Famed wax museum opens

Grace Leong

Friday, July 23, 1999 | 11:46 a.m.

When Madame Tussaud launched her first wax exhibit in London in 1835, little did she know that by the end of the millennium her name and her museum would find their way to an Italian-themed hotel-casino in Las Vegas.

The $20 million exhibit, which employs 84 people, made its U.S. and Las Vegas debut Thursday night at the Venetian hotel-casino on the Las Vegas Strip.

It features five themed environments that showcase more than 100 wax portraits of some of the world's most popular film, television, music and sport celebrities, as well as legendary Las Vegas icons, each one taking up to six months to craft at a cost of $30,000 to $45,000.

Madame Tussaud's, which received portrait sittings from almost all English royalty since King George III, will have a decidedly Las Vegas flavor here, featuring gaming legend Bugsy Siegel, Hollywood icons Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor; and music stars Wayne Newton, Tom Jones and Liberace. There's Elvis too, of course.

The 28,000-square-foot, two-story wax museum brings to 10 the number of museums and attractions operated worldwide by the Tussauds Group. An 11th is set to open in New York in 2001.

The London-based developer of visitor attractions was sold last October by British media giant Pearson PLC for about $598 million to a venture capital group, Charterhouse Development Capital.

The group is now looking for opportunities to open Madame Tussaud museums in two other U.S. states, Andrew Tansley, the group's executive director, said. He declined to reveal the potential sites.

Plans are also in the pipeline for an initial public offering of the Tussauds Group on either the London or New York Stock Exchange, he said.

The Tussauds Group, which currently entertains more than 10 million guests a year at its attractions in Europe and Australia, aims to attract at least 400,000 visitors to the new Las Vegas museum by the end of the year.

"Las Vegas, with more than 26 million visitors annually, is an ideal location for our first U.S. attraction," said Tony Peluso, vice president and development director U.S.A. for the Tussauds Group.

Madame Tussauds' officials predict local residents will initially comprise some 15 percent of the museum's visitor volume, and tourists the remaining 85 percent. "Las Vegans tend to give attractions time before they visit, so we should see better numbers by 2000," Wyatt Foley, the museum's general manager, said.

"We're on a number of billboards around the city, taxicabs. We have a red London Bus driving up and down the Strip. But our main advertisement is by word of mouth. That's how 40 percent of our London visitors say they were recommended to see the museum," Tansley said.

"We've tailored each exhibition for the local market. We've done a lot of market research with different focus groups, identifying what people want to see... We want Nevada residents to think of the Madame Tussaud's here as their very own Tussaud's," he said.

Confidence in the museum's appeal was so high that even the lingering possibility of Culinary Union activism occurring on the Venetian's sidewalks failed to sway the the Tussauds Group's decision to ink a 20-year lease agreement in 1998 with the hotel-casino.

"This is not our issue. We have no issue with the Culinary Union. They wrote to us asking us to hire some of the former Sands staff. But we are not involved in any way with them," Tansley said.

Venetian owner Sheldon Adelson and the Culinary Union are at odds over his refusal to recognize the Culinary Union as bargaining agent for Venetian workers or agree to a card-count process as opposed to a vote by employees on whether they want a union.

While the Tussauds Group is banking on the strength of the Tussauds' brand name to draw the crowds, one retail analyst believes it may take more than $20 million worth of bee wax, acrylic, fiberglass and craftsmanship to sustain visitor interest.

"Madame Tussaud's is a novel idea. But there are a lot of other attractions in Las Vegas also in competition. And most of us already expect to see real-life celebrities here in town," said George Connor, a vice president at the Colliers International real estate company. "But the good news is tourists change every three days. So there's a constant flow of fresh people here."

Then there's the question of ticket pricing. Admission fees to Madame Tussaud's are tagged at $10.75 for Nevadans and $12.50 for all other visitors. But for about the same price, visitors may view the $300 million world-class art collection including works by Picasso and Monet at the Bellagio. And at less than half the price, visitors can enjoy the World of Coca-Cola and the M&M's World attractions.

And as more luxury hotel-casinos such as the Bellagio and Mandalay Bay are built to appeal to jet-setters and well-heeled baby-boomers, and given the relatively poor showing of children's theme parks here, Connor questioned whether there are incentives for the city's entertainment providers to become more family oriented.

"Kids are not the driving force for the retail market here. The growth area is in the baby-boomers with good disposable income, those who can afford to pay $150-$250 a night on rooms, entertainment, dining, spa and golf," he said. _endstory