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As Fremont East prospers, the Las Vegas Shakespeare Company places a $45 million bet on the Other Downtown. Plus: Light Strikes Twice: rebirth of the Vegas nightclub.
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www.HeraeaLV.com 702.701.0201 HeraeaLasVegas @HeraeaLV
S at u r d ay, M ay 4 t h P a r t y S ta r t S at 2 : 0 0 P Mall woMen wearing derby hatS will be entered into a drawing to win the winning ticket of the derby.
Special brunch menu includes chicken and waffes and a cornbread Skillet.
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[ upcoming ]
may 4-5 California Hotel and Casino hosts the 16th annual Lei Day Polynesian Festival (TamaevaArii.com) may 8-12 34th annual San Gennaro Feast (SanGennaroFeast.com)
A GrAnd AffAirThe grande dame of Las Vegas epicurean fes-
tivalsUNLVinostretched over four days this
year. The biggest bash at the 39th annual event
was, as always, the Grand Tasting, which took
place at Paris Las Vegas and featured more
than 500 international wine selections, as well
as food prepared by UNLV culinary students
and an extravagant auction, whose grand prize
was a World Whiskey Tour for 10. Influential
Las Vegas restaurateur Elizabeth Blau (right)
was honored with the Dom Prignon Award
of Excellence. Once again, UNLVino raised
scholarship money for the universitys William
F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration.
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LocaLs InvIted to dIve Into PooL seasonAs another Memorial Day approaches, so, too,
does another summer of daylife, the poolside
answer to Las Vegas powerhouse nightclub
scene. This year brings a lot of positive change
for locals, with hotel pools seemingly going the
way of most everything else in town and looking
to offer deals that appeal to the citys captive resi-
dent market. In this case, the deal is free entry.
Whether or not attending a pool party is your
idea of a good timeit can get really lets call
it stupid at some of these booze-n-skinfests
well, thats something youll have to decide for
yourself. My sole purpose here is to give you
the seasons first comprehensive list of potential
targets. The rest is up to you.
The list below identifies pools that grant free
entry with a Nevada ID. Trust me: Everything has
been checked and verified, so its valid as of right
now. Trust me again: Many of these policies will
change, some more than once, so try to call ahead
or have a backup plan in case you get denied.
A resort often has multiple pools, some of
which have outside operators, so when a specific
pool is mentioned, the stated policy is for that
pool only. A good example is Caesars Palace,
where there are seven different pools that make
up the resorts Garden of the Gods, but only the
Venus Pool Clubwhich is the actual name of
Caesars topless poolhas free admission Mon-
day through Thursday. Heres the rest of the list:
Free for All: Locals are welcome to hit the pool
at Hooters free of charge any day of the week. The
same is true at the Rios Voodoo Beach and the
Voo (no longer topless); the Stratosphere; the Pond
at Green Valley Ranch (which previously was only
open on weekends); and Planet Hollywood (though
the powers that be are reconsidering this one).
Free for All ... Kind of: Want to check out the
Palms pool scene gratis? You can ... but only until
the end of April. Among the other resorts that
have asterisks afixed to their free-for-locals pool
policies are the Cosmopolitan (free with a players
card, availability permitting); the Cosmos Mar-
quee Dayclub (free Monday-Thursday only); Hard
Rock (Monday-Friday); Palms Place (Monday-
Thursday); Rumors Gossip Pool (free daily unless
theres a special event with a cover charge);
Silvertons Sway Pool Lounge (Monday-Friday,
with a $5 charge on weekends); The Mirages
Bare Pool Lounge (Mondays only); Tropicanas
Bagatelle Beach Club (open weekends only);
and Venetians Tao Beach (Monday-Thursday).
And then theres Mandalay Bays topless Moorea
Beach, which is always free for women. Ditto for
men ... on Thursdays ... from 11 a.m. to noon. (Yep,
thats a one-hour entry window.)
Anthony Curtis is the publisher of the Las Vegas
Advisor and LasVegasAdvisor.com, a monthly
newsletter and website dedicated to finding the
best deals in town.
It dIdnt take a genius to fgure out that the last thing MGM Resorts International was going to build was more hotel rooms; it already has plenty of them. Condos, mean-while, didnt pan out at CityCenter (to put it mildly), so its no surprise that MGM shelved its plans to build a condo tower in front of Mandalay Bay. And room renovations and improvements at existing resortsas necessary as they arewont give the company the wow factor it will need to compete.So whats a casino mega-con-
glomerate to do for its next big move? With the recent announce-ment of The Park, MGM decided to go back to urban basics and plan a street-level experience. The project is comprised of retail/dining de-velopment between New York-New York and Monte Carlo, a renovation of the Strip-front facades of both resorts and a 20,000-seat arena operated by sports and entertain-ment giant AEG.Cynics will say that MGM is just
copying Caesars Entertainments Linq, which also features dining and retail on underutilized space between two casinos. But that doesnt matter. What matters is whether this is a smart movein particular be-cause its the antithesis of CityCenter. CityCenter was pitched as an
urban development that would remake the way people interacted with space along the Strip. But it had severeand I mean severedesign faws that made it impossible to make it truly urban and walkable. Some people thought CityCen-ter was too bold a project for Las
Vegasthat visitors couldnt handle a development that wasnt a large Y-shaped tower. But in truth, City-Center was too conservative; it had too limited a vision. Instead of master-planning just
the 76 acres that ultimately became CityCenter, the visionary move would have been to master-plan the entire span of Las Vegas Boulevard from Tropicana to Flamingo on both sides, taking into account the pieces that MGM controlled as well as the ones it didnt. In other words, the smart move would have been to fgure out how to maximize the value not only of those 76 acres, but also of the entire block. Instead, CityCenter is aloof from the sur-rounding Strip-scape.The Park appears to be a move
to do just what MGM should have done at CityCenter: use undevel-oped space not just to create new revenue streams, but to enhance the value of what the company al-ready has. With more action along the Monte Carlo/New York-New York nexus, MGM will give visitors a reason to spend the afternoon around a stretch of the Boulevard they currently hurry past on their way to see the Bellagio fountains. Even without the arena, this would re-energize that stretch.It will also likely have a spillover
effect for both the Tropicana and MGMs Mandalay Mile properties. But is that good for Las Vegas?
Will it just siphon visitors away from Caesars Linq?I say yes to the frst question
and no to the second. If you look at the history of casinos in Las Vegas, theyve really only thrived when they compete against each other. Going back to the neon explosion of the 1960s, progress has come when one resort builds the biggest neon sign in town, and then another tops it by 10 feet, and does something more elaborate to boot. At the end of the day, Las Vegas gets the Stardust and Dunes signs, and puts new international icons on the map. Strip casinos have been doing this
for years, with neon, pools, buffets, entertainers and nightclubs (but, unfortunately for serious gamblers, not table-game odds). Competition made the city a better attractionand a better value for visitors.During the Great Recession,
thanks in part to overconcentra-tion, Las Vegas lost some of that. Now it appears to be back.Along with Linq and Resorts
World Las Vegas, The Park will broaden the possibilities for visitors to Las Vegas, which is only going to help the city as economic uncer-tainty continues and the travel market becomes more competitive. Thats why The Park will likely be a positive, not just for MGM Resorts, but for the whole city.
