{"id":14959,"date":"2014-11-06T14:50:26","date_gmt":"2014-11-06T22:50:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=14959"},"modified":"2022-03-31T06:38:11","modified_gmt":"2022-03-31T14:38:11","slug":"showman-steve-wholl-take-bucharest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/showman-steve-wholl-take-bucharest\/","title":{"rendered":"Showman Steve; Who’ll take Bucharest?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rather than hire out entertainment for his Wynncore showroom (the one not occupied by Le Reve<\/em><\/a>), Steve Wynn has taken a DIY approach. He’s producing and co-writing<\/a> Showstoppers<\/em>, a revue of some of the most iconic songs<\/a> from Broadway<\/strong> musicals. It’ll \"Steve<\/a>cost a tiny fraction ($10 million) of the budget of a Cirque du Soleil<\/strong> show and the anti-Cirque approach was part of the attraction, according to Wynn himself.\u00a0“We can’t just surrender to Cirque du Soleil.\u00a0How many shows can you stand of that stuff. Jumping, popping, swinging. I mean, enough already,” said the man who brought Cirque to the Las Vegas Strip<\/strong>. Besides, creative personnel include choreographer Marguerite Derricks<\/strong>, a Zumanity<\/em><\/a> veteran. Randal Keith<\/strong>, the best King Arthur I’ve seen in Spamalot<\/em>, will topline the show. The 28 dancers outnumber the original A Chorus Line<\/em>‘s 18.<\/p>\n

Showstoppers<\/em> may not have have the whimsical grotesquerie of Cirque but it won’t lack for production values. It will have a cast of 34 and a lavish orchestra of 30.\u00a0“We’ve got to do our own thing here,” Wynn said, dismissing long-running rumors that Spider-Man, Turn off the Dark<\/em> would land at Wynncore<\/strong>. (He did snare Spider-Man<\/em> director William Philip McKinley<\/strong>, though.)\u00a0“If you hire stars, they get all the money,” he added, suggesting that perhaps he’d soured on the arrangement that brought Garth Brooks<\/strong> to the Strip. Wynn knows how to cater to millennials but Showstoppers<\/em> is unabashedly for Baby Boomers. We’ll see if enough of them plunk down the $90\/seat ticket price. Performances begin Dec. 16. Then we’ll get the verdict on\u00a0\u201cthe most personal project I\u2019ve worked on in my whole life.\u201d<\/p>\n

* When Steve Beshear<\/strong> (D) was elected governor of Kentucky<\/strong>, in 2008, on a pro-gambling platform, Columbia Sussex<\/strong> jumped the gun and purchased the Bavarian \"BavarianBrewing\"<\/a>Brewing Co<\/strong>. building in Covington<\/strong>, derelict since 2006. Fast-forward to 2014 and Beshear still hasn’t been able to get casino gambling through the Bluegrass State’s Legislature, leaving ColSux CEO William J. Yung<\/strong> with something of a white elephant on his hands, one he’d like to tear down, his sale price having proven excessive<\/a>. Although the brewery is on the National Register of Historic Places<\/strong>, that can’t save it from demolition. Local grass-roots activists are trying to gin up a protest<\/a> in the face of a do-or-die Urban Design Review Board<\/strong> meeting on Nov. 17. But they concede that outrage at Yung is waning and they need to rally public support. As for ColSux, it would replace the brewery with “high-rise condominiums, retail outlets, parking structures” — but no casino anymore. (The company has gotten out of the gambling business following a series of catastrophic setbacks.)<\/p>\n

* While Horseshoe Baltimore<\/strong> continues to lead gambling revenues in Maryland<\/strong>
\nupward, it’s only delivered a glancing blow to Maryland Live<\/strong>, off 3% last month. \"Harrahs<\/a>Even a 10% dip in September was less than projected. Having sampled Horseshoe, Maryland Live patrons appear to be reverting to familiar habits. (Horseshoe revenues, in their first two months, are holding rock-steady<\/a>.) Caesars Entertainment<\/strong> executives say they have made “incremental week-over-week gains” in terms of converting Baltimore Ravens<\/strong> to Horseshoe fans. October was a good month for Rocky Gap Casino<\/strong>, where revenue grew by 11% but not so good for Penn National Gaming<\/strong>‘s forlorn\u00a0Hollywood Casino Perryville<\/strong>, where it dropped 11%.<\/p>\n

* Caesars Bucharest<\/strong>? It may never happen and certainly not while tax rates in the country hover at 25%. Romania<\/strong>‘s parliament is mulling tax reductions<\/a>, poker rakes of a tenth of a percent and the extension of licenses from five to 10 years. (Casinos have been legal in Romania but no international operator has applied for one.) Don’t get your hopes up:\u00a0Comparable reforms were proposed last year but went nowhere.<\/p>\n

* Phil Ivey<\/strong> will appeal the ruling of a London<\/strong> court that he cheated<\/a> while playing at a Genting Group<\/strong> casino.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rather than hire out entertainment for his Wynncore showroom (the one not occupied by Le Reve), Steve Wynn has taken a DIY approach. He’s producing and co-writing Showstoppers, a revue of some of the most iconic songs from Broadway musicals. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[80,15,70,28,4,120,7,22,116,72,69,74,32,9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14959"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14959"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14959\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30946,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14959\/revisions\/30946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}