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Bars / Lounges / Drinking / Viva Elvis / Gold Lounge / Aria / CityCenter / Closings / Zarkana / Openings / → All Tags

What's Going to Happen To Gold Lounge?

While imagining ourselves as a big-time celebrity about CityCenter, we realized there's a problem at Aria that no one has seemingly pondered just yet. With Viva Elvis marking its last curtain call later this year, what will become of Aria's Gold Lounge, a nightlife mash-up just as entwined as PB&B.

The entire theme of Gold Lounge was meant to capture Viva Elvis attendees who still felt a hankering for a hunk of burning nightlife. The nightspot's website describes it as inspired by Graceland with connections to Elvis just about everywhere you looked from the golden monkeys ringing its perimeter (Elvis loved 'em) to a horse-shaped lamp (Elvis loved them, too). The food and beverage service also offers nudge/wink tributes to The King. There's also that whole thing of the lounge being a partnership between Aria, The Light Group and Cirque du Soleil.

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Vegas on Film / Aria / Woody Harrelson / Isla Fisher / Viva Elvis / Elvis / Gold Lounge / → All Tags

What Woody Harrelson's Night At Aria (Probably) Looked Like

Woody Harrelson and Isla Fisher were on set at Aria Tuesday filming an upcoming flick called Now You See Me. The movie, to be released next year, stars a group of illusionists who rob banks and give the cash to their audiences. Kind of the opposite of that nightly show at Luxor about an illusionist who robs his audience and banks the money. Yep, we just did that.

Turns out we just missed the movie cameras by that much as we were in the house of Aria the night before. So while we don't have the crappy pics of Woody's fedora, we can create our own set through the magic of digital film.

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Openings / Zarkana / Closings / Viva Elvis / Aria / Shows / Cirque du Soleil / → All Tags

It's A New (Already Tested) Cirque Show for Aria This Fall

What do you do with a Cirque du Soleil show that's performing even worse than Criss Angel Believe less than expected? Replace it with an already tried, tested and popular Cirque production. Duh.

If you were expecting a totally new original show to replace struggling Viva Elvis, Aria has already been there, done that. No, instead Cirque has tapped the touring "surreal acrobatic spectacle," Zarkana, to keep Aria's crowds from leaving the building.

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Closings / Viva Elvis / ARIA / Cirque du Soleil / → All Tags

But, What's To Happen To The Oversized Elvis Head?

Apparently, there's been a huge rift in the space/time continuum because MGM Resorts wants to replace a Cirque du Soleil show and it's not Criss Angel Believe.

All the Vegas gossips are reporting that MGM Resorts doesn't just want more Viva and less Elvis, anymore. They want a whole new show entirely for Aria. And, they want Cirque to make it happen by late next year. The Las Vegas Sun reports general disinterest poor ticket sales are to blame and that the Viva Elvis cast were informed of its probable end earlier today.

So, seeing as there's a bit of a time crunch here, let's all suggest replacement show ideas below. It being the season of sharing and all. At least Cirque will have something to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.

(Photo: PhotoBucket.com)

Closings / Reopenings / Vegas Shows / Viva Elvis / ARIA / Norm Clarke / Rumors / Cirque du Soleil / → All Tags

Viva Elvis To Close, Work On More Viva, Less Elvis

A Cirque du Soleil production on The Strip is closing up shop, but before you get too excited, it's not that one and it's not for good. Yet.

Vegas gossip king Norm Clarke broke the news that Viva Elvis at ARIA is in for a major reworking with a temporary closure slated for this January.

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Snapshot / Vegas Observations / Elvis / Aria / Viva Elvis / → All Tags

A Tale Of Two Elvi

Not Brandon Walsh and Elvis. Also, not the two Elvi with a tale to tell.

We bumped into Elvis on a recent winter wander through Aria. Literally. We were drunk weren't paying attention to where we were walking. The King of Rock N’ Roll’s bust has been beckoning visitors to Viva Elvis since the show’s premiere a year ago. But in that time the head has been rolled from outside the theater upstairs to the bottom of the escalator.

While we await Pawn Stars to explain the dueling karaoke Elvi above, we snapped an updated Viva Elvis photo for our bust collection. Like a rookie parent at Disneyland though we failed to count to three to provoke a smile and our flash didn’t pop off.

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Shows / Dining / Restaurants / LOVE / The Mirage / Jersey Boys / Palazzo / Viva Elvis / Aria / Le Reve / Wynn / The Lion King / Mandalay Bay / → All Tags

Where to Chow Down Before You Show Down: Five Pre-Show Dinner Spots

You’ll have to excuse us if we still have food on the brain after spending a weekend gorging at Vegas Uncork’d. We did try to move past our culinary crushes on Rick Moonen, Bobbles Flay, and Cat Cora by focusing on another love: Vegas show deals.

