It was back in 2002 when news first broke of plans to build a seven-story, $35 million theater behind Bally’s to house a new water-themed spectacular called Aquaria. Apparently, the show was to feature an internationally themed retelling of the mythical Greek story of the goddess Persephone, complete with snowboarding and ice-skating, as well as a giant water tank for the obligatory swimmers and divers. Part of the interest in the story stemmed from the fact that swimming legend Esther Williams was apparently signed up to design the costumes and co-produce the show ... "Just as I was getting ready to pack it in," the 78-year old Williams reportedly told Variety that April.
In the ‘40s and ‘50s, Esther Williams became a household name and national sweetheart as a result of a new Hollywood genre, the "swimming movie." A champion swimmer, in 1940 Williams’ Olympic dreams were shattered by the intervention of World War II and the cancellation of the Tokyo games, but her athletic body and movie-star good looks soon saw her embarking on a new career, starring opposite Johnny Weismuller in Broadway’s first swimsuit spectacle, The Aquacade. From there she went on to take the lead in the Hollywood hit Bathing Beauty, choreographed by Busby Berkeley, followed by 25 more movies and a legion of magazine covers. Famous for her risqué costumes ("They knew how to fit a crotch!" she remarked to Variety of the design team who made her famous swimsuits), she went on to design her own Esther Williams Collection, based on the retrospective full-cut style of the ‘50s and aimed at the more mature woman, as well as producing several TV specials and endorsing a line of private swimming pools.
So that’s the background, and then came the 2002 rumor. For a while the story went cold. But it resurfaced in 2003, as reported in the August edition of LVA Lite: "Bally's has announced that it's creating a new water-based spectacle called Aquaria, to be housed in a specially designed 2,000-seat theater being built on the east side of the casino, near a future stop on the Las Vegas monorail. Esther Williams, famed for her exquisitely choreographed ‘swimming-spectacular’ films, is signed on as a show co-producer. Aquaria is scheduled to debut sometime in 2005."
But now here we are, midway through 2008, and once again there’s been a deafening silence. We sent an enquiry to the official Esther Williams Web site at www.esther-williams.com, but received no response, so we phoned Bally’s box office to get the latest, which is: The show is firmly off the agenda. The lady we spoke with couldn’t supply a reason, but informed us that the decision to scrap Aquaria pre-dated the property’s purchase by Harrah’s.
So that’s the last word -- for now -- on this on/off production. If we hear any plans to resurrect the idea in the future, we'll be sure to pass them along.
Photograph courtesy of Las Vegas News Bureau.
