The aging (built in 1957, expanded a lot in the sixties) Tropicana Hotel in Las Vegas has been on life support for some time. For a decade or more now, we've been hearing almost annual reports that it's being sold, it's being torn down, it's being replaced by one or more new "mega-resorts" on that prime acreage, etc. But nothing ever happens to the place. It just goes on and on…and of course, not much is being spent on upgrading its facilities. The last time I stayed there was at least fifteen years ago and it was falling apart then. The plan may be not to implode it but to just wait until a stiff breeze blows the place down.
Something is changing, though. The hotel just got a new president and he promptly announced the closure of the long-running show there, the Folies Bergere. It opened on Christmas Day of 1959 and will close March 28. That will leave Jubilee! at Bally's as the last of its kind…the big production show in the classic Vegas tradition.
Most shows in Vegas are suffering these days. A few years back, there was a period when ticket prices were being increased on what felt like a daily basis. A number of hotels found that they could hike the fees up and sell just as many seats as before…so they hiked up fees. They probably hiked them too much and now they have to spread around discount coupons and it isn't the same. Something like the Folies probably suffers from sheer permanence. People who saw it ten or twenty years ago know it hasn't changed much so they might as well see something else. People who haven't seen it figure they can see it anytime so they might as well go to something that won't be there next trip or the trip after or the trip after.
Well, now it's going away. I saw the show a few times — once from the wings — because I had a friend who was headlining in it for a time. The ladies were cute. The boys danced well. The costumes were great. The music was pre-recorded. I think canned accompaniment hurts this kind of show more than producers think. Yes, it still sounds great…but it creates a feeling that the show's on auto-pilot, like one of those robotic Disneyland shows where the folks on stage have to time their performances to the music track and not to the audience response.
Las Vegas is facing a lot of cost-cutting. In the fiscal year ending June 30 of last year, profits for Nevada casinos fell 69%. That ain't so good and it's only gotten worse since then. At the same time, new and bigger hotels are opening, which further puts the pressure on places like the Tropicana. In dumping the Folies, they're probably looking to get out of financing whatever's in their showroom and to get some other show to come in a four-wall basis (as discussed here). The idea is to transfer the monetary risk to someone else and just play landlord.
Something's going to bust but in the meantime, it's not a bad time to visit Las Vegas. If you click around on the web, you can usually find a decent room for under $50 a night midweek, and not that much more on weekends unless there's a big convention in town. Most of the buffets and low-end restaurants are dropping prices. That's something that hasn't happened in a long time. You can eat quite well there for under $25 a day…and there are things to do for free if you don't have the money to gamble. Just walking around the newer hotels opened by Steve Wynn can be quite entertainining, even if you can't afford to eat in one. Or see most shows.
You see, at the same time, the high-end eateries are charging more and the top shows are keeping prices high. Tickets for Bette Midler run from $86 to $227. Elton John goes from $100 to $250. Cher can be seen for a low of $95 to a high of $250. Barry Manilow runs $95 to $225. Contrast that to the ticket prices for the Folies Bergere, which ran $35 to $45. They're not only closing the oldest show in Vegas but one of the cheapest.
So what's happening is that that you have this ever-widening gap between Rich and Poor, those who can afford the top and those who scrape along the bottom. It's kind of like a microcosm of what's happening in the United States, except with sequins.