David G. Schwartz is the director of UNLVs Center for Gaming Research.
The Meaning of MGMs Park
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last winter, BuzzFeed got a pony. Well, technically it was a min-iature horse named Mystic, and she came by for a visit one morninga surprise treat for hitting a Web-traffc goal. Sure, a cash bonus might have been more practical, but a little pony with pink ribbons in her mane and a tiny gold party hat that stuck up like a unicorns horn? So much cooler. And judging by the photos that employees quickly posted on Facebook and Twitter, Mystics visit was basically the best day ever. At least until the time Grumpy Catthe famous cranky-look-ing felinestopped by.It was enough to make even
a Google employee jealous. Not that Googles New York offces dont have their own enviably
cool visitorsStephen Colbert, Lang Lang and Toni Morrison, to name just a few. Employees also get razor scooters. And pool tables. And arcade games. And subsidized massages. And free gourmet meals. And a full-ser-vice dessert truck permanently parked on the eighth foor.These days, visitors to a New
York offce are as likely to stum-ble into a game of pingpong as they are to fnd suited work-ers shuffing through a grim landscape of carpet tile and cu-bicles. Thrillist has a kegerator; building-mate Foursquare has shuffeboard and a beer of the week. Etsys Dumbo headquar-ters blends homemade coziness and high-end design so master-fully it could make an Urban Outftters executive weep.Until quite recently, such
perks were considered the eccentric luxuries of twenty-something tech prodigies, edgy advertising frms and cash-fush startups. Corporate America dis-missed the cool offce as a feet-ing phenomenon. But the wild successes of companies such as Google and Facebook have made even the stodgiest CEOs contemplate the potential ben-efts of video-game consoles and French-press coffee. A pingpong table in the middle of your offce used to imply that you were run by a 24-year-old. Now a lot of companies want to imply that theyre run by a 24-year-old.Indeed, the cool offce has be-
come a national fxation. And in the countrys collective imagi-nationan imagination fed by countless magazines, blogs
and secondhand storiesit is a utopia of lofted ceilings and abundant natural light, where no one ever seems bored or blocked or fatigued (how could anyone be tired with both a nap room and an espresso ma-chine?), where workers always appear to be seriously having fun, furiously exchanging ideas or seriously having fun as they furiously exchange ideas. Even the after-work hours are better. Rather than rushing home to drown their sorrows in drink, workers hang out in their hip, bar-like lounges, knocking back craft brews in celebration of yet another ridiculously productive day of creative cathexis.In this way, the cool offce goes
so far as to suggest that the inher-ent tensions of the workplacebetween labor and management, between our authentic selves and our professional selves, between working for love and working for moneycan be over-come. Its a paradise wrought by the Protestant work ethic, where creativity and massive profts can be merged painlessly, a delightful feedback loop in which greater happiness yields greater produc-tivity yields greater happinesssalvation by way of pingpong and Stumptown coffee.Last October, French beverage
conglomerate Pernod Ricard moved into an 82,000-square-foot space at 250 Park Avenuea buttoned-up 20-story tower in Midtown that has traditionally been a great favorite of white-shoe law frms. While the loca-tion and the building seemed an obvious choice for a huge
Amusement Perks
How the cult of cool ofces took over the
cubicle world
By Kim VelseyThe New York Observer
Many offices are now much more than just places where people work.
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international corporation, the distillery-chic space was not: ex-posed 14-foot ceilings, concrete foors, vast walls of brick and glass, plus a massive bar, a game room and huge terraces.They all want some kind of
cool vibe, said Scott Spector, a principal at the Spector Group, the architectural frm that designed Pernods space, adding that even law frms and hedge funds are requesting the facto-ry-meets-art-gallery look. While the frst cool offces
started appearing more than a decade ago, theres now been a fundamental shift in offce de-sign. What were once features found mostly at tech compa-niesopen, collaborative areas, kitchens, game roomsare becoming standard.
Cool has conquered all, Spector said.A decade ago, workplace inno-
vation revolved primarily around where people worked. Working remotely was all the rage, and being able to work in your paja-mas was talked about as though it were one of the great hopes of humanity that could fnally now, through the miracle of technol-ogy, be achieved. Companies contemplated the cost-saving potential of vastly reduced work spaces, and workers welcomed the end of commuting and sim-pler child-care arrangements.But like other work-space
panaceas before it, telecom-muting proved less than revo-lutionary. (Its worth noting that the cubicle, maligned though it is today, was seen as an innova-
tive solution to the problems of the modern offce when it frst debuted in the 1960s.)Now innovation is all about
whats cool, said Lenny Beau-doin, a senior managing direc-tor of CBREs global corporate services. Beaudoin, a work-place strategist who helps the real estate companys clients revamp their workplaces to en-hance productivity, is working with a number of traditional companies that want to create cooler, less traditional offces in happening neighborhoods.The new offce is part
hospitality, part retail. People work 24/7, and they want their workplaces to appeal to their lifestyles, he said. The idea of going into a high-rise and sitting in a cubicle all day,
the tyranny of the traditional offce, thats going away. Its about lifestyle integration.Google has been criticized in
the past for using its admittedly amazing amenities to lure work-ers into longer and longer days at the offce. But its offces remain the envy of workers everywhere, because many Americans arent offered any trade-offs for their devotion to their desks, let alone a package of extravagant ones. The modern offce is transform-ing into a workers everythingthe place where someone not only works, but eats, exercises, relaxes and socializes.Just the prospect of moving to
a cool offce is enough to make some workers giddy. Ryan Alovis, the CEO and founder of ArkNet Media, a midsize Long Island startup, was surprised at how psyched his 16 employees were when he told them theyd be ditching their traditional offce in Valley Stream for a hip, college-campus-like complex in Garden City.Theyre so hyped up, every-
ones freaking out, he said. I walked by my VP of operations and he showed me a pool table that they have at L.A.s Hard Rock Cafe that he wanted us to getevery time you hit a ball, it either reveals a girl in a bikini or it looks like a ball of fre.There will not be the bikini/
fame pool table at the new offce, but there will be a bar, a ftness center, a coffee center, not just coffee, a juicer and pizza parties. You have to wow people, Alovis said. A juicer, a ftness center, a cafeteriapeo-ple expect this now. Tech work-ers are the new rock stars.It should not come as a sur-
prise that corporate Americaits once-promised fnancial security and career stability having vanishedwould be drawn to the cultural blueprint and anti-status ethos provided by tech. While techs DNA is fundamentally capitalist, the in-dustry proved that it could not only make money and be cool at the same time, but that it could make money by being cool.By following the path that
tech forged, companies have an opportunity to remake their images along with their offces. Now companies talk endlessly of creating interactions, of CEOs getting right into the mix of things, of ideas circulating and fourishing in their open foor plans. As though we could wipe out the thankless, unglamorous tasks that make up the entirety of some jobs right along with bad fuorescent lighting.
