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Into the Past

Arial performers above a crowd at a Gatsby themed event
Angel J. Rivera Lugo
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AJR Photography

Gatsby culture is hot. Here are four places where you can revel in the excess

IMAGINE A CHANCE to transport yourself to the opulent era of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby. Decked out in a flapper dress or tuxedo, you’re sipping on gin and bourbon — or maybe a mint julep like those that wealthy socialite Daisy Buchanan asked her husband to make as they entertained her former love, the titular Jay Gatsby, in a lavish suite at New York’s Plaza Hotel.

Set during the roaring twenties, Gatsby reflected an era of exuberant consumer culture. Despite Prohibition and the mob’s looming presence, Gatsby’s characters whiled away their time at fancy soirees where jazz set the tone and bubbly flowed freely. Almost 100 years after the novel’s 1925 publication, many still celebrate the novel’s excess at Gatsby-style parties and Jazz Age lounges.

Walking the Las Vegas Strip, you can see hints of the Gatsby era in glowing neon lights and casinos beckoning passersby. Duck into one of these 1920s-themed events or speakeasies, and you’ll feel like you’re at one of Jay Gatsby’s legendary parties.

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Voltaire at the Venetian is planning to throw The Great Gatsby Party on New Year’s Eve. Event creator Derek van Bakergem, CEO of Rosé Lifestyle, says there have always been many Gatsby-themed events held across the nation, but they haven’t been Gatsby-esque enough in terms of performances, dress code, and venue. His event, he says, will offer a true Gatsby experience with an enforced dress code of black-tie and flapper-inspired attire and entertainment such as a performer inside a massive champagne tower. A sumptuous menu of caviar, chocolate trees, macarons, and petit fours is planned — paired with bubbly, of course. Jazz music will set the mood as the midnight countdown starts. High-rollers can reserve Jay Gatsby tables for $1,000 or more. “We try to create an environment where people feel like they are Gatsby,” van Bakergem says.

At the Venetian is also the recently opened 1923 LIVE, a hidden speakeasy — for those who can find it (you will) after being dropped off at an undisclosed location. Well-dressed servers welcome visitors into a venue rich in crimson tones and elegant chandeliers.
“Going through a secret door,” owner Noel Bowman says, heightens the mystique. (Hint: There is a hidden magic room, too.)

Bowman’s original speakeasy, the 1923 Prohibition Bar at Mandalay Bay, which opened in April 2014, is also mired in secrecy — you can find a magic show in their hidden chamber and a secret bar with hard-to-find whiskey selections that are unavailable in the speakeasy’s main bar. Though 1920s attire is not mandatory, Bowman says he’s astonished at how many people come dressed as flappers and gangsters. The bar offers NOLA nights on the weekends, with live music and a burlesque dancer at the Mandalay Bay location, meant to emulate New Orleans nightlife. The bar’s food is also reminiscent of the Big Easy: The Torched Maple Bourbon Bacon with candied pecans and spiced chocolate bark offers a taste of the South. Overall, Bowman says, his venues give off a Gatsby-adjacent vibe. “I’m more of the (spot for) gangster, Prohibition bar, underground, common blue-collar folks,” he says. “But yet, it still has a little bit of that (Gatsby) illusion.”

Heading downtown, one finds the Mob Museum, home to the Underground Speakeasy & Distillery. Displayed on the walls of the bar are 1920s fashions, alongside a photo of Fitzgerald and his wife, Zelda. “We have flapper dresses exactly like you would have seen Daisy and the other women in The Great Gatsby wearing,” says the Mob Museum’s director of education, Claire White. A painting of Texas Guinan, a Prohibition-era actress and nightclub hostess, hides a secret room for private parties. During Prohibition, White points out, “alcohol wasn’t technically illegal to drink. So, most Americans really didn’t see themselves as breaking the law. They saw themselves as having a little fun.”

Legality aside, the Underground’s Food and Beverage Manager David Edis recommends the joint’s 1920s-inspired rendition of the world-famous James Pepper Old Fashioned — best savored while enjoying the bar’s live weekend jazz and light bites, naturally. Gatsby, bootlegger that he was, would be proud.