Blue Man Group Adds Colorful Touch

Blue Man Group at the Venetian is unlike any other show on the Las Vegas Strip. There are no elaborate costumes, no death-defying acrobatics and no scantily clad dancers. There are simply three blue-hued men dressed in black who make music, make you laugh and make you think.

This avant-garde, unorthodox show is part comedy, part performance art and part wacky science experiment, accompanied by a percussion-driven soundtrack. The performers never utter a word, but instead use their eyes, facial expressions and subtle gestures to evoke responses from the audience.

Your first clue that this is no ordinary show is when you are escorted to your seat in the custom-built 1,760-seat theater, handed crepe paper and encouraged to decorate yourself with it…and the adventure is just beginning there. What follows is 90 minutes of fast-paced fun.

The show begins with the Blue Men creating their own brand of unique art by drumming on top of brightly colored paint that splashes onto a blank white paper. They go on to create art by spraying paint from their mouths onto spinning white canvases. The paint comes from rubber balls they toss to each other across the huge stage and catch expertly in their mouths.

Later in the show, a giant video screen is used to explain to the audience how the world is becoming more and more interconnected – not through advances in technology – but by good old fashioned plumbing. What better segue into the group’s exploration of PVC pipe as a musical instrument? The Blue Man Group’s trademark primitive, tribal percussion sound is generated by a host of specially-designed instruments made from the plastic tubes.

Take for instance the drumbone, which is made from large PVC pipes. As one Blue Man strikes the contraption, another slides sections of it in and out, changing the pitch of the sound, much like a traditional trombone.

Another unique instrument is the Backpack Tubulum, which looks like curvy organ pipes strapped to the Blue Men’s backs. The backpacks glow as the Blue Men beat rhythms on them.

Plumbing materials aren’t the only unusual instruments the Blue Men use. Believe it or not, they can also make percussion-based music from loudly chewing Cap’n Crunch cereal. Blue Man Group’s band, which features seven musicians, also uses some pretty non-traditional instruments including a zither and a Chapman Stick, which looks like the fret of an electric guitar and is played with a tapping motion.

Blue Man Group’s show features plenty of wacky, off-the-wall vignettes that will make you laugh, including a tutorial on rock concert moves that everyone needs to know whether they want to become a rock star or just worship one. The show relies heavily on audience reactions – the performers constantly play off and respond to the crowd and there is definitely audience participation.

One of the most spontaneous bits is when a member of the audience is invited on stage to share a snack of Twinkies with the group. The three men watch intently as the volunteer tries to eat the Twinkie with a knife and fork. The Blue Men imitate every move the person makes and they try to get the person to join in on their antics as well. The results are hilarious.

Watching a Blue Man perform is sort of like watching a strange, other-worldly creature explore his surroundings. It also makes you kind of wonder what exactly a Blue Man is and just how someone becomes one.

Blue Man Group was created in New York in the late ’80s by three friends, Matt Goldman, Phil Stanton and Chris Wink, who started out performing in the streets and eventually opened their show in an Off-Broadway theater in 1991. They continued to add shows in other cities and debuted in Las Vegas at the Luxor in 2000 before moving to the Venetian in 2005.

Blue Man Group has recorded three albums including the Grammy-nominated “Audio,” “The Complex” and “Live At The Venetian – Las Vegas,” which is available exclusively on iTunes.

The group also collaborated on the score for the animated motion picture “Robots,” for which they created more than 25 new metal percussion instruments to accent the music.

There are always three Blue Men featured in each show and a cast of eight men at the Venetian are constantly rotating in and out of the schedule.

Trying to describe the Blue Man character can be a challenge. Some people believe he’s a child, some think he’s an alien.

“Blue Man is not an alien in the sense that he’s from another planet, but alien in the sense that he’s very different than what we’ve all become,” said Matthew Banks, a director and performer who has been with the show for eight years.

He likes to describe the character as “part dog, part five-year-old and part hero” or “part shaman, part trickster and part scientist.”

“Blue Man knows nothing, but he’s got curiosity,” Banks said.

However you choose to describe a Blue Man, it definitely takes some special skills to become one.

“You have to be six feet tall, an actor/musician and be able to catch things in your mouth,” said Banks. He’s only half joking. The performers really do have to be able to catch paint balls and marshmallows in their mouths from across the stage and learning how to do that isn’t easy. Banks said it takes about a half hour of practice every day over a six-week period to really master the feat.