The cool offce sells not only an image of a creative hotbed to clients, but perhaps more importantly, to employees. It invites them to see their job as a form of self-expression rather than rote labor, grant-ing fexibility in exchange for loyalty and long hours.There is something vaguely
unsettling, though, something overwrought about the descrip-tions of all the fun being had: the Tuesday-night runs that take off from the offce and end at a local pub, the spontaneous exercise breaks, the craft nights with wine and cheese where ev-eryone makes holiday-themed cards, or mugs, or whatever strikes our fancy!There is a cult-like undertone
in this all-encompassing exis-tence, in the blurring of lines be-tween home and offce, between personal time and work time, between employee and self. The cool offce works to disguise the very basis of the relationship be-tween company and employee: the exchange of money for work. Work is a lot of things, but this is its fundamental essence.As architect Sam Jacob recently
wrote in Dezeen, the rise of the fun offce can be seen as a denial of the very real power structures inherent in labor relations. And even more fundamentally sinister is the idea of work colo-nizing the real spaces of intimacy and freedom: When your offce resembles all the places that you go to escape work, maybe there is no escape from work itself.But for better or worse, Amer-
icans have always embraced that you are what you do. The idea that you are where you workliterally is new. For many of us, the cool offce ministers not only to our immediate needs, but also to our fantasies: fantasies about the kind of people we would like to be, the jobs we wish we had, the lives we wish we were leading. We might not land that dream job, but the dream offce could be within reach!And yet, as much as the cool
offce can seem to matter, it can also matter very little. Of the many conversations that The Observer had with the haves and the have-nots of the offce world, our thoughts returned frequent-ly to what a Google engineer said to us after describing a Vermont ski weekend the company had taken him on, Lang Langs visit, and a lunch of expertly prepared salmon and roasted Brussels sprouts: At the end of the day, whether you enjoy your job or not is more important than get-ting roasted Brussels sprouts.
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Vegas to the Moon!Whats the future of space tourism in Las Vegas?
By David G. Schwartz
Could las Vegas become a launching pad for a new type of touristthe kind whos look-ing for a thrill ride that cant be found behind the velvet rope?In the past fve years, ideas
that once seemed outlandishmedical tourism, a tech corridor, green energyhave been seri-ously considered as viable tools
for our economic development. Why not space tourism?For its frst 40 years, spacefight
was limited to those chosen as part of a national astronaut selection process; mostly Soviet (later Russian) cosmonauts and American astronauts. For a while, it looked like the space shuttle was going to open up space to
civilians; politicians Jake Garn and Bill Nelson few on shuttle missions, but plans to have regu-lar fights of educators in space and more trips by civilians were scrapped when teacher Christa McAuliffe perished in the 1986 Challenger disaster. That tragedy, and the sub-
sequent loss of Columbia in
2003, highlighted the dangers of spacefight, but leaving the green hills of Earth for the depths of spaceeven if its just a couple of days in low-earth orbit, roughly 200 miles upremains a dream for many. Of course, only the elite of the elite can become astronauts. Lacking extensive piloting experience or advanced degrees in the sci-encesand the dedication to be at the top of your feld for most of your adult lifeyou dont have much of a chance to become a professional cosmic explorer.But space tourism may make
orbit available to the nonpro-fessionalthough for the past decade thats meant the kind of
nonprofessional who could pay millions for the privilege. In 2001, the frst space tour-
ist, engineer and investment manager Dennis Tito, few on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to the International Space Station. He trained for several months be-fore the mission (which pales in comparison to the years regular astronauts log before liftoff, but still shows dedication) and con-ducted a variety of experiments in his nearly eight days in space. He reportedly paid $20 million for the journey.But he got to know the thrill
of foating weightless; of seeing the curvature of the Earth; of witnessing a sunrise every 90
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How the reborn Light is raising the stakes in a hypercompetitive businessand what that says about the future of Las Vegas nightlifeBy David G. Schwartz
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By the time the club closed in 2007, it had been surpassed by several bigger venues: Pure (2004), Tao (2005) and Tryst (2005). Since then, Wynn Las Vegas has tripled-down, fol-lowing Tryst with XS (2008) and Surrender (2010). And there are more megaclubs on the way: Hakkasanthe recently opened $100 million, 75,000-square-foot London-via-San Francisco import at the MGM Grandis expected to become the next big thing, which will probably lead to an even bigger club opening sometime next year.The nightclub arms race will
always be about whats next, which makes it somehow endearing that the biggest non-Hakkasan nightclub news of the moment is the re-birth of the club that started the race in the first place. The namesake of the Las Vegas-based Light Group will soon return to the Strip at Man-dalay Bay, where it is taking over the space that used to be Rumjungle.The fate of the previous
tenant speaks volumes about how fckle nightlife can be. At one point, Rumjungle was one of the top 20 highest-grossing venues in the country. In 2006, it pulled in more than $16 million in gross revenues. But changing public tastes, new competition (including from MGM-owned outlets in Mandalay Bay) led to a quick dropoffin 2009, Rumjungles last full year of operation, it earned $6.6 milliona nearly $10 million decline in just three years.But, in the mid-2000s, $16
million was no longer enough. When Rumjungle was at its peak, Tao at the Venetian
dwarfed its numbers, bring-ing in more than $55 million. The frst clubs had proven that there was money to be made in the nightlife business. And in the time-honored logic of Las Vegas, if X is good, the obvious next step is to multiply it by 10. So along came the megaclubs: bigger, louder and more proftable. By applying economies of scale to a proven model, they made nightlife more than an amenityit became a lifeline for casinos facing the recession.In 2012, seven out of the
top 10 nightclubs in the country were in Las Vegas. The leader was XS at Encore, which grossed more than $80 millionthats more than $1.5 million per weekend. Even a smaller venue, like the Ghostbar at the Palms or The Bank (which replaced Light at Bellagio) can pull in $20 million in the course of a year. With all that success, its no
wonder todays nightclub scene is crowded. Meanwhile, clubs are working themselves more deeply into the weft of resort fabric, with dayclubs and vibe dining carrying them into new areas. At the turn of the millen-nium, nightlife started going Vegas. Now Vegas has gone nightlife.
