Case Bets: Gibbons vs. gaming; Pansy Ho; R-J shocked, shocked!; Rat Pack not back

First off, a hearty S&G salute to Steve Friess, named “Best Blogger” by the readers of Las Vegas CityLife. (Yes, I was nominated but didn’t even make it into second place. I’ll live.) As you scroll — and scroll — down the page, you’ll incidentally come across a bit of my deathless prose in re the “Best Local Theatre Director” and “Best Local Theater” categories. You’ve got to be an early riser to beat Friess to a story, so congratulations on an accolade well and truly earned.

“Gross receipts tax? Bah!” That’s the gist of a recent policy speech by Gov. Jim Gibbons. Which means that if the state of Nevada is subjected to another four years of Gibbons’ rule, the multi-billion-dollar shortfall projected for 2011 is probably coming out of the hide of the casino industry. That’s been Midnight Jim’s default strategy whenever he needs to find a few extra dollars under the sofa cushions, so Big Gaming had better bend over and prepare to pay more while all non-mining businesses continue to enjoy a free ride (or even 50% tax rebates).

Gibbons’ answer to the current revenue crisis is — brace yourselves — to boost tourism. If he’s got any ideas on that score (other than saying we should blow off China) he should have been busting them out two years ago, although I suspect he has “wind in his sleeves,” to borrow a Chinese colloquialism.

Did Pansy Ho really only put $100 million into $1.2 billion MGM Grand Macau? If so, how did she get 50% control out of such a small equity infusion? And why weren’t gaming regulators asking those questions? Considering some of the people how have denied (or, more frequently, allowed to withdraw from) licensure in Nevada, Pansy Ho wouldn’t meet the standards the Nevada Gaming Control Board usually sets and which frown upon even casual contact with the criminal world.

Having a Capt. Renault moment was Las Vegas Review-Journal Publisher Sherman Frederick, to whom the news that Stanley Ho is mobbed up came as a shocking surprise. Maybe it should, because when Pansy Ho’s alliance with MGM Mirage was going through Nevada’s regulatory process, the R-J‘s drowsy scrutiny amounted to scarcely more than a handful of Jane Ann Morrison columns.

Pace Frederick’s contention, the only person who’s “kidding yourself” is the man at the publisher’s keyboard. The gaming industry’s growth has long since outstripped the NGCB’s apparatus and the latter’s business-as-usual approach, in which increasingly large companies have taken regulators hostage, passes without comment from the spectacularly incurious R-J. (Though I doubt its business desk would have snoozed through this story during its Dave Berns/Jeff Simpson era.) We’re breathlessly informed that “developments on this case … could be explosive.” Yeah, as explosive as a mouse fart in a tornado.

The Musical of Musicals: The Musical. A few years back, the Westin Casuarina took a brave stab at relevance by hosting a satellite company of Forbidden Broadway. It didn’t last long but the effort was to be commended. Currently, Nevada Conservatory Theatre is presenting The Musical of Musicals: The Musical, which differs from Forbidden B’way in that it doesn’t use actual show tunes with new lyrics but is an original pastiche (if that’s not oxymoronic) of five different B’way composers. There’s something about employing the grandiose style of, say, Rodgers & Hammerstein to tell the mundane story of a girl who’s short on her rent that is inherently funny in its deliberate mismatch of form and content.

Not only is TMOM:TM playing to across-the-board raves, it would be a natural for a showroom like the Las Vegas Hilton‘s Shimmer Cabaret if casinos could get past the lounge-as-profit-center mentality. Offer the purposefully low-budget show for free and recoup as much of the (relatively minimal) cost at the bar. Heck, TMOM:TM‘s hilariously cheap version of Phantom of the Opera‘s falling chandelier alone would generate good word of mouth and probably stir up a little extra foot traffic. Given the quality of some of the matinée and early-evening shows I’ve seen on the Strip, The Musical of Musicals would be a huge step upward.

On the subject of shows, I had been planning to review Sandy Hackett’s Rat Pack Show: Shadows in the Desert. (Uff da!) at the Sahara. Then casino manager Navegante Group, in yet another blunder, moved it from the atmospheric Congo Room to the main venue downstairs. Plunking an intimate spectacle like SHRPS:SITD into the vast wasteland that is the strangely configured Sahara showroom is tantamount to a death sentence.

Even in the Congo Room, cast members — particularly the droll and tireless Hackett — have to run around quite a lot. Put them in the huge downstairs venue and SHRPS:SITD is no longer a performance, it’s a track meet. Also, a healthy-sized crowd in the Congo Room would look like a a flea circus in the showroom. Navegante — and negligent owner Sam Nazarian‘s — continued amputation of bits and pieces of the Sahara is reason to be thankful that the Aqueduct racino contract got yanked from Navegante’s grasp. The company’s just not ready for the big time.