Logout

Question of the Day - 18 May 2012

Q:
Your April 30 QOD response mentioning "Casino Diaries" got me thinking about Las Vegas-based reality shows. For a while there, it seemed that every cable and network channel had a show ("Las Vegas," "The Defenders," "American Casino," etc.), but now, except for the show about the Las Vegas jail and "CSI," they have all but disappeared. I doubt it's due to a lack of stories available, so was it just overload?
A:

We confess to having a fundamental problem with the whole concept of "reality" television (can there really be any such thing, and if so, can any of the Las Vegas examples really be it?), but we'll leave that aside for another day.

In answer to your question, while a lot of these series you mentioned (we hate to be pedantic, but we definitely draw the line at calling "CSI" a "reality" show!), plus others like "Real World Las Vegas" (two seasons), "Rehab: Party at the Hard Rock" (three seasons), not to mention even more such precious gems as "The Gun Store," "Goodfellas Bail Bonds," "Gold Diggers," and "Bachelorette Party: Las Vegas" have thankfully apparently run their respective courses, there may be more Las Vegas-based reality TV than you seem to be aware of.

Of course, the likes of "Holly's World" (two seasons and counting), "Pawn Stars" (six seasons, with more in the pipeline), and spinoff "Rick's Restorations," are not casino-oriented, they are still based in Las Vegas (we assume the former is, since Holly lives here, although we confess to never actually having watched it). And did you know about the ongoing Vegas Stripped reality series on Travel Channel, featuring the staff and customers of South Point?

L.A. producers were on the search for potential real-life Vegas characters last year for a series titled "Trailer Park Housewives," but we've heard nothing since the October, 2011 submission deadline and whether that one will ever make it to your screen reamins to be seen. A Discovery Channel series scheduled to be filmed around the Las Vegas coroner's office was scrapped after the pilot episode. Frankly, we were flabbergasted when we first heard about this project, since the current writer formerly worked for a U.K. production company that was taken under when a series about the coroner's office in Nashville went horribly wrong (identifiable cases were inadvertently featured without the deceaseds' families' consent...) -- and that was for Discovery Channel, too!

Still, although these two projects may have fizzled, we read that the company behind "Trailer Park Housewives" (and "The Gun Store" etc., referenced above), has been contracted by Showtime to make a third series of "Gigolos," the series about the lives of five male Sin City escorts that debuted in Apri, 2011. Filming is scheduled to commence next month, the last we heard. And TruTV, which brought us "Rehab," has since produced two series of "Vegas Strip," the reality show following Metro cops, with the last episode we're aware of having aired at the end of February. (We're not sure if this one's ongoing or not.)

So, with hits like "Pawn Stars" (now the second-most-watched reality show, behind "Jersey Shore") continuing to blaze a trail, when blogger Vegas Chatter attended the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) expo that took place here last month, she found producers from Discovery, TLC, etc. in a bullish frame of mind about the potential for new Vegas reality series (everyone's looking for the next "Pawn Stars.") The Nevada Film Office reports that no less than 77 reality television productions came to Nevada in 2011, so stay tuned...

Also, look out for a slew of Las Vegas/gambling-based movies in the works, including Lay the Favorite, starring Rebecca Hall, Bruce Willis, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Vince Vaughn, the real-life story of stripper-turned-sports-handicapper Beth Raymer, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January and should be slated for general release any time now. Back in April, Russell Brand and Julianne Hough were spotted filming the wrap scene for an unnamed movie about a small-town girl who survives a plane crash but is left horribly scarred and faithless, until she meets a Las Vegas bartender, while the same week Woody Harrelson, Michael Caine, Mark Ruffalo, and Jesse Eisenberg were also in town wrapping a movie called Now You See Me.

Jim Carrey and Steve Carrell are also allegedly co-starring as rival magicians in a movie that was filming in town last December, while rumors continue that Training Day director Antoine Fuqua, who's name has been linked to a possible Tupac Shakur biopic (which would also feature Las Vegas, of course), will direct Storming Las Vegas, an adaptation of the book about a real-life casino robber Jose Vigoa, sub-titled "How a Cuban-Born, Soviet-Trained Commando Took Down The Strip to the Tune of Five World Class Hotels, Three Armored Cars, and Millions of Dollars." Oh, and then history fans should have a treat this fall, when CBS' new series "Vegas" about former '60s Sheriff Ralph Lamb, starring Dennis Quaid and Michael Chiklis, is set to premiere. You can catch a sneak peek here courtesy of the Washington Post.

Hence, although the torrent of Travel Channel coverage may currently have slowed to a trickle, you should have no difficulty satisfying your appetite for Las Vegas "reality" -- or fiction -- in coming months.

Update 18 May 2012
Many thanks to the reader who wrote in with the following additions/updates to today's answer: A few notes about Las Vegas reality shows in your May 18th Question of the day. - The most recent episode of the Bad Girls Club on the Oxygen network was filmed in Las Vegas. The season recently finished but it's still running in reruns on the cable network. - The Vegas Strip reality show (a personal favorite of mine) is supposedly filming a new season now and will premiere in July according to the below link. - Finally, I really enjoyed the "Vegas Stripped" show about the South Point hotel and casino on the Travel Channel network but I don't think it will have a 2nd season. The last two episodes were shown at erratic times (one was first shown at 2:30am), the show isn't on Travel Channels current list of television shows, and it hasn't been on it's television schedule since March. Plus there's this link from the Las Vegas Sun.
No part of this answer may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without the written permission of the publisher.

Have a question that hasn't been answered? Email us with your suggestion.

Missed a Question of the Day?
OR
Have a Question?
Tomorrow's Question
Has Clark County ever considered legalizing prostitution?

Comments

Log In to rate or comment.