So thE LiGht thAt opENS on Memorial Day Weekend will do so in a very different Las Vegas from the original, and its going to be a mark-edly different venue. For one, Light will be joined by Day-light, and its going to be part of a bigger interest that Light Group parent Morgans has in Mandalay Bay: THEhotel is be-ing rebranded the Delano and will be run by Morgans, and
its also managing Red Square and Citizens Kitchen & Barboth within steps of Light.And theres more. This time,
Light isnt just a nightclub; its a nightclub with a twist. That twist is Cirque du Soleil, the Montreal-based performance troupe that has become as inextricable a part of the Vegas tourist experience as all-you-can-eat buffets and Elvis impersonators. Think Cirque performers on poles. Think Cirque performers bounc-ing off a two-story acrowall behind the DJ booth. Think Cirque performers literally fy-ing through the air on tethers. This, Lights builders promise, will make the club one-of-a-kind, and the most revolution-ary thing to hit Las Vegas since
the last revolutionary thing.The Cirque twist speaks to
the evolution of Las Vegas nightlife, which parallels the changes that began taking place on the gaming foor 20 years ago. It once was enough for a casino to simply be a gam-bling hall, with plenty of games and free drinks. Then compe-tition heated up and casinos started playing dress-up, pre-tending to be medieval castles, pirate islands and even refned Italianate lakesides. Gambling ceased to be a compelling gimmick, and the answer was to pile gimmicks on top of gimmicks. It worked for a few years, but in 2005 Wynn Las Vegas frmly rejected a theme in favor of a more nuanced ambience of customer service
and delicious design surprises, and designers across the Strip throttled back on theming.Looking at Light, it seems
that Vegas nightlife is now where casinos were around 1993. There was a time when clubs just needed booze and beats. Now, they need some-thing else to stand out. Enter the nightlife gimmick.And if Cirque-meets-clublife
is successful, that might make Light the frst Vegas nightclub, version 3.0.
AS uSuAL iN LAS VEGAS, the hype machine is pushing the redline with Light. The group has invested a great deal in the Mandalay makeover, and expectations are high. The designers were asked to
When Light opened at Bellagio in December 2001, it pointed the way to the next wave of nightclub development in Las Vegas. It was the frst casino nightclub designed around the then-novel concept of bottle service, and as the clubs success became apparent, it inspired more than its share of imitators.
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deliver something that was both entirely different from the once-successful, now-passe Rumjungle, and suffciently wild to impress an increasingly jaded target audience.It delivers without dispute
on the frst count. Un-like Rumjungle, which was partially open to public view, Light presents a blank face to those who arent inside: Most of the frontage is taken up by bamboo facade with more than a passing resemblance to a stylized suns rays, two sets of nondescript black doors and the Light marquee.Walking by, you might hear the
muffed sounds of a great time inside, but make no mistake about it: This is a private party.After passing a hostess stand/
VIP check-in, guests will ascend a red-and-black carpeted stair-case; at the top, theyll come out onto the mezzanine level. To the left is the main bar; to the right, the massive open space that contains three tiers of tables and, oh yeah, the dance foor. Flush against the foor is the DJ booth, with a massive LED display above it; youve also got a catwalk and the acrowall back there for the Cirque acrobats.The new Light is deeper than
the old Rumjungle space, since theres no restaurant (the club is bucking the vibe-dining trend, with hungry club-bers presumably directed to Red Square or Citizens). Its taller too, with the drop ceiling ripped out and several tiers of tables and the mezzanine level
in the newly acquired airspace.That means more tables,
which means more bottle service, which means more money. As it will be confg-ured on opening night, the new Light will have nearly 100 tables. The original Light, by comparison, had 33 tables at its biggest build-out.Even with the club empty,
one thing is certain: This isnt just a place to have a good time; its a place to be seen having a good time. Those moneymak-ing tables are stacked in levels, stadium-like, around the dance foor, which becomesalong with the DJ booth, the LED wall and every square foot between foor and ceilinga perfor-mance space. Thats where the twist comes
in. With Cirque artists fipping and slipping through the air, theres going to be plenty of visual energy. Each DJ, accord-ing to a Light spokesperson, will meet with Cirque and get a customized show. Whats being
packaged here isnt just a night out, but an evening of immer-sion in the crafted spectacle of a night out. The club itself is a performance of nightlife. The real challenge is how the
space will fow when its flled with clubgoers, waitresses, bouncers and acrobats. With whats touted as the loudest sound system on the Strip, it will be intense, to say the least. But will the room stand up to the rigors of the modern night-lifestyle?Josh Held, the architect
behind the new Light, has planned for that. I always tell my team to design as if we are designing the interior of a zoo full of wild animals, he says. Any type of abuse you can imagine will happen, and the design has to look fantastic regardless. Special linings were used in the upholstery to prevent punctures. Floor and wall materials are of a differ-ent grade than one would usu-ally specify. Every surface that
can be stood on or jumped on will be, so we over-design those surfaces to withstand the abuse.
With A prActicEd dESiGN and an ambitious goalto remake the Vegas club experi-encewill Light do its forebear proud? All signs point to yes, but you never know for sure in Vegas. When he opened Circus Circus back in 1968, Jay Sarno was sure that the acrobats spin-ning over the heads of the craps tables would enhance the expe-rience for gamblers. Turns out, most players werent as absorbed by the game as he was, and the idea fopped. Light is banking that Cirque
fantasy will heighten the oth-erworldly party vibe for which people come to Las Vegas. If it is successful, there will be imitators, who will scale up the formula even more. If not, there will be no shortage of people ex-plaining, in hindsight, why this couldnt have worked.
Whats being packaged here isnt just a night out, but an evening of immersion in the crafted spectacle of a night out.
A rendering of a big night at Light (left), and a photo of the bar awaiting its first patrons (below).
SATURDAY, MAY 4, 2013 FREMONT STREET EXPERIENCE
Register TODAY at www.komensouthernnevada.org702.822.2324
JOIN US FOR THE 18TH ANNUAL SUSAN G. KOMEN SOUTHERN NEVADA
RACE FOR THE CUREOnline Registration is Now Open!
nspired
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parties
See more photos from this gallery at SpyOnVegas.com
Photo
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paradise BeachHard Rock Hotel
[ Upcoming ]
April 27 CrazibizaandSexPanther
May 4 TheDiscoFries
May 25 JuicyBeachwithRobbieRivera
nightlife
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marquee dayclubThe Cosmopolitan
[ Upcoming ]
April 26 Keidyspins
April 27 AviciikicksoffWetWonderland
April 28 EDXspins
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MoonThe palms
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April 25 ExoduswithSeanyMac
April 26 MarkStylzandExodusspin
April 27 TaboooftheBlackEyedPeasspins
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LavoThe palazzo
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April 26 SoundsbyDJCheapshot
April 27 StereoSaturdayswithsoundsbyGusto
April 28 ViceSundayswithguestDJMr.Mauricio
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LaXLuxor
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April 26 FridaysatLAXwithDJGusto
April 27 SaturdaysatLAXwithDJGusto
May 4 FatJoeperforms
Gastro Fare. Nurtured Ales. Jukebox Gold.
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[ Scene StirS ]
Jules Verne and rick Moonen haVe your next round RM Seafoods second floor will close May
3 for a reconceptualization that will mesh
nicely with Mandalay Bays other new
draws: Light Nightclub, Daylight Beach Club
and Cirque du Soleils new Michael Jackson
show. When it reopens in late June as Rx
Boiler Room (pronounced Ricks), the
more casual venue will reflect Moonens
taste for all things Thomas Edison, H.G.
Wells, Jules Verne and steampunk.
