaten up a lot," he told the magazine. "I had a horrible stutter; I got my butt kicked by bigger kids in school for breakfast, lunch and tea. I want my child to not be that person. I want her to be popular. I want her to have self-confidence. I want her to be comfortable being herself because those were the things that I never had."

After observing Maile during Saturday night's show, self-confidence hardly seems a problem. During a bit when Brady's sidekick, Jonathan Mangum, asked the audience to shout "something you do," Maile cut through the din with, "Homework!" And several times she seemed primed to rush the stage from her front-row seat, especially during Brady's show-ending tribute to James Brown.

As for the show's adult content - and there is a lot of it - Brady said to his daughter, "I'll explain it to you later, honey."

NoteMart

Wynn-some couple: According to a story in People magazine, Steve Wynn has hosted Katie Couric and her new love interest, entrepreneur Brooks Perlin, at his Sun Valley, Idaho, home. Couric and Perlin like the skiing up there ...

Wichita, Kan., is abuzz over New Frontier owner Phil Ruffin's proposal to build a casino in that city's downtown region. Ruffin, who has several business interests in the area (among them a couple of greyhound race parks) says he would have Donald Trump run the resort. The two share that sort of business arrangement in the Trump International project on the Strip, but Ruffin's casino plans for Wichita face an obstacle because of a state law forbidding anyone from owning a dog track and a casino in the same area ...

Four Kegs at 267 No. Jones Blvd. is hosting a viewing party from 8 p.m. to midnight today to celebrate the tavern's appearance on the Food Network's "Diners, Dives and Drive-Ins." During that time, the tavern's famed strombolis, pizzas and wings will be half price, or two-for-one, however you want to slice it ...

For the past couple of months, Talk of the Town, the strip club on Las Vegas Boulevard South (several cartwheels north of the Stratosphere), has retained female swingers. They are, in fact, on swings, at the front of the business, joining the statue of Marilyn Monroe (which revives the flying skirt scene from "Seven Year Itch") to help draw attention to the adult emporium. The women are not dancers and are paid a by-the-hour rate, usually from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m., to simply swing ...

When does a crawfish boil morph in to an NFL Draft party? When more than 400 LSU alumni attend a party on NFL Draft day and four Bayou Bengals are drafted in the first round. The LSU grads convened at Sierra Gold on Interstate 215 and Jones Boulevard for their annual boil, which then turned into a celebration (or, maybe a wake, considering all the talent LSU lost) for first-rounders JaMarcus Russell, LaRon Landry, Dwayne Bowe and Craig Davis ...

A conversation with a person who knows a little about marketing resulted in this idea: The coveted seat that figures into the plot of "Monty Python's Spamalot" could be used as a method of cross-promotion for Vegas celebs. That seat could be saved for headliners and stars of Strip productions, or even the mayor, if he can find the time. Seeing John O'Hurley welcome, say, Wayne Newton to the stage would be worth the effort ...

Yot club: Plate on a green Yukon, MOMSYOT.

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