Wow, people used to actually get dressed up to visit the casinos in Las Vegas! This scene from the mid-’50’s may have been staged, but there were a lot more people going to a nice dinner and show back then.
Of course, the dinner show to see Rose Marie, or Jimmy Durante, or Joe Brown, was an under-$10 affair. If you slipped the maître d‘ a couple bucks you got a nice seat. $5 put you up front where the singer or comic might just talk directly to you!
When the Rat Pack was making headlines in the 50’s and early 60’s, you could count on seeing Frank Sinatra or Dean Martin for a reasonable price, and they often hung around with other stars after the show to have a cigarette and a couple shots. Of course, that’s when it was Vegas and the Mob!
When the Moulin Rouge casino opened in 1955 with stars like Count Basie, Pearl Bailey, Harry Belafonte and Louis Armstrong performing, their small showroom filled-up for the end of the second show with other stars like Marlene Dietrick, George Burns, Judy Garland, and Jack Benny, who were playing at other clubs in town. Nobody wanted to miss out on the Class A entertainment and the casino management went so far as to add a third show at 2:30 am, because as Chickie Berman used to say, “Nobody important gets up before noon anyway.”
Life Magazine put the new club on its cover and touted the Moulin Rouge as the first racially integrated casino in Las Vegas, but the casino’s success was also its undoing. Profits were being siphoned from the count room, bills went unpaid, and casinos on the Strip like the Sands pushed their weekly entertainment budget to astronomical levels, paying some stars more than $100,000 a week.
The Sands also slowly began allowing African American entertainers to enter using the front door of the property, and to even stay in some of the hotel bungalows. The change was quick and dramatic, and the Moulin Rouge closed just five months after it opened, but its impact was significant and within a few years all of the casinos in Las Vegas were fully integrated.
Today, you don’t have to put on a coat and tie to enjoy the top stars playing at the Mirage, MGM, or the Luxor, but you can expect to pay $100 to see a big-name on the stage. That price doesn’t get you dinner anymore, but there are a lot more choices in town than there were 50 years ago. Enjoy!
Thanks for reading – Al W Moe
I really appreciate the kind of topics post here. Thanks for sharing us a great information that is actually helpful. Good day!
LikeLike
This is a very good post. Just wonderful. Truly, I am amazed at what informative things you've told us today
LikeLike
This is a very good post. Just wonderful. Truly, I am amazed at what informative things you've told us today. Thanks a million for that.
LikeLike
Thanks for taking the time to discuss this, I feel about it and love learning more on this topic.
LikeLike
I really enjoy simply reading all of your weblogs. Simply wanted to inform you that you have people like me who appreciate your work. Definitely a great post
LikeLike
I just want to say \”Awesome post\”. Very interesting sharing.Thanks
LikeLike
Gambling is the activity of betting something of value on the result of some particular event. The event should have a definite range of outcomes. Depending on where and with whom the gambler gambles, the articles placed as bets might vary.
LikeLike
Are you thinking how much time you would have to spend in learning the game? Do not get panic, appropriate time may vary but to give you an idea of what it takes to learn the poker games is thousands of trial games of poker, reading several books and articles of poker say about hundreds of books read about several times again and again and again.
LikeLike
This post is worth for me, this is the great source of great information.
LikeLike
Ah, the old days.
LikeLike
You have done really a superb job with your web site. Marvelous stuff is here to read.
LikeLike