Encouraged by the property to reinvent,
Moonen says ideas ran from steakhouse
(but thats not fun, thats not me) to a
so-called gastrolab. But while avant-garde
techniques would surely be a part of any
new Moonen project, he felt the term gas-
tro is overused. So, the chef looked inward
for inspiration: When I was growing up, I
was kind of a geek. But back then being a
geek wasnt cool. Now its hip! The Boiler
Room will be both geeky and hip, celebrat-
ing the alchemy of food and drink.
Re-envisioned in tandem by Cleo Design
and the chefs wife, Roni, this will be
Moonens clubhouse, where things happen,
where things get cooked up. In the dining
room, booths will become intimate, robed
in velvet curtains beneath a stamped-metal
ceiling. Tables of reclaimed wood will
include communal dining options and no
white linen in sight. The new menu will rely
less on structure and more on seasonality.
Service could include small plates, large
platters, pairings and chalkboard specials.
Plus: a great sound system? Yes. A killer
brunch? Yep. Local crooners slinking in
for impromptu performances on a Lucite
piano? It could happen, Moonen says.
Moonens core value of sustainable
seafood remains, and will operate alongside
this new farm-to-table lineup of redefined
comfort foods; think buckets of crisp, fried
Cornish game hens, Steampunk Oysters
and deviled green eggs. Looking for your
culinary North Star? There will always be
oysters on the half shell at any Rick Moonen
restaurant opened anywhere in the world.
But the bar is where the fun really starts.
The upstairs entry, formerly easy to over-
look, will be wide open and festooned with
gears and cogs. Inside the lounge, oddly
shaped furniture leads to the bar, where
lead bartender Nathan Greene and his
team will serve original craft cocktails and
classic revisions from beakers, flasks and
barrels. Here, your orange peel is flamed by
a Bunsen burner. Im gonna let these guys
just run free, Moonen says. And when Rx
Boiler Room is open, RMs first floor will get
a little update, as well. I think it has infinite
possibilities. Its certainly more fun than
trying to do fine dining in this environment
right now. The three-star Michelin chefs
have that covered.
For more scene stirrings and shake-ups, visit
VegasSeven.com/Cocktail-Culture.
Get Lunas Poppy Sling recipe at VegasSeven.com/Cocktail-Culture.com.
as cocktails traVel through time and space, they tend to change and evolvesometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. One of the cocktails most approximated for convenience and skewed to refect the current contents of the liquor room is the Singapore Sling, which was cre-ated at the start of the 20th century at the Raffes Hotel in Singapore. Although originally based on dry gin, cherry brandy and lemon juice, an ever-changing cast of support-ing liqueurs, syrups, bitters and other citrus juices (most notably pineapple) has jumped on and off board over in the nearly 100 years since. But it almost doesnt matter which
recipe you useif the ingredients are fresh and the products top-notch, the resulting vaguely Southeast Asian gin punch should be a hit. At Poppy Den in Tivoli Village, mixologist Julian Luna
does his Poppy Sling Caribbean-style, with Pussers Rum (favored over gin by one of the owners), Heering cherry liqueur, Bndictine, house-made grenadine, lime and pineapple juices, plus Bittermens Elemakule Tiki cocktail bitters. While sipping a cocktail may not be enough to trans-port you to Singapore, you can at the very least feel whisked away to Summerlin.
Slinging Praises
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out of the space, face-offs between Signature supporters and intractable library trustees during the public-comment portions of district meetings became exercises in tension. Wed go back every month, and they were hostilevery hostile, Larsen says. Theyd give us three minutes while they were busy tucking things inside their briefcases and getting ready to leave. They couldnt have cared less.Sanity eventually triumphed.
Credit relentless, passionate pleas by Larsen and Broadway Bound (a youth theater group that also rented the space), plus a petition drive within Signa-tures fan base and entreaties to county commissioners and Mayor Goodman, prompting rethinking by library trustees. In what amounts to a gi-
ant phew! the library district relented last fall, slashing the hike to a still-gut-punching 180 percent. Sucking it up, Sig-nature raised ticket prices $5, to an average of $30 for adults and $20 for kids.Where can you go to see a
Broadway [type of] show for 30 bucks? Larsen asks. You cant.Resurrection is onstage right
now, the company in the midst of its comeback run of Camelot that began April 15 at yes, the Summerlin Library theater. Unsurprisingly, the layoff inficted damage. Ticket sales are down some,
Larsen says, noting that by the frst preview, advance sales for the 22 performances were only at 40 percent, though the num-bers were climbing last week. Our being gone for a whole year and the perception that we had quit performing were probably in play. Only time will tell whether we will be as suc-cessful as a year ago. Looking back on the whole
mess reveals something dis-turbing: Quietly, we nearly lost something precious even as we gained something momentous, and relatively few Las Vegans knew or cared, exposing a cultural blind spoteven in our new Smith Center world. Fellow local theaters didnt get it either when it came to Signature. I didnt feel any support from
the smaller companies, Larsen says. The theater community is really split up in this town. We dont trust each other. Its like North and South Korea here.
* * *
What level of theater were we denied while they battled to keep breathing? Consider
the perspective of the Las Vegas Review-Journals Anthony Del Valle, the citys toughest, most respected (and in some quar-ters, feared) theater critic.On 2007s Peter Pan: a bliss-
ful achievement. On 2010s All Shook Up: an orgy of fun and a celebration of being alive. On 2011s Oh What a Night: exuberantly performed, excit-ingly sung and pumped with theatrical pizzazz. On 2009s Thoroughly Modern Millie: Youll say Wow a lot. Theres more musical-comedy talent here per square foot than anyone has the right to ask for in a community production.(Not that its all warm hugs
and sweet kisses. About Signatures The Sound of Music in 2010, he wrote that the inevitable tears come duti-fully and unimaginatively, one among other pointed criticisms over the years. Still, you cant quibble over the consistency of his standards. While Del Valle smiled upon several Broadway tour productions in The Smith Centers inaugural season in the R-J, he also machine-gunned the visiting Anything Goes and The Addams Family.)Conventional thinking sug-
gests that because community theater exists in its own bubble, with its own loyal (if modest) following, The Smith Centers Broadway series of traditional musicals doesnt threaten to swipe patrons. Largely thats true, given that the schedules of the most active local compa-niesincluding Las Vegas Little Theatre, the Onyx, Cockroach Theatre, Nevada Conserva-tory Theatre and CSNs theater departmentare crowded with dramas, comedies, original works, adult-oriented plays, avant-garde pieces and other non-musicals absent from The Smith Center.Not so Signature. Unlike
some other local troupes (PS Productions, Stage Door Entertainment, Huntsman En-tertainment) that offer similar musicals sporadicallyoften merely one-offs on a rotation
at the Super Summer Theatre program at Spring Mountain Ranch State ParkSignature is the steadiest provider, produc-ing three or four annually.Only Signature, then, is even
near the same ballpark with The Smith Center in terms of delivering the same theater genre at quality levels with regularitycreating potential audience overlap. Yet Signa-tures promotional resources amount to a fraction of a frac-tion of Smiths, and it lacks the Broadway brand sex appeal of a tour production.Statistics dont exist (and al-
most certainly wont) quantify-ing whether Signature patrons now save their splurge money on a Broadway tour instead. Or, conversely, whether some Smith Center attendees, newly turned on to musicals, will check out Signature and be
surprised to discover quality showsalbeit on a smaller scale, but also at less expensethat are in no way creatively slumming.Or whether, frankly, it will
make no damn difference.More importantly, Signa-
tures survival has got to count for something. Specifcally, how will high-grade local theater be perceived and valued in a post-Smith Center era, given its overall exclu-sion from that gleaming venue while locally produced classi-cal music (the Las Vegas Phil-harmonic) and dance (Nevada Ballet Theatre) get to snuggle in and call it home?Unreservedly, we say: Glory
be to The Smith Center, that half-a-billion-dollar pearl that has el-evated our cultural cred and widened our entertainment palate. Its enormous positive impact is undeniable. Yet it has also pushed back the goalposts, perception-wise.Once upon a pre-
Smith time, commu-nity theater left Las Vegans impressed or unimpressed based on their own merits
or demerits. Now its image issues are akin to Sisyphus and that damn boulder. No longer can residents claim their city lacks culture: The Smith Center is a mighty rebuke. Some, however, will dismiss local theater as culturally irrelevant by comparison.Quaint, but not impactful. Di-
version, but not art. Or worse [A library offcial] said,
Now that we have The Smith Center, we dont need [library] theaters, Larsen says.Employing a word likely
never uttered at a Signature show: Bullshit. Lets not allow the refresh-
ing performing-arts awareness incubating inside The Smith
Center to breed cultural small-mind-edness toward whats outside it.Signatures back.
