Vegas, Baby

Kendall and I just returned from a quick trip to Las Vegas to celebrate our second wedding anniversary. I told her I was going to surprise her with a little getaway and from the messages on our machine when we got home, I could tell that most of Kendall’s friends thought I was whisking her off to some elegant Bed and Breakfast in the Napa Valley for long romantic walks in the countryside. Um…not exactly. Kendall loves Las Vegas and screamed in excitement when she finally realized where we were headed.

We hadn’t been to Vegas for about five years. On our last trip, Kendall had oysters for dinner (it was about 110 degrees outside) and immediately got the worst case of food poisoning I’ve ever seen. We left early and I vowed never to return to that hellish town again. But that episode seemed a distant memory this week as we made our way through the desert to Sin City.

The first thing I noticed on this trip was that Old Las Vegas has virtually disappeared from the Strip. Gone are the last vestiges of the original hotels that the Jewish mafiosos and other shady characters put up beginning in the 1940s. One by one the kitschy casinos on Las Vegas Boulevard have been imploded to make room for the gigantic monstrosities of Steve Wynn and other multinational corporations. One of the last to go was the old Desert Inn where Kendall and I saw Steve and Eydie perform (with Don Rickles as the opener). I kept wishing they had kept just one of these old-style hotels restored to what it looked like during its Rat Pack-era heydey. It would be a perfect place for an exhibit on the history of Las Vegas and it would be fun to see recreations of the old-time shows in one of those nightclub-style theatres that seem microscopic by today’s standards. But I guess the real estate on the Las Vegas Strip is simply too valuable for any nostalgic trips down memory lane.

I first visited Las Vegas twenty years ago this summer. I had just moved to L.A. to work on a children’s TV news show based on an animated character named Ted E. Bear. Ted was voiced by Tommy Smothers with other voices supplied by Susan Saint James and Louis Nye. We had to film a promo with Smothers who was appearing at the Desert Inn with his brother Dick so we came to Vegas and stayed with the Smothers Brothers at their temporary digs—Engelbert Humperdink’s house! It was a perfect introduction to the glitz, hype, and horror of Las Vegas culture.

My next visit to Las Vegas was in the late 1980s. I was attending a national conference for teachers of young children and the second I stepped out of my car I was approached by a prostitute looking for some business. At first I didn’t get it. I started giving this woman directions to the convention center but then I realized that she was definitely NOT a second grade teacher—unless she hailed from the Sodom and Gomorrah School District.

Today the Strip seems more organized, more corporate, and more antiseptic. Everything is HUGE there, from the themed resorts and elaborate shows to the crab legs on the all-you-can-eat buffets and the boobs on the cocktail waitresses dispensing free drinks.

Do Islamic fundamentalists use photos of Las Vegas as fuel for their hatred of American culture? Despite the insanity, Kendall and I had a great time. We stayed at the Bellagio and had a superb anniversary dinner at Michael Mina (remember the days when people went to Vegas because of its cheap food?). That night we saw one of the four Cirque du Soleil spectacles that have taken up permanent residence in Las Vegas. This one, called KÀ, told the story of royal Asian twins who were separated at birth by opposing forces and had to find their way back to each other at great peril. But as usual in the alien universe that is Cirque du Soleil, the focus was not on the story or the words but on the jaw-dropping acrobatics of the superhuman cast. And when I say jaw-dropping, I mean it! Every time I looked over at Kendall her mouth was wide open in disbelief.

I crawled into bed exhausted at one in the morning leaving Kendall in the Bellagio casino until all hours, half expecting to wake up to find that we no longer owned our home. Thank God that even though Las Vegas brings out the absolute worst in our addictive personalities, we’re both major wimps when it comes to gambling. Last time we were there Kendall played a little blackjack, but this time we were both too scared to try anything except the slot machines, and even there we mostly stuck with the nickel slots.

It’s amazing how Las Vegas can so quickly lay waste to all discipline and moral values. At first it was a big deal if we put five dollars into a machine and we vowed to limit ourselves to a very small amount of money for gambling. Hours later we were shoving twenties into those damn machines without a moment’s thought. Kendall and I have absolutely no gambling skills whatsoever. I’d start on a machine and immediately anthropomorphize it into a sentient being that was always just about to pay up big. Once I started on a machine I simply could not stop. My only moment of self-control came when I finally did win a jackpot on one of the nickel machines. I’d been at it for over an hour with my original $20. I was down to a paltry 30 nickels when I suddenly got three Double Diamonds in a row. My eyes almost bugged out of my head as I watched the numbers go nuts on my machine and I immediately cashed out my winnings of 1600 nickels. Wowee! Easy money, huh? No, just another ruse to keep the hope alive. Luckily, I only lost about $60 on the trip but I heard many people bemoaning their losses of thousands and thousands of dollars. When I came downstairs at 7 am yesterday morning it was sad to see all the people hunched over tables and in front of slot machines who were clearly there since the night before.

