Tales of Las Vegas #1

Any day now, the Clarion Hotel in Las Vegas will be imploded. The specific date seems to be in flux but it's coming, it's coming. The latest in an endless series of owners, developer Lorenzo Doumani, plans to erect a luxury resort in the $500 million to $1 billion price range.

You probably never stayed at the Clarion, which is located on Convention Center Drive as a mid-point between The Strip and the big Vegas convention center. It started life as the Royal Inn in 1970 and thereafter always seemed to be changing names, owners or formats. It became the Royal Americana at one point owned by Horn and Hardart, the folks who used to operate cafeterias and Automats in New York, then it closed in 1982.

A few years later, it was remodeled so it looked like a riverboat and it reopened as the Paddlewheel. That didn't last long and in '92, Debbie Reynolds bought it and it morphed into the Debbie Reynolds Hollywood Hotel, a combination movie museum and casino. The big paddlewheel on the side of the building was repainted to look like a reel of movie film and inside, you could see Ms. Reynolds perform, get a glimpse of Clark Gable's shirt and lose yours. The effort, though intriguing, did not catch on. In '97, Ms. Reynolds filed for bankruptcy and later sold the property…to the World Wrestling Federation.

We're not done yet. The W.W.F. tried to convert it into a wrestling-themed hotel — make up your own joke — but they weren't able to pull that together and it was briefly called the Convention Center Drive Hotel. After a year or so, they sold it to a company that rebranded it Greek Isles. I'm not sure why. Maybe some marketing survey told them there were a lot of folks of Greek extraction wandering around Vegas with money protruding from their pockets, looking for a place to stay. By 2009, those owners were gone, the Clarion people were in…and now it's over, it's all over. The place closed last Labor Day and is expected to be a parcel of dirt by the close of this month as the developers try to pull together financing for their luxury resort.

My experiences with the building were all when it was the Paddlewheel. In the late eighties, I was commuting often to Las Vegas for about eleven varying reasons, one of which was that I liked the town. I liked the pace and the energy and the friendliness and all the show businessy type things and whole 24-hour lifestyle.

Another, which I've written about, was that I was fascinated by Blackjack and the not-quite-cheating practice known as Card Counting. Less to make money and more as a personal challenge, I wanted to see if I could master the skill to my own satisfaction. I did, I gave it up…but I still went to Vegas every few weeks. It was a fun place to be then.

Not that it isn't now but, well, it's different.

I have here a Vegas magazine I picked up at the peak of my semi-residency there. The date is March of 1988 and let's see what's going on at the major hotels there, in alphabetical order. You'll note that not one of the shows is or even vaguely resembles Cirque du Soleil. I'm not saying that's a bad thing but it is a thing…