Although the cast in Las Vegas is all male, Banks said there has been a woman in the group’s show in Boston. Women are allowed to audition for Blue Man Group as long as they meet the height and build requirements.

The costumes in the show are not elaborate, but the performers do have to transform themselves into the blue-hued creatures.

Banks said the brilliant blue color comes from greasepaint and although it takes about 45 minutes to get into costume, it’s relatively easy to wash the color off. The more challenging task is removing the glue that’s used to attach the bald skullcaps. “We’ve become masters of exfoliation,” Banks said.

Since the Blue Man character is silent, Banks said one of the biggest challenges he faces as a performer is not laughing during the show. He said another challenge is constantly working as a group of three and reacting to and playing off each other. Playing off the audience can have its moments too.

“It takes a lot of nerve,” Banks said. “We walk into the audience and we’re up on chairs and in people’s faces but we try not to be invasive.”

Banks said when it comes to choosing audience members to participate in the show, there is a certain demographic the performers look for. “We try to get the right amount of shyness and excitedness.”

Some audience members have proven to be a little too excitable though. Banks relates a story about a Blue Man who was actually punched in the face after startling a sleeping audience member who suddenly awoke to see the unearthly-looking creature in front of him.

Despite a few challenging aspects, Banks said being a Blue Man is a rewarding experience. “When we go into the lobby and meet the audience afterwards, they are so heartfelt. There are 86-year-olds telling you it’s the best show they’ve ever seen or there are little kids seeing it for the first time.”

“There’s a sense that something beyond entertainment is happening here.”

Show Dates:

Ongoing Daily

Not showing:

Jan 7, 2009
Feb 1, 2009
Mar 7, 17-18, 2009

Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular

When the Venetian resort announced it was spending $40 million to design a custom-built theater for “Phantom of the Opera” and renaming the show “Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular,” audiences knew they were going to be getting a little something extra in this version of the popular Broadway musical. Even though the Las Vegas production has been enhanced, fans of the original will not be disappointed. Creator Andrew Lloyd Webber, director Hal Prince, choreographer Gillian Lynne and others from the show’s original creative team helped develop “Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular” and pared the show from its original two and a half hours down to one hour 35 minutes. Some dialogue and the intermission have been cut from the original, but all of Webber’s well-known songs remain intact.

The things that distinguish the Las Vegas version of “Phantom” from its Broadway counterpart are elaborate new sets and special effects and the 1,800-seat theater, which is itself a spectacle.

Welcome to 19th century Paris

The Venetian employed renowned architect David Rockwell to design the Phantom Theatre, which took 11 months to build. Rockwell’s work includes the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood and Nobu restaurant in Las Vegas. The site, which is located in a space formerly occupied by the Guggenheim Museum, had to be completely excavated and the theater was built from the ground up.

Designed to closely resemble the Opera Garnier in Paris, the lavish Phantom Theatre features plush red seats and curtains, gold statues and carvings, a hand-painted ceiling topped with an 80-foot wide dome and opera boxes lining the sides. The opera boxes are inhabited by 70 colorful mannequins, which were built in Belgium. No two are alike and each one is completely outfitted in an authentic period costume.

The centerpiece of the theater (and major plot point of the show) is the chandelier, which weighs 2,100 pounds and cost $4.5 million to create. The shimmering chandelier is comprised of 29,444 individual crystals that were hand strung.

In this version of “Phantom,” the chandelier hangs in four pieces, which assemble in dramatic fashion during the beginning of the show. The spokes of the ceiling’s dome support 32 cables that guide the chandelier into place and it takes 40 individual computers, complete with navigational software, to run the chandelier. During the show’s climactic scene, the chandelier falls 45 feet in three seconds and stops only 10 feet above those seated beneath it – an effect that always causes a stir in the audience.

“The people sitting underneath feel the wind rush and some people scream … and I don’t blame them,” said Production Stage Manager Ray Gin. In addition to the customized theater, the Las Vegas production of Phantom differs from the original with new sets, state-of-the-art technology and special effects. This is a show where what goes on behind the scenes is almost as incredible as what happens onstage.

Enhancement and modernization of the illusions throughout the show were developed in part by Jim Steinmeyer, who has also worked with David Copperfield.

One of the new sets includes a beautiful opera house façade not seen in other productions of “Phantom.” Gin said the lights on the set run on car batteries that must be recharged each night. During the scene that features the façade, fireworks explode above the opera house – another effect seen only in Las Vegas. “Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular” employs two pyrotechnicians to oversee the fireworks and other fire illusions in the show.