I always feel this dichotomy in Las Vegas. There’s something I truly despise about the city and everything it represents but at the same time I can get completely carried away and enjoy the wild fun of it all. Still, I can’t imagine being there for more than two days at a time. The sheer visual stimulation alone would do me in. My eyes actually started to hurt from the constant display of garish, gigantic, over-the-top imagery. I’m eating breakfast right now in Beverly Hills and the surroundings seems like a salve to my overworked eyeballs. You know you’re in trouble when you start to see Beverly Hills as a tranquil respite from sensory overload.

As I wrote that last line, I suddenly heard a voice that seemed very familiar. That sounds like Morgan Fairchild, I thought. When I looked up to see who was talking, I saw an older woman alone at a table harping loudly on her cell phone. That’s funny, she really does sound just like Morgan Fairchild. Oh well. I then looked two tables to her left and lo and behold, there was…MORGAN FAIRCHILD! Hello? I kept looking at both, thinking somehow that my mind was playing tricks on me but no, there was the bona fide Morgan Fairchild talking softly to two producers while her voice was coming out of a total stranger nearby. I had to watch for several minutes to make sure I understood whose voice was coming out of which mouth. It reminded me of the time I saw Kendall and her mom being interviewed on a TV show before I met them. I was ironing some shirts at the time so I wasn’t paying close attention to the screen but I was enjoying the interview. Finally, towards the end, I looked up to discover that the older, more sophisticated voice I assumed all along was Betsy’s was actually coming out of Kendall’s mouth and the voice that sounded much more like a young girl’s was actually her mother’s!

Should I tell Morgan Fairchild that I saw her very own penny slot machine in Vegas this week? There are so many themed slot machines these days, from “Men in Black” to Clint Eastwood to “The Beverly Hillbillies.” Just give me some old-fashioned cherries, sevens, and bars please. By the way, just so you know, Morgan Fairchild looks gorgeous. I haven’t seen her since she played Chandler Bing’s mom on “Friends,” married to Kathleen Turner, Chandler’s transvestite dad. Did you know that Fairchild’s first professional job was as Faye Dunaway’s stand-in during the shooting of “Bonnie and Clyde?” Do you think I’m the only person in this restaurant blogging about her right now? Probably not! I was just thinking of Fairchild’s 1980s soap opera this week because the Bellagio is located on Flamingo Road. Remember that show? Her mother was played by Barbara Rush, who we had dinner with last Saturday night and the show also featured Stella Stevens, who I wrote about recently. Oy, I’ve got to stop these circular ramblings, Give me a second and I’ll find a way to link Saddam Hussein and Molly Ringwald in the same sentence.

I had intended to write one or two paragraphs about our trip but I can see that blogging affects my discipline in the same way as the slot machines. Regarding Old Las Vegas, the one retro element of city that I’m sorry is still with us is the fact that everyone still smokes there. What a shock to see those ancient artifacts called “ashtrays” everywhere and to smell that familiar stench from the past. One of my dorky personal highlights of the trip was going to the interactive Star Trek Experience at the Las Vegas Hilton. This consists of a Star Trek museum (I spent over an hour on the timeline alone—do you know what year Lt. Uhura was born? Hint: I mentioned it somewhere on this blog) and two rides, Klingon Encounter and Borg Invastion 4D in which you are made to believe you are under attack and must flee in your space pod. Very well done and so realistic that I almost threw up during our escape from the Klingon warship. I felt a little sorry for the human workers, dressed in full Starfleet getups, who were having a tough time getting much of a response from the glassy-eyed tourists. At the end of the rides, they spit you out into the world’s largest Star Trek store where you can buy bottles of Romulan Ale or Klingon Blood Wine. Oy.

I told Kendall I could only take Las Vegas once a year at the most. But then I read in the paper today that the newest Cirque du Soleil show, based on the songs of the Beatles, opens at the Mirage tonight. I can hear my winning nickel slot machine calling me back for a bigger prize. Should we go back this weekend? Morgan? Wanna come with and show me your slots?