Were better for it. Re-fecting on its journey through adversity to survival, there is poet-ry in a line from King Arthurs soliloquy in Camelot, now onstage at the home that was nearly lost: We shall live
through this togeth-er, Excalibur.
Stage
Camelot by Signature ProduCtionS
2 and 7:30 p.m. (schedule varies) through May 11, $25-$30, Sum-merlin Library
and Performing Arts Center, 1771 Inner Circle Dr.,
878-7529, Signa-tureProductions.
net.
How will HigH-grade loCal tHeater be PerCeived and valued in a PoSt-SmitH Center era?
Community theater royalty: Camelots King Arthur
(James Claflin) and Guenevere (Lila Harper).
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Alex clAreHard Rock Caf on the Strip, April 18
This cats got soul. Taking the stage in front of a packed house, U.K. singer-songwriter Alex Clare
launched into Relax My Beloved, that stirring voice with just the amount of grit shining bright
(though the sound in the venue could have been a bit louder). The set included nearly every song
from his album The Lateness of the Hour, but Clare also delivered new material as promised. The
standout Three Hearts, proved that any forthcoming album will be strong.
This is the first song I learned to play on the guitar, Clare said, as he presented a cover of Lead
Bellys Goodnight Irene. Also throwing it back some in music history, Clare and his band busted
out with a dubstep-y version of When Doves Cry by Prince, though the majority of the crowd
didnt seem to recognize itnot because it was such a variance from the original but perhaps they
were just too young. Enthusiastically applauding after each song, the crowd finally started to dance
around during Up All Night, and then expectedly went apeshit when Clare saved his most recogniz-
able hit, Too Close, for the next-to-last song, ultimately closing out with the song he wrote for his
new wife, I Wont Let You Down. Deanna Rilling
the PostAl serviceThe Chelsea at the Cosmopolitan, April 19
The obsession started a decade ago
when the nation first heard those
three descending chords of The
District Sleeps Alone Tonight. Few
could resist the transcendentally
catchy songs on Give Up, which
elevated the side project (peopled by
Death Cab for Cuties Ben Gibbard,
Dntels Jimmy Tamborello and Rilo
Kileys Jenny Lewis) into something
more. Sadly, that success never
led to a second album. But on April
19, fans got the next best thing: a
reunited Postal Service celebrating
Give Ups 10-year anniversary.
The show began with the same
three descending chords. But instead
of going straight into the scattered
beats of track two, Such Great
Heights, the wiser, less predict-
able Postal Service played We Will
Become Silhouettes. Lewis stole the
show every time she sang, especially
during Nothing Better. She twirled
around Gibbard, harmonizing while
staring into his eyes during the
sickeningly precious duet.
Since the band doesnt have much
material, the performance felt some-
what contrived. With the exception
of an explosive intro to Natural An-
them and a few new songs (Turn
Around and the equally repetitive A
Tattered Line of String), their music
hasnt changed at all.
Refreshingly, the show didnt end
with the much-anticipated Such
Great Heights, but instead with the
inspiring Brand New Colony. The
music dropped out as Gibbard, Tam-
borello and Lewis led the audience in
a chant of the last words: Everything
will change, ooooooo. That combined
with the cascading orange lights
emanating from the stage made for a
touching moment some would have
considered worth the yearslong wait.
Ashley Gates
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in the spirit of a Terrence Malick screenplay, certain rhe-torical questions to be spoken in hushed voice-over present themselves regarding Malicks latest, To the Wonder.Can we ever see enough
sunsets as flmed by Malick and his mighty cinematogra-pher, Emmanuel Lubezki? Is serious spiritual yearning even worth attempting to capture in a series of moving images? And will Malick ever tire of the look of tall grass in the wind, bend-ing this way and that, much as his characters conform them-selves to the dictates and gentle yet unmistakable hand of the flmmaker himself?Shot in Bartlesville, Oklaho-
ma, and in France, To the Wonder fnds Malick pursuing a form of
visual storytelling that is closer to chamber music, or sym-phonic rapture, than conven-tional flm narrative. It skates along the edge of self-parody every second. Compared even with his previous feature, The Tree of Life, this ones bound to frustrate the average meat-and-potatoes flmgoer looking for clear outlines and the usual dramatic builds.Whatever. Minor Malick does
not mean To the Wonder is a noth-ing. It is very much something: supple and a bit mad. What that something iswell, youre the interpreter, as much as the writer-director in charge.It depicts an Oklahoma man
(Ben Affeck); a Ukrainian woman living in Paris (Olga Kurylenko); another woman
back in Oklahoma (Rachel McAdams); and a fourth char-acter, a Catholic priest stricken by a crisis of faith and purpose (Javier Bardem). Affecks Neil, whom we see sampling soil for groundwater contamination in and around his hometown of Bartlesville, has met Marina (Kurylenko) in Paris. Romance has bloomed. Ill go wherever you go, she whispers to us in voice-over, before they explore Mont St. Michel, on an island off the Normandy coast.Where is wherever? Okla-
homa. Its a strange new world to Marina and her 10-year-old daughter, no less so than the land Malick presented in his earlier flm, The New World. At one point in To the Wonder, a classically Malickian transi-tion glides from a shot of the shoreline off Normandy into a gliding frame of grasslands and power lines in the USA. The re-lationship soon sours. Marina, conceived as a twirly force of nature at odds with this land of big-box stores and cowboys, retreats with her daughter to France. Neil takes up with an old fame, a rancher (McAdams) who likewise loves to twirl in the wheat, among the bison.The relationships come and
go; Marina drifts back into
Neils life. Since her voice-overs from the start favor the past tense, we sense impermanence throughout. The flm is a reverie, a memory reactivated, in a land of beauty despite the Sonic drive-ins and drab sub-urban cul-de-sacs.I admire the picture, though
little of To the Wonder gels in the usual way. Bardems priest inter-acts only briefy with the other major characters; hes a state of troubled mind more than a dimensional being. The women competing for Neils conscience and heart are largely nonverbal sprites, endlessly photogenic. The flm is completely insular yet utterly open to everything in nature: the skies, the breeze, the unspoken connections between one human being and another. In this universe, when the mus-ings (visual and verbal) are in-terrupted by a sign of everyday modernitywhen Marina Sky-pes with her faraway daughter, for example, or when someone says something as blunt as My visa has expiredits a shock to the system.However elliptical, To the
Wonder clearly speaks to, and from, Malicks own experi-ence. Its conjecture, of course, but he appears to be atoning for past relational sins with
his story of Neil, described as a taciturn but incredibly loving man. (Its not an unfattering self-portrait, to be sure.) Weak people never bring anything to an end themselves. They wait for others to do it, Marina says in voice-over. Is Bardems priest too weak to break up with God, or too strong to do so?So, to get back to the rhetori-
cal questions: Can we ever see enough sunsets as flmed by Malick? The answer is no. Is serious spiritual yearning even worth attempting to capture in a series of moving images? The answer is yes. Malicks images may run together, gliding in and out of windows, up quiet streets, in ways that induce a trancelike state (or, if youre not with it, sleepiness). But Malick is a true searcher, true to his preoccupations and def-nitions of soulful rhapsody. To the Wonder repeats its central motifs aplenty, yet you may fnd yourself thinking about life, and living, and love, while sorting through the movie. Even if it drives you nutz.Oh, and: Will Malick ever
tire of the look of tall grass in the wind? The answer is no. He will not.