Everything in the Phantom Theatre is state-of-the-art including the sound. Gin said the entire theater is filled with surround sound speakers — there is even sound coming up from the stage, immersing the performers in the music, which is provided by a live 19-piece orchestra.

The stage measures 60 by 50 feet – mammoth by Broadway standards. A special CO2 fog machine spreads dry ice 360 degrees around the stage to fill it quickly during the lake scenes.

Besides the 43 actors working onstage, there are 70 crew members behind the scenes making the magic happen and making sure everything runs smoothly including stunt people, wardrobe, makeup and wig assistants.

One crew member drives the Phantom’s boat with a joystick controller, maneuvering around a maze of candles on stage and another drives the huge staircase set seen in the “Masquerade” number.

A day crew is specifically assigned to do things like dust the mannequins, hand-paint shoes, check the intricate beading on all the costumes and repair even the most minor flaws.

“Our credo is that it’s got to look like it’s opening night,” said Gin.

The Music of the Night

“Phantom” recently celebrated its one-year anniversary in Las Vegas and Gin said the audience reception has been very positive. “I think these audiences are great. They go in expecting one thing and they’re astounded…They’re very appreciative. They’re loud.”

They’re loud because “Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular” features an incredibly talented Broadway-caliber cast. Anthony Crivello is the Phantom, Kristi Holden and Amanda Huddleston play Christine Daaé and Andrew Ragone appears as Raoul. The show, a tale of unrequited love, is based on Gaston Leroux’s famous novel about a ghost haunting the Paris Opera House. Christine Daaé, an aspiring opera singer is being tutored by a mysterious man she believes is her “angel of music,” sent to her by the spirit of her dead father.

In reality, her angel is the Phantom of the Opera, a lonely, disfigured man who hides behind a mask and lives in an eerie lair beneath the opera house. Not only does the Phantom fall in love with Christine’s magical voice, he becomes obsessed with her as well.

It doesn’t bode well for anyone when Christine becomes engaged to her childhood sweetheart, Raoul. The Phantom is thrown into a jealous rage, causing mayhem around the opera house and ultimately forcing Christine to choose between the two.

“Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular” definitely lives up to its new name. Whether you’re a longtime fan of the show or it’s a first-time experience, you’ll leave the theater wishing the music of the night would never end.

Better Midler in The Showgirl Must Go On

She’s a tiny woman with a big voice and an even bigger stage presence.

Bette Midler has no problem at all commanding the audience in the 4,296-seat Colosseum at Caesars Palace. In The Showgirl Must Go On, she works the 7,000 square feet of performance space with all her usual charisma — so much so that even she admits there are times when “the showgirl must sit down.”

Midler’s prolific career spans more than 40 years, with numerous appearances on stage and in film, including the Broadway musical “Gypsy” in the early 1990s and the movies “The Rose” (1979) and “Beaches” (1988). Her albums “Bette of Rose” (1995) and “Bathhouse Betty” (1998) both went gold, while “Bette Midler Sings the Rosemary Clooney Songbook” was nominated for a Grammy.

“The Showgirl Must Go On” is different from other Vegas shows. As the Divine Miss M will tell you, her show doesn’t use any French-Canadian circus performers like Cirque du Soleil. Instead there are backup singers, the Staggering Harlots (Jordan Ballard, Kyra DaCosta and Kamilah Marshall) and 20 showgirls, the Caesars Salad girls.

The stage is decorated simply, with a mountain skyline and a drop screen projecting various images set upstage behind Midler’s 13-piece band. Hanging strands resembling beaded curtains mechanically move and shift into various shapes and configurations throughout the show, creating very simple but elegant scenery such as a forest of trees.

Designers Carol Dodds and Michael Levine conjure up some lovely visuals, aided by a massive video screen. For example, Midler sings the touching “Hello In There” amidst multi-layered scrim projections of vintage New York engulfed by fog. The gold coin curtains also become a character in the show, forming objects such as trees, clouds, and rain for several numbers. Costume designer Constance Hoffman has crafted some eye-popping outfits, including reversible clothing that gives the illusion that Midler’s back-up singers — here dubbed the Caesar Salad — clad in black have instantly exploded into bright floral colors.

As Soph, the oldest living showgirl in the world with a pink feather headdress “half the size of Tennessee,” she rattles off a series of scandalous jokes, dirty enough to make even a drunken sailor blush.