But that just got us thinking about where to make dinner reservations before hitting LOVE. So our self-prescribed therapy is to check out the pre-theater dining options around town. We've rounded up what we think are the Five Best Pre-Show Dinners on the Strip for what we consider the top shows on the Strip. (KLAS polls notwithstanding.)

Most of these meals can be had before the early showings (typically at 7:30pm) but a few can also be had before the later showings too. And now, to start the show...

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Snapshot / Viva Elvis / Shows / Cirque du Soleil / Aria / CityCenter / → All Tags

Best Thing About Viva Elvis? The VE Shop

Spend your money with these nice people, not at the Box Office

As you might have gathered yesterday, we weren’t the biggest fans of Viva Elvis. But one thing we forgot to put on the “what we liked” list yesterday, is the VE shop.

We checked it out back in January, and it was fantastic. Of course, it has every Elvis CD, t-shirt and bit of kitsch you could possibly want, like the Memphis-made cashew crunch Elvis used to eat at Graceland:

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Viva Elvis / Openings / Shows / Cirque du Soleil / Aria / VegasChatter Reviews / CityCenter / → All Tags

The Only Reason We'd See Viva Elvis Again Is If We Were Playing Cirque Bingo

Sorry, Elvis

So. Viva Elvis. If you were reading our tweets on Friday night, you’d have seen that we went to the officlal premiere (along with Gene Simmons, Priscilla Presley, Justin Long and oodles of other celebs – apart from Paul ‘The Flake’ McCartney who was a no show (probs for the best - scroll down). You’d also have seen that we really weren’t taken with it.

Before we carry on, it’s only fair to say that we don’t count ourselves as big Cirque fans. In fact, we haven’t seen any of the other Cirque shows in Vegas, though we have elsewhere. While we love the signature acrobatics, we aren’t mad on spurious plotlines (like in Varekai).

We have, though, seen enough of Cirque to know what to expect, we are big Elvis fans, and we know what we like in a show. And, yeah, we just didn’t like this – and from where we were sitting*, we weren’t the only ones. Let’s take it from the top - we’ll tell you what we liked, and then what we didn’t.

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Shows / Viva Elvis / Cirque du Soleil / Elvis / Aria / CityCenter / → All Tags

'Viva Elvis' Still Has Big Blue Suede Shoes to Fill

When VegasChatter caught a glimpse of Viva Elvis last month, we knew we couldn't make a solid judgment based on a preview of four songs. Yet five weeks later, after seeing the full show, we're afraid Viva Elvis is still not quite living up to its potential.

While we loved the costuming, sets and storyline, the production came up kinda short in the "Cirque" factor and felt more like a musical than an on-the-edge-of-your-seat, za za zsu (to quote "Sex and The City"), over-the-top show.

Sure, it was very entertaining, but were we blown away? Not really. Would we pay $100+ per ticket to see the show. Highly unlikely. We love the King and yes, this show does pay homage to his life and legacy, but this Cirque interpretation is a far cry from what they’ve done with The Beatles LOVE, "O" or even Zumanity.

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Elvis / Viva Elvis / Cirque du Soleil / CityCenter / Deals / Shows / → All Tags

'Viva Elvis' Tickets are $75 for The King's 75th Birthday

If you didn't know it, this Friday is practically a holiday in Las Vegas--it's Elvis' (would-be) 75th birthday! So in addition to the geeks and porn stars flooding the Strip, there will no doubt be Elvis' swaggering around town.

But what better way to celebrate The King than by seeing the new Cirque du Soleil show, Viva Elvis?

Via the Cirque Twitter, we found out that they are offering 75 tickets at $75 a piece on Friday, January 8th. The offer also comes with the new CD, "Elvis 75".

Regularly, tickets start at $87 each. But since the show is still in previews (the grand opening is not until next month), at least you aren't paying full price to see it. We were just "meh" on the sneak preview we saw but it's hard to judge from four songs.

Go here for the special coupon for the $75 tickets.

Viva Elvis / Cirque du Soleil / Show Reviews / Shows / Aria / CityCenter / CityCenter Grand Opening / → All Tags

Viva Elvis Still Has a Whole Lotta Rehearsing To Do

It's not fair to judge a show based on a preview of only four numbers. It's just not. So the sneak peek that we received yesterday for the Viva Elvis show is probably not going to be the same as what theater-goers on February 19th, the show's grand opening gala, will see. But folks with tickets on Friday will probably see a version close to this. And we are a little worried about that.

But let's take it from the top. The Viva Elvis theater is spectacular. It's new, it's got incredibly high ceilings and the seats are red and plushy with cup-holders, almost like giant Laz-e-Boys. Elvis' TCB with lightning bolts logo (which is found all over Graceland) is found all over this theater from the door handles to the TCB belt buckles that the ushers wear. (TCB? Taking care of business.) The souvenir shop outside the theater has everything you could want of Elvis memorabilia.

The feeling is very much like the frenzy that fans feel at LOVE at The Mirage, the Cirque du Soleil show about The Beatles. Even in the media preview with just a smattering of folks in the audience, the anticipation was high.

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