To the Wonder (R)
Wonder to BeholdTerrence Malick delights in picturesque
landscapes and obtuse love triangles
By Michael PhillipsTribune Media Services
Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams and amber waves of grain.
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[by tribune media services]short reviews
42 (PG-13) This carefully tended portrait of Jackie
Robinson, the man who broke Major League
Baseballs color barrier, settles for too
little. Jackie Robinson (Chadwick Boseman)
endures long odds and societal racism to join
the Brooklyn Dodgers. Harrison Ford is fun
as the general manager who brought him up,
Branch Rickey. The film treads too carefully,
a primer, a story that protects and enshrines
Robinson. It feels like a production watched
very carefully by his survivors. Boseman is
highly capable, but the filmmakers failed to
ask much of him.
Evil Dead (R) This remake of Sam Raimis 1983 cult classic
offers plenty of reasons to jump and turn
away. Mia (Jane Levy) has quit drugs, and
her withdrawal confuses her senses. Her
brother and her friends have brought her to
the cabin in the woods to cure her. But is she
seeing visions of demonic possession, or is
this simply the cold turkey playing tricks on
her mind? Theres a demon that jumps from
human to human, and more splashing of bodi-
ly fluids than one knows what to do with. All
in all, its OK, and likely a franchise ... again.
The Place Beyond the Pines (R)
Luke (Ryan Gosling) is a motorcycle stunt
performer traveling with a two-bit carnival.
Coming through small-town New York, he
learns he has fathered a son with a local
waitress (Eva Mendes). Luke turns to bank
robbery while also trying to establish a
relationship with his son. Then, the story
switches to the police officer (Bradley Coo-
per) who is plagued by becoming known as
the hero who pursued the moto-bandit. Its
a fine film with really solid actors playing
well-written, authentic characters.
G.I. Joe: Retaliation (PG-13) The action is nonstop in this sequel. But do
we really want our action to never end? Like,
ever? The plot concerns the murder of the
Pakistani president, stolen nukes, a frame-up
job by COBRA disgracing the Joes. The Joes
fight back. Spoiler alert: They win. Sure,
theres Channing Tatum as Duke, Dwayne
Johnson as Roadblock and even ole Bruce
Willis as the original Joe, but the movie plays
out like a video game, and certainly weve
learned by now that there should be a dif-
ference.
somethings wrong. tom Cruise, or rather, Jack Harper, his character in the placid new science-fction adventure Oblivion, cant shake his dreams of a woman giving him the big eyes on the ob-servation deck of the Empire State Building.Its 2077. Earth has been dev-
astated by a war with invading aliens. Most of the remaining populace has been relocated to a Saturn moon. Jack has recently undergone a manda-tory memory wipe and now goes about his work, a couple of weeks prior to his own exit from Earth. Hes a security guard and all-around Mr. Fix-It living and working high above whats left of Earths sur-face in Tower 49 with his lover/colleague Victoria (Andrea Riseborough).But who is this woman in
Jacks dreams? I mean, its Olga Kurylenko, also starring in the new Terrence Malick flm To the Wonder, but who is she?A sort of Partial Recall,
Oblivion gives you a lot to
think about. And too much time to think about it. The script by Karl Gajdusek (an interesting playwright) and Michael Arndt, based on an unpublished graphic novel by the director, Joseph Kosin-ski (Tron: Legacy), weaves a tale involving governmental conspiracy, a revolutionary underground movement (Morgan Freeman plays the supercool head of the scavs, or scavengers) and various pro forma battle scenes that pit Cruise, in his spaceship or on his futuristic motorcycle, against a cadre of scowling, moonfaced mechanical fying drones, equipped with ma-chine guns stolen from Attack of the Clones.Jack knows somethings up
when his HAL-9000-styled boss, Sally (Melissa Leo, seen only on video monitors and oozing the sort of fake charm that spells trouble), orders him to stay away from a crash-landing site. Does Jack follow orders? No. He follows his instinct, and rescues the surviving member
of the downed U.S. spaceship. She is the woman of his dreams, played by Kurylenko, and from there Oblivion springs a surprise or two.Surprise is a relative term.
Kosinskis rhythm and visual style are pretty square for such a squirrelly script: Each grave, purposeful exchange of dialogue (some of it pretty thick in terms of expositional backstory) is laid out very
carefully, as if were idiots. The movies not bad for a while, but its made of spare parts from a lot of other mov-ies, among them Total Recall, 2001: A Space Odyssey, the 2001 riff Moon, a certain recent play by Caryl Churchill (cant say; spoiler) and a few others.Whats interesting about it
is its tight focus on a handful of characters. Oblivion is odder and less conventional than
your average forgettable star vehicle; at times it feels like a fve-character play taking place in a digital-effects lab. But theres not much energy to it. When you go to a futuristic, dystopian, post-apocalyptic barn dance starring Tom Cruise and his space guns, you expect a little zap with your thoughtful pauses.
Oblivion (PG-13)
end of days (and ideas)Tom Cruise stars in this
post-apocalyptic sci-f rehash
By Michael PhillipsTribune Media Services
Kurylenko and Cruise neither crash nor soar in this could-be clunker.