But beneath all the showgirl glitz and glamour, the strongest moments in the show come when it is just Midler alone on the stage. Her rendition of “When a Man Loves a Woman” is so powerful it drives the entire audience to its feet. It’s when singing her hits like “The Rose,” “From a Distance” and “Wind Beneath My Wings” that this diva is truly divine.

Show Dates:

Nov. 25 – 26, 28 – 30, 2008
Dec. 2 – 3, 5 – 7, 9 – 10, 30 – 31, 2008
Jan. 2 – 4, 6 – 7, 9 – 11, 13 – 14, 16 – 18, 20 – 21, 23 – 25, 27 – 28, 2009

Cher Plans Artistic Rebirth

The indestructible diva, who retired from touring in 2005, will star in a song-and-dance spectacle starting May 6 at the 4,100-seat Colosseum in Caesars Palace. She’ll perform four shows weekly for one month, then return mid-August through early October, leapfrogging stints with Bette Midler. Her pact with promoter AEG Live extends three years.

Cher, 61, promises a “visually unbelievable” hit parade that entails elaborate choreography, complex staging, eye-popping costumes, 14 dancers and four aerialists.

“Creatively, we’re doing something that’s never been done with sets,” she says. “Getting the whole thing in book form, in pictures, has taken months. Our set moves down from the ceiling, in from the sides, up from the floor. We have screens in the foreground, the center and the back. We can change a city into a forest in two seconds. You’ll see a different stage for every song.”

The music will access all chapters of Cher’s career, from her Sonny & Cher start to her recent dance-pop phase, and she’s plotting updates of both old and new hits.

Cher’s extravagant 2002-05 Farewell Tour rang up $192.5 million from 273 shows, the ninth-highest-grossing tour in history, according to Billboard Boxscore.

“Cher definitely achieved elite status as a live performer on her Farewell Tour, which was a remarkable endurance test and a hugely popular draw,” says Billboard touring editor Ray Waddell. “With her elaborate costumes, long list of hits and over-the-top presentation, I can’t think of another artist more suited to Vegas. A Cher concert is just a really good time.”

Cher insists her Vegas splash won’t recycle Farewell’s motifs: “I’d like to be challenged.”

She hasn’t seen Colosseum concerts by previous residents Celine Dion or Elton John, nor the venue itself (“I saw a picture of it”). She’s furiously working out to gear up for rehearsals, and she likes the idea of bouncing between her home in Malibu and a steady gig in Vegas.

Show Dates (2009):

Feb.: 21 – 22, 24 – 25, 28

March.: 1, 3 – 4, 7 – 8, 10 – 11, 14 – 15, 17, 20 – 21

April.: 25 – 26, 28 – 29

May: 2 – 3, 5 – 6, 9 – 10, 12 – 13, 16 – 17, 19 – 20, 23 – 24

Elton John in Concert at Caesar’s Palace: The Red Piano

He has survived the ups and downs of musical stardom for over 30 years. Commercially, creatively, on stage and on record, Elton John is a legendary artist — one who is still as relevant as ever.

Elton John’s finely honed stage presence, a winning factor in targeting his tunes straight into the heart of America, is excess incarnate. In The Red Piano, the showy costumes are replaced by incredible video imagery and stage props, yet the end result is unmistakably classic Elton John.

Gregarious, show-stopping, outlandish and unforgettable. Words that could be Elton John as much as they are Vegas. Together with photographer David LaChapelle, Elton John has created The Red Piano — a career overview performance you won’t soon forget.

The Red Piano takes the audience inside Elton John’s world. LaChapelle creates a dreamscape dripping with rich imagery of Hollywood and Las Vegas icons — each moment created to give the viewer a new, three dimensional interpretation of Elton John and Bernie Taupin’s most memorable recordings.

Don’t miss your last chance to see this cultural and musical icon as he closes out his spectacular five-year run at Caesars Palace. Only three engagements remain at The Colosseum in the show that USA TODAY called “the future of Las Vegas entertainment.”

Please note that The Red Piano is designed with a Vegas theme and mature audiences in mind. The video imagery that accompanies the music may at times be considered risqué, and includes montage style scenes that include brief frontal nudity. The Video content is designed within the context of the songs and overall theme of the show.

Show Dates: Feb. 3 – 4, 6 – 8, 10 – 11, 13 – 15, 2009