Mitchell’s ‘Breakfast’ serves No. 1,000; Lewis talks of post-telethon plans

By John Katsilometes

Friday, Sept. 3, 2010 | 3:11 p.m.

A tote board of notes for Labor Day weekend, a healthy span of which will be spent at South Point for the "Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon." Look for coverage of that event beginning Sunday and ending after the show goes off the air Monday, having raised either $70 million or $40 million, if Lewis' prediction holds true.

Onward:

"Breakfast" No. 1,000 served

Dennis Mitchell is celebrating a milestone that is nothing less than stunning today: His 1,000th "Breakfast With the Beatles" broadcast. The two-hour retrospective airs at 10 a.m. Saturday and again at 5 p.m. Sunday on KVGQ 106.9-FM "The Q," and can also be linked at BeatlesRadioShow.com.

The weekly Beatle-ized radio show debuted Jan. 6, 1991, on KKLZ 96.3-FM, and was a dependably entertaining broadcast on that classic-rock station through 2002. Mitchell then sent the show out in national syndication, and finally moved its Vegas home to KUNV 91.5-FM. In 2008, Mitchell and broadcast partner Dan Lea started their own site, 963classicrock.com (that site airs "BWTB" at 9 a.m. Saturdays and Sundays), which hearkens to some of the best years of KKLZ.

The ever-meticulous Mitchell made sure that "BWTB" No. 1,000 will actually be that number. "I began counting dutifully at No. 380," he said during a phone interview Friday.

It has taken Mitchell 18 hours over three days to assemble and edit the interviews for the landmark broadcast. Featured interview subjects include Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono, The Quarrymen, Olivia Harrison, Victor Spinetti, Deborah Harry, Gary U.S. Bonds and Peter Frampton.

"I came into this trying to put all these ingredients together and see what came out of the oven," Mitchell said in a very Beatle-esque way. "I think I baked a very nice cake," if not a flaming pie ...

Lewis onstage for 7 1/2 hours

Jerry Lewis' schedule for this year's telethon is to open the show and spend the first five hours onstage — 6-11 p.m. Sunday — and close the show for at least the final 2 1/2 hours, from 1-3:30 p.m. Monday. He might well spend more time in front of the cameras on the second day. The telethon schedule is consistent for its flexibility, owing to Lewis' often-whimsical approach to live performance.

In the interview we conducted Tuesday, he said that in the months after the MDA fundraiser is completed, he's shooting scenes for the independent drama, "Max Rose." With Liv Tyler playing his daughter, Lewis portrays a widower who relives important episodes in his life to sort out issues with his marriage and his family.

In the fall he begins casting for "The Nutty Professor," which he plans to bring — as he says it — to "BroadWAAAAAAY!"

What can he tell us about that casting process?

"I can tell you a lot about the 'The Nutty Professor,' but I'm not!" he said. "That's a whooooole different story."

Also, in a video posted online Wednesday, Lewis took after Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton in an interview with "Inside Edition."

He said of Lohan, "I'd smack her in the mouth if I saw her!" He also said he'd "put her over my knee and spank her," then ship her back to rehab. He added, "Those children are begging for help!"

On Tuesday, I'd asked Lewis about Hilton, in the wake of her arrest on the Strip last weekend on drug charges. "I have no use for her," he said.

Several celeb and mainstream media websites have run free with the "Inside Edition" clip (and here it is on our mainstream media site, too). But really, it would have been bigger news if Lewis had been asked about Lohan and Hilton and just said, "No comment."

Suits us fine

Over the past several weeks I've had many conversations with newsmakers in Las Vegas about the copyright lawsuits Righthaven LLC has been filing on behalf of the Review-Journal against website operators and bloggers who post R-J content without authorization.

Last month a person who is a newsmaker in Las Vegas — significant enough to oversee a big website for this person's company — mapped out this scenario:

The person is contacted by an R-J reporter to help the reporter with an important story, one that would appear in the paper and online. Without this person's contribution and assistance, there would be no story. So the story is written, it appears in the newspaper and is posted on the R-J website. The newsmaker's company grabs a couple of paragraphs from the story, giving due credit to the R-J for its content, and links directly back to the story on the R-J site.

And weeks later, the newsmaker — a vital contributing source for the story — is sued without warning by Righthaven. So the question this person asked is, "Why am I talking to the R-J if they are going to turn around and sue me after posting a link to a story I helped them report?"

I don't know that answer ... but here's my card.

A somewhat thorny Rose

"We just wanted to go with a concept that was a little different," is how Palms owner George Maloof described the hotel's new slot promotion.

Different, as in a circus-like stage show in which the star smashes a cinderblock held by a nervous dwarf on the dwarf's genital region.

The fanciful promotion is the "Curiously Strange Slot Palladium," which is where the Palms' weekly slot tourney runs headlong into the county fair. The show debuts Labor Day and runs 9-10 a.m. each day through Oct. 2.

The contest is open exclusively to Club Palms players-club members. The hotel's Key West ballroom has been made over to look like a scaled-down version of the Circus Circus Midway, replete with vintage-style circus posters, games and even a "needle in the haystack" contest for Thursday's media day, where the winner (and there was not one) would have been awarded two nights at the hotel and dinner for two.

Players taking part in the promotion will be treated to a stage performance by the eminent Jim Rose, who accurately is billed on the Palms news release as "master of all things strange, bizarre and peculiar." That would explain the scorpion that is either a pet or a snack, right? Rose has toured with Nine Inch Nails, Marilyn Manson and Korn.

Asked how he knows Rose, Maloof smiled and said only, "Oh, I've known him for quite a while."

As Rose understated, "We don't want this act to look anything like what you'd see at a certain circus-themed casino on the Strip." No problem. No trapeze, either.

Speaking of Circus Circus ...

On Thursday, Goth-inspired magician Dan Sperry of "America's Got Talent" drew ogles when touring the Adventuredome with Fright Dome owner Jason Egan. Sperry will be the attraction's main stage act in October. Also featured will be magicians Dixie Dooley (long one of the city's underappreciated performers) and Rudy Coby.

Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at twitter.com/JohnnyKats.