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The Host (PG-13) This movie version of Stephenie Meyers
departure from the Twilight series is painful
to watch. Earth has been invaded by aliens
called Souls. Some Souls called Seekers
locate humans to serve as hosts for other
Souls. Saoirse Ronan plays Melanie, whose
body is sublet by a Soul named Wanderer.
Melanie and her Soul become frenemies,
and Melanie arm-twists her visitor to return
to Melanies cave-dwelling survivalist clan.
Then Wanderer falls in love with Ian (Jake
Abel). And then ... you get the picture. Its
agonizingly slow and just not very good.
Olympus Has Fallen (R) This movie is Die Hard in the White House,
where terrorists appear out of nowhere
to storm Washington, take over the White
House and seize the president (Aaron
Eckhart) and most of the cabinet. Their
only hope is ex-Secret Service agent Mike
Banning (Gerard Butler), the only man
who knows how to get into the fortified
presidential bunker where the hostages
are. Banning stabs, shoots and strangles
his way through legions of terrorists.
There are much better thrillers out there.
Admission (PG) In this fraught romantic comedy, Portia
(Tina Fey) is a Princeton University
admissions officer with a secret. Her
live-in boyfriend, a professor played by
Michael Sheen, treats her like a doglit-
erally. But on a road trip, Portia visits a
new-age alternative high school, run by
John (Paul Rudd). John believes a prom-
ising applicant just might be the same
boy that Portia gave up for adoption. Fey
and Rudd are smooth as silk together,
but the film is only half good.
Spring Breakers (R) Writer-director Harmony Korine is a resolute
sleaze monger. This helps Spring Breakers,
in which not-so-innocent debauchery turns
sociopathic. Its about four teenage girls,
three nasty (Ashley Benson, Vanessa Hud-
gens and Rachel Korine), one nice (Selena
Gomez). Determined to have a memorable
vacation, the girls get some spending cash by
fake-pistol-waving in a restaurant. But things
steadily move into a more dangerous space,
with an impressive turn by James Franco as
a lively gangsta rapper.
The Croods (PG) Its Ice Age with humans and less ice. The
Croods are a brood of cavepeople; theres
Ugg (Nicolas Cage), Ugga (Catherine
Keener), Eep (Emma Stone) and some oth-
ers. Earthquaked out of their dwelling, the
Crood brood embarks on a search for a new
home. They come across Guy (Ryan Reyn-
olds), a caveboy who knows about fire and
has ideas. Guy leads the Croods toward a
place he calls Tomorrow where survival
lies. Not a whole lot here, and like most
Dreamworks vehicles, its way too much.
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (PG) All of the skilled actors on display in this ab-
surd comedy cant save the film. Las Vegas
magicians Burt (Steve Carell) and Anton
Marvelton (Steve Buscemi) have a stale
act, and Burts become a terrible person.
They cant stand each other. And theres
a dangerous new kid in town, a Jackass-y
performer (Jim Carrey) who gives the
bloodthirsty public what it wants. While Alan
Arkin and Olivia Wilde manage ably in their
scenes, the rest of the movie is poor
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Bullshit artist, you say? Utter bullshit.So insists 84-year-old Tommy
DeVito, founder of the Four Seasons, whos itching to answer back after this writers oral history of Jersey Boysthe musical based on the groupwas published in Vegas Seven earlier this year. Among the comments was this quote from Jersey Boys co-writer Rick Elice, recalling the genesis of the plot and characters:The audience [would]
recognize that Tommy is a bullshit artist from the frst words out of his mouth.While Elices comment irked
DeVito, a longtime Las Vegan, one senses hes torn: still disgruntled over his depiction in a show that hit Broadway nearly eight years ago and Ve-gas fve years ago (now at Paris Las Vegas) but grateful for his revival in the public eye. And unsure how to express that ambivalence.Nonetheless, he deserves his
say about thatand his color-ful life.
What was your reaction to Elices comment?When I read Seven, I was like,
What was the statement I said that was bullshit? I dont care what they say about me, but I know hes wrong. I started this thing, so when I hear things, its more sensitive to me.
Publicly, you seemed OK with the musical, even at-tending the Broadway open-ing, so what bothers youan incident that was misrep-resented or your overall characterization or Elices statement? I dont think I was as rough as
they wanna make me, and I like to see the truth and only the truth. Yeah, I went to jail seven or eight times. Im not proud of it, but Im not ashamed of it. My neighborhood was rough. If you come out alive, thats an achievement. Whatever hap-
pened when I was out there scuffing and getting arrested and doing things I wasnt sup-posed to do, that was my life. I was around mob guys all my
life. [Mob boss] Gyp DeCarlo (depicted in Jersey Boys) was a really, really good friend of mine. I didnt ask him what he did when he woke up in the morningHow many guys ya gonna kill today? I still talk to his wife at least once a week. But there was so much bad in there that it turned good. I remember [co-writer] Marshall Brickman said, I wish I had two Tommy DeVitos to write about. I guess if it aint broke, dont fx it.
What did prison teach you?You can learn an awful lot
there, especially at a place like Rahway [now East Jersey State Prison]. There should be more places like Rahway. You make your balls, they call it. If you dont, theyre gonna stab you in the back or hit you with a pipe. I did it in the frst couple of days, just hit somebody with a pipe from the bushes. From that day on, they walked that way instead of walking toward me.
Favorite Seasons song?I was partial to Rag Doll,
the way it happened. Gaudio and I came out of the studio in New York. Every time you came out, some little kid would clean your windshield, and youd give them a buck. This little girl ran up and was cleaning the window. Bob only had fve dol-lars. I said, Give her the fve dollars, whats the difference? She was so poor, like a little rag doll. Bob called me about an hour later and said, You gotta come up here. He played it for me. It was great.
Youve had extreme highs and lows in life. What was the highest high?The Rock and Roll Hall of
Fame was the cream of my life. We were lucky at the time we [formed the Four Seasons], but
I cant say we werent talented. Frankie [Valli] and his three-and-a-half octave rangeI picked him when he was 15, hangin on the corner. And Bob Gaudio with his ingenuity in writing these songs, and Nick Massi was a master of harmony.
Do you still communicate with Valli and Gaudio?I talked to Frankie two
months ago. Every once in a while hell call and say, How ya doin? I have to give him a lot of credit. I respect what he accomplished, but he went through a lot with the family, losing his daughter. I lost a son, 26 years old. I thought it was [drugs], but it was bad rhythm in his heart. Frankies kind of sick himself. I take up prayers for him, whether Im
mad at him or not. I call Bob once in a while.
Despite quibbles with the story, has Jersey Boys been a positive in your life?I thought to myself, what
a shot in the arm, after all the stuff I went through. Its phenomenal. Like, youre not through with it. Its a nice feel-ing at this age.
Tommy DeVitoThe Four Seasons founder on his Jersey Boys
depiction, his relationship with his former
bandmates and lessons learned doin time
By Steve Bornfeld
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