• At the Aladdin, you could see a magical review called "Abracadabra" (I did; it was pretty good) or see Johnny Cash perform (I didn't; it was pretty expensive). That Aladdin has since been torn down and replaced by a totally new hotel which had that name but later changed to Planet Hollywood.
• At Bally's, which is still there, you could see at various times throughout the month, the following headliners: Tom Jones, Jackie Mason, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Frank Sinatra and Smokey Robinson. There was also their big production show, "Jubilee," which just closed for renovations. At the time, it was one of several shows in town featuring classic showgirls. When it recently went on hiatus, it was the only one of its kind remaining.
• Caesars Palace was then about half its current size but still plenty big. In their showroom that month, they had Rodney Dangerfield, Reba McIntire, The Pointer Sisters, Jay Leno, The Beach Boys and a parlay of Dionne Warwick and Burt Bacharach. Reba still plays there a few weeks a year and her top ticket price is $205 a seat, which is less than half of the top price Elton John gets when he plays there.
• Circus Circus was the same place it is now, the same place it will always be.
• The Desert Inn had as its headliners, Suzanne Somers (with Louie Anderson as her opening act), Rich Little (with Anthony Newley), Charley Pride, Ray Stevens, Roseanne Barr and Larry Gatlin. The Desert Inn was torn down so they could build Wynn. Suzanne Somers is now appearing in commercials on MeTV selling the Three-Way Poncho.
• The Dunes had a Comedy Store outlet with (that month) Jimmie Walker, Damon Wayans, George Miller, Steve Oedekerk, Felicia Michaels (Hi, Felicia!) and others. They tore the Dunes down so they could build the Bellagio.
• The Flamingo Hilton had a revue called "City Lites." The hotel's still there with different shows, one starring Osmonds.
• The Frontier had a show called "Beyond Belief" starring Siegfried and Roy before they were *SIEGFRIED AND ROY!!!* Developers tore the Frontier down in 2007 to build, so far, nothing. About once a year, they announce a new mega-resort of some sort but it's still a mega-empty lot.
• At the Golden Nugget, you could see Paul Anka, Don Rickles, Lou Rawls, Diahann Carroll, Vic Damone, David Brenner or Yakov Smirnoff. The Nugget is still there and Rickles still plays Vegas (though not the Golden Nugget) once or twice a year for a few days, calling people hockey pucks, pointing out black men in the front row and, of course, dropping his pants and firing a rocket.
• At the Hacienda, you could see a "Minsky's Burlesque Show" starring the last two surviving comedians from Minsky's Burlesque, Irv Benson and Dexter Maitland. Minsky's Burlesque is gone…and pretty much was then. The Hacienda is gone and replaced by Mandalay Bay. Dexter Maitland is gone and replaced by no one. And as far as I know, Irv Benson is still alive and if so, he'll be 101 at the end of this month.
• The Las Vegas Hilton is no longer the Las Vegas Hilton. Its latest in a series of names is the Westgate and it's slated for a major renovation. In March of '88, you could see Barry Manilow or Wayne Newton there. I suspect if you see Wayne on the premises again, he'll have a belt sander and be part of the crew doing that major renovation.
• The Holiday Inn in '88 was featuring the "Roarin' 20's Revue." Before the Paddlewheel looked like a riverboat, the Holiday Inn did. Now, the building's been redesigned so it no longer looks like a riverboat and it's Harrah's.
• The Imperial Palace in '88 was featuring "Legends in Concert" and it did for a long, long time. Now, "Legends in Concert" is over at the Flamingo Hilton while the Imperial Palace has been completely remade into The Linq.
• The Landmark was featuring "Melinda, the First Lady of Magic." Both are gone.
• The Marina was featuring "Beatle Magic." Where the Marina once stood is now the MGM Grand.
• The Riviera was pretty much the same place then that it is now and last time I was in it, it didn't look like it had been cleaned since then and I recognized some of the food in the buffet from '88. Incidentally, in March of 1988, their comedy club there was featuring a kid named David Spade.
• The Sahara Hotel housed Redd Foxx, as did about half the hotels on this list at one time or another. The Sahara has been completely remodeled to become a resort called SLS Las Vegas. Redd Foxx has been completely remodeled to become Tyler Perry.
• The Sands was featuring Gallagher, Paul Revere & The Raiders and Sha Na Na, which was quite a change from the days when it featured Frank, Dino and Sammy, though perhaps more in dress than in content. The Sands was torn down and The Venetian now occupies that plot of desert.
• The Stardust was offering "Lido de Paris" featuring Bobby Berosini and his Orangutans. Someday here, I have to tell you a story about that odd, controversial act. Anyway, the Stardust was imploded in 2007 to make way for a grand resort called Echelon Place which, last I heard, was a set of blueprints and a lot of press releases.
• The Tropicana had the "Folies Bergere." The show's no longer there but amazingly, the Tropicana is. For years, it kept being announced that the Trop was going to be nuked and replaced by a new, zillion-dollar resort. Somehow, the place has survived and even undergone renovation. Looks like it'll be around for a while.
• The Union Plaza downtown was featuring "Nudes on Ice," which I didn't see but which one reviewer then said should have been retitled, "One Semi-Nude on an Ice Cube." It's now just The Plaza and in its showroom, you can see Louie Anderson who I presume is neither nude nor on ice.
• Vegas World was offering "The Robert Allen Show." I don't know who he was either but the hotel he played has been revamped into the Stratosphere.

And the Paddlewheel had two shows. One was "Hot Lips," which featured comedian Pete Barbutti, a jazz quartet, six great-looking mostly-naked women and a magician. The other was "The Heat is On," which starred six great-looking mostly-naked men. I spent a couple of interesting nights at the Paddlewheel and no, it wasn't because of the latter show. I'll tell you about those nights one of these days.