Comments

[OldOldLady Of The Hills]

Oh Danny...this post brought up such memories of the "old" Las Vegas....Just so you understand...I haven't been to Las Vegas since 1961! And I went there first in I believe 1956...and went one or two more times after that...till that very last time in '61. So, I only know the old Las Vegas...I have never seen any of these newer hotels. In fact some BIG (Not by todays standards of course), hotel that was built after my time there in '61, has already been torn down to make way for one of these Monster Hotels....The Sands was where I stayed mostly, and then the old Desert Inn...ALL of these Hotels were just two story's high or in some cases just one story high--except for The Sands, which had a High Rise...(HA!) It think it was 8 or 10 story's high...I don't remember...EVERYTHING was cheap then...Rooms and Food...! I don't think I could take LV the way it is now....It just seems like it is another place entirely...! I saw some fantastic performers there...in the days when ALL the shows were "Performers"....The Good Old Days? Well, they are to me.
Glad you had such a great time, my dear...

[Pearl]

Danny,
The other night I was at a series of lectures for the Shavuot holiday. One of the moderators was talking about the Ten Commandments and saying that when the Torah was being given at Mount Sinai, there was a sound-and-light show (lots of noise, fire, smoke, sort of a Babel-like setting)going on...
As I read your description and had flashbacks of my own trip to Vegas (I also believe 20 years ago this summer), I couldn't help but think that casino interiors and activity must've been modeled after the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai. ;)

[Pearl]

BTW, Happy Anniversary...and many more!

[Laurie]

Danny,

Thanks for the info about Las Vegas. Michael and I are going next week and will be staying at the Hilton. I am looking forward to checking out the interactive Star Wars experience.
Happy second anniversary!!!

[Mikal]

Danny,

Happy Second Anniversary! May there be many more.

Yes, it's me -- your virtual pal from the Bay Area, and old acquaintance/would-be-squire of your wife's back in the day -- returning after a major domicile- and career-change that blew me out of blogdom for awhile.

Good piece on Lost Wages. I first went there in the absolute tail-end of the Mob era, a few weeks before the brothers Spilotro were literally buried alive for losing the Outfit its billion-dollar cash-cow in the desert. Back then I liked the generally sleazy and unabashedly greedy gambling-fuled ambience of the city, although I had a lot more fun buying exotic weapons at the Survival Store and scoping nekkid girls at the Palomino* than I did dropping money on the tables. I guess even then I was too aware of how the place subsidized its cheap hots n' cots, and too much of a stats/probability geek to kid myself about my chances against the house.

Fast forward to late '05. Cut adrift from my old life as an Oakland online entrepreneur, I did a southwestern getaway/head-clearing trip with an old high-school buddy that concluded in Sin City. I'd been to LV in the meantime twice to see the Grateful Dead at some early-90s gigs at the Silver Bowl, but was unprepared for how radically the place had changed in the intervening years. The sheer size and over-the-top excess of the hotels themselves was astonishing; I could have spent days just wandering through places like New York New York or the Venetia just marvelling at the ungepachkit** extravagance of it all.

The place really has become a sort of adult Disneyland: corporate, controlled and slick; but with enough naughtiness in the form of gambling, open drinking and smoking, and racy shows to give it a slight edge. Too, the mall-ification of the hotels makes perfect sense to a cynic like myself -- even if you comes out ahead at the tables, the opportunities to blow your winnings on high-ticket impulse buys are just too easy and frequent for most people to resist. I'm sure the big establishments are using legit retail to clear as much or more than they ever did by skimming gambling losses.

Which didn't affect me much, because I'm still largely resistant to the lure of the games. Give me a couple of rolls of nickels, a 5c video-draw-poker machine, and a few comped beers, and I'm happy to just stand there soaking up the atmosphere and pretending I can beat the 91% payoff average.

I suppose I'll return before too long, as there really isn't anywhere on Earth quite like Sam's Town. But if you guys are into REAL sensory overload and a more organic form of naughty hedonism, I'd recommend my personal favorite Silver State destination: the end-of-summer Burning Man Festival.

Again, a happy 2nd to you & Kendall!

*There, your Italian-American narrator and his two Jewish pals made a boozy toast to the life and memory of Benjamin Siegel, Father of Las Vegas and Martyr to American Sleaze.

**Now how many goyim do you think use THAT word?

[knibilnats]

Sammy Davis Jr. should be pope. But maybe that's just me.