We’re looking on Tuesday at the changing face of entertainment on the Strip — some of those changes go back to the first year of the pandemic.
It was in that year, 2020, when the long-running show La Reve closed at the Wynn.
To replace it, Awakening opened in 2022. The high-tech show, however, didn’t hit the ground running. Some audiences were confused by its story and ticket sales weren’t great. But producers have recently made changes. Can it rebound?
And speaking of rebounds: How did Cirque du Soleil do it? They faced bankruptcy during the 2020 shutdown, but now are seeing revenues higher than before the pandemic.
Following these local entertainment developments and many more is Las Vegas entertainment columnist John Katsilometes of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. He joins State of Nevada host Joe Schoenmann along with Kip Kelly of The Beverly Theater, set to open soon.
On what’s changed in the Wynn’s Awakening
KATSILOMETES: Well, short answer not a lot. What the producers of Awakening are saying is that they dropped the show down for a time to recast a scene and add some music, and the tweaking of the show is going to be an ongoing process. So at this point, there's one thing called the water round that's been kind of changed and adjusted a little bit. And, mostly with new music from Brian Tyler, there's a new song in it, but it's actually very good. And after that, there's not a whole lot discernible if you've seen the show at its opening and where to go back to this week. It's not as if they've taken in, completely changed the order of acts or dropped significant acts or anything of that nature. They're just tightening it, I think is the best way to say it.
On high ticket prices for shows like Absinthe
KATSILOMETES: We have Absinthe as the probably gold standard. If you can handle the humor, it's probably the gold standard production show in the city, still running since 2011. … They're in that same class and are in the top tier with all the Cirque shows. And they run 14 shows a week. They sell well. They don't sell out every show, but they sell well enough to make a profit. And until the market adjusts where people aren't going to be willing to pay that price, they're gonna stay there. And that is just the market trend.
On Cirque’s post-pandemic bounceback
KATSILOMETES: What happened with their ticket sales when they reopened is there was a new demand for certain shows … they had an increase in sales, especially in Mystere at Treasure Island, you know, which was a show that was just kind of running, I think it was around 67% capacity, maybe a little bit more than that, when Mystere reopened, it vaulted up … like 90%. Because people realize that when you reopen the city, they wanted to get back to the shows that they had heard about, you know? There was a renewed interest in a lot of the Cirque productions. … Some international businesses returned certain benefits from that, from the convention business and people from overseas returning to Las Vegas. It's very big with those crowds of visitors from the U.K. And Mad Apple is a hit.
The Beverly Theater is an arthouse theater opening in downtown Las Vegas on Friday. The venue will host film, literary and live music events.
On what the community can expect from The Beverly Theater
KELLY: Beverly Rodgers imagined a space where we could lift up the independent voices and kind of bring them into the mainstream. And so that starts with independent film. And that's what we're anchored by. So any of those titles that haven't traditionally had the screen time that … we think they might have deserved here in Las Vegas is kind of what we're aiming for. Things that are impactful or meaningful or tell a very unique story that Las Vegas haven't been able to see in the theaters. … We understand what that climate means; we're dealing with independent film and an independent film, the first thing to get caught is the marketing budget. Right? So we're showing titles that no one has seen. But maybe even more importantly, we're showing titles that a lot of people may not have heard of. It's our goal to make sure that we are evangelizing the venue in the right way. We're proactive, we're always in the conversation. I think traditionally, exhibitors have been a reactive space for studios … We can't do that, which is why we kind of designed the space so that we can be more proactive and more aggressive with our programming.
On opening following the closure of Regal Village Square
KELLY: I think Village Square was a good spot. I appreciate what they did, for putting some independent titles on their screens. I will admit, candidly, I think it's a little bit sad that Las Vegas when associated with an art house, the closest thing we have is the second largest movie chain in the United States. I think that is sad. Hopefully, the Beverly Theater becomes not just filling that void, but takes it into the stratosphere, because we plan to program independent film seven days a week, and that is what will make up 100% of our screen time.
On what makes the Beverly an ‘intentional’ music venue
KELLY: Being anchored by independent film and having our literary events, we've kind of comprised our three pillar program offerings to make sure that we didn't ever have to just fill something for the sake of getting something on the calendar. I think concerts are going to be a big part of what we do. We hope that we can bring some touring acts to Las Vegas, we think that we have designed a space that acts that might skip because they don't want to play the Strip … we hope we're designing the space where they can reach [the] actual Las Vegas market and not just our visiting economy. … Sometimes as a venue if that's all you do, you have to really scramble to come up with other kinds of live acts and live performances that may not do so well. So we're really hoping to only bring those things that are going to sell out.
For ticketing information, visit the Beverly Theater’s website.
Guests: John Katsilometes, entertainment columnist, Las Vegas Review-Journal; Kip Kelly, chief experience officer, The Beverly Theater