{"id":8387,"date":"2012-01-30T16:51:00","date_gmt":"2012-01-31T00:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=8387"},"modified":"2020-09-05T06:15:38","modified_gmt":"2020-09-05T14:15:38","slug":"luck-you-a-new-gaming-bonanza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/luck-you-a-new-gaming-bonanza\/","title":{"rendered":"“Luck” you!; A new gaming bonanza?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Last week, Mandalay Bay<\/strong> hosted an advance screening of the pilot episode of Luck<\/em>, which debuted on HBO<\/strong> last night. If it was hard to follow on the ginormous MBay screen, I cannot imagine how impenetrable it seemed on a humble TV set. Before the showing, an HBO executive rhapsodized about the “elevated writing” of showrunner David Milch<\/strong> (Deadwood<\/em>), which expressed itself in three ways: A)<\/strong> obscure gambling argot; B)<\/strong> conversations about goat testicles and the like; C)<\/strong> “Fuck you, you dumb fucking dumbfuck” sorts of badinage. Set in the demimonde of horseracing, Luck<\/em> manages to simultaneously deglamorize the Sport of Kings and make it viscerally thrilling. It owes the excitement to director\/executive producer Michael Mann<\/strong>‘s fondness for tiny HD cameras, which enable him to obtain all manner of improbable in-race perspectives (sort of like being Jiminy Cricket<\/strong> on a jockey’s shoulder). Unfortunately, Mann has also encouraged the actors to mumble shamelessly (co-lead John Ortiz<\/strong> is virtually incomprehensible), which hardly makes the horse-player esoterica easier to follow. Luck ought to come with subtitles and<\/em> footnotes.<\/p>\n

\"\"Horseracing, card rooms and casino gambling all get black eyes because they’re equated with Dustin Hoffmann<\/strong>‘s senile mobster — imagine Rain Man<\/strong> with Alzheimer’s — whose endgame appears to be a covert takeover of a Sacramento<\/strong>-area track, which he will then convert into a racino, complete with table games. Given Hoffmann’s irascibility, it’s understandable that no one has told him this will require a minimum of one California<\/strong> constitutional amendment, not to mention redrawing every tribal compact in the Golden State. Besides, he’d probably respond with, “Qantas<\/strong> never crashes.”<\/p>\n

\"\"But why bother with plausibility? Luck<\/em> doesn’t. Dennis Farina<\/strong> seems far too sharp a cookie for the dumb-as-dirt Mob gofer role (the kind of palooka part that used to be stamped, “Property of Burt Young<\/strong>“). Horse players are depicted as a greasy, degenerate bunch, embodied by the hyper-twitchy likes of Kevin Dunn<\/strong> and Ian Hart<\/strong>. And Richard Kind<\/strong> (right<\/em>) must have been mighty famished, as he devours every piece of scenery within reach as a stammering, excitable jockey’s agent. As good as it is to see Jill Hennessy<\/strong> (Claire Kincaid of sainted memory from Law & Order<\/em>), she’s got a nothing role as a veterinarian. Also featured is “jockey turned actor” Gary Stevens<\/strong> … at least they got the “jockey” part right. The only thespian who comes out ahead in the game is Nick Nolte<\/strong>, as a grizzled — what else? — horse trainer. Brooding under a straw fedora, Nolte grinds a lifetime of regret out of every monosyllabic utterance.<\/p>\n

Upcoming on Luck<\/em><\/strong>: Nefarious Asian card players, acting heavyweights Michael Gambon<\/strong> and J\u00fcrgen Prochnow<\/strong>, and lowlifes being chopped up and sent to Davey Jones’ Locker. Hasn’t Dexter<\/em> done that gambit to death … so to speak?<\/p>\n

\"\"If a trendy new agenda is enacted<\/strong>, there is one outcome that will be as inevitable as death and even more so than taxes: gambling expansion. It doesn’t matter whether you have limited casinos (Kansas<\/strong>, Maine<\/strong>, Ohio<\/strong>) or none (South Carolina<\/strong>). When those tax-starved budgets don’t balance, the primary and secondary means of redress are going to be expanded gambling and higher gaming taxes. You definitely<\/em> don’t need a weather man to know which direction this wind is blowing. Missouri<\/strong> could find itself between Scylla<\/strong> and Charybdis<\/strong>, because Ameristar Casinos<\/strong> and Pinnacle Entertainment<\/strong> (primarily) agreed to a tax hike contingent upon<\/em> permanently capping the number of licenses in the state. True, that can be revoked by means of a ballot initiative … but those agreed-upon tax increases go out the window, too. Of course, if you’re the executive of Joe’s Casino Entertainment<\/strong> or whatever, this “starve the beast” trend is excellent news because it means that even the most straitlaced, puritanical lawmakers are going to have to suck it and let you set up shop in their state. If you thought casinos were spreading like prairie fire (Nebraska<\/strong> is debating legalization this week), you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week, Mandalay Bay hosted an advance screening of the pilot episode of Luck, which debuted on HBO last night. If it was hard to follow on the ginormous MBay screen, I cannot imagine how impenetrable it seemed on a … 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":[40,34,67,45,147,39,71,30,90,111,130,31,20,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8387"}],"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=8387"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8387\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27914,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8387\/revisions\/27914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}