Viva Venetian: Pigeons take flight and celebrity likenesses will pose placidly at the new resort

Melissa Schorr

Tuesday, May 4, 1999 | 9:11 a.m.

The Bellagio made a splash with "O." Mandalay Bay enticed guests with "Chicago." The Venetian plans to draw flocks of patrons with 2,000 flying white pigeons, wax figures of Brad Pitt and Gerard Depardieu, and a still undetermined new production show.

The new megaresort's entertainment options will include a version of Madame Tussaud's famed London wax museum, a bird-release show replicating the pigeons of St. Mark's Square, and a 30-member cast of paddling gondoliers and characters such as Marco Polo, Napoleon and Cassanova wandering through the hotel's corridors and canals, singing Italian arias and enacting duels.

As of last week, Venetian executives were said to be still considering a handful of original shows, one of which they hope to present in the new casino's Carnevale 2000 showroom by mid-summer.

William Weidner, Venetian president, says that shows under consideration include an homage to the Rat Pack, a Broadway-style revue and a star-driven vehicle, similar in style to Danny Gans' show at the Rio.

"In entertainment, you're always trying to figure out what next thing will grab people's imagination," Weidner says. "It's not an easy process, we're still not there as yet."

Whatever it turns out to be, it will be "something you do not expect," promises Heftel Entertainment Vice President Peter Aaronson, former Bally's entertainment director who is now heading up the construction and operation of the showroom while simultaneously booking the rest of the casino's entertainment and acting as its marketing manager.

All Aaronson will say for sure is what the show won't be: Contrary to the trend towards musical theater, it won't be a full-scale production from the Great White Way. It also won't be a typical Vegas showgirl production. And it definitely won't be another offering from Cirque du Soleil. "Been there, done it," he says emphatically.

Talking with Aaronson is like playing a game of 20 Questions: Will it have an Italian theme? "Maybe," he allows. Will it be classical music? Probably not, although Aaronson notes that Venetian execs are "opera freaks" and there will be "operatic influences" throughout the casino corridors and on the hotel's telephone system.

Whatever the show is, like so many entertainment directors before him, he breathlessly promises it will be different. "We will set a new niche in what we're after," Aaronson promises.

However, his stated plans for booking headliners don't smack of great innovation: he cites Rod Stewart and Tina Turner and Elton John -- all already booked here for New Year's Eve -- as headliners who would be appropriate for his convention crowd.

Then again, he has some pretty hefty shoes to fill -- legendary entertainment directors such as Jack Entratter once stood on this spot on the Strip and booked the Rat Pack into the Copa Room, back in the hotel's previous incarnation as the Sands.

Whatever production show is selected, it will have to be flexible: The arena will shut down to accommodate headliners, probably on the weekends. The three-level room will seat about 1,400 audience members, including two balconies which each seat 350 people. The top level also features six luxury skyboxes. And every night after 11 p.m., the room will transform into Club C2K, a nightclub with a "Venice carnival theme."

Phase Two of casino construction will add a second, larger venue of about 2,000 seats, Aaronson says.

The Venetian will also feature two lounges, featuring live music each evening, La Scena (or "The Scene"), a 195-seat "elegant" lounge, and the Rialto Lounge, which will be an "intimate piano bar."

For the birds

Outside the casino, the Campanile bell tower will chime on the hour with a 10-minute animatronic musical display, concluding with a release of 400 white homing pigeons in homage to the 5,000 pigeons living in St. Mark's Square in Venice.

"The main two things people take away from Venice is boats and birds," notes Joe Krathwohl, the self-described "Birdman of Las Vegas," who has appeared in his own show, "Wings of the World," at the Tropicana, trained birds for magicians such as Siegfried & Roy and Lance Burton, and now works breeding endangered Andean Condors.

Krathwohl was approached by the Venetian in February to create the "Uccelli de Venezia" (Birds of Venice) show, which he values at $500,000.

Although the Venetian's press releases try to "upscale" the birds, referring to them as "doves," they are in fact, common garbage-pickin', urban pigeons -- albeit, snowy white ones.

Late last week, Krathwohl offered a tour of his Southwest Las Vegas home, where 900 white pigeons brought in from California, Virgina and Iowa nervously dart around 13 wire cages in his back yard, awaiting final transport to their new home on the Strip.

The birds will be set loose five times daily from either a gondola out front or the hotel's "riverbank," circle in the air and (if all goes well) promptly return to their cages on the ninth floor of the Venetian's parking garage. "It'll fill the sky and then the sky clears," he describes. "It'll be a real wow."

In the coming weeks, 2,000 birds will have been bred or brought in, and Krathwohl will begin training the pigeons to return to their cages atop the Venetian's parking garage, slowly bringing them a greater distance from their cages each day, using the methods of behaviorist E.F. Skinner.

He expects the full release will not debut until sometime next month. At first, the release will only take place during the day, but he hopes to expand it to nighttime, using spotlights shining into the air that the birds will fly through. "That to me (would be) phenomenal," he says.

It is still being decided if he will create a similar release inside the casino at the replica of St. Mark's Square, like the scheduled preview release of a dozen birds at the opening night gala.

The joke around town is that visitors will have to run for cover from falling excrement. This is slander, Krathwohl fumes, because birds do not relieve themselves mid-flight. "Flying is so strenuous that they empty themselves before they start," he says. "It's amazing how many people think birds poop when they fly." And because the flight lasts about 30 seconds, the birds aren't expected to be seen roosting on rooftops above the casino.

The birds can hone in on their cages from as far as 500 miles away due to iron in their brain that lets them determine the magnetic northerly direction, he says. But as "romantic" as that sounds, he adds, the truth is they usually just recognize landmarks. "My birds turn (to go home) at the Luxor."

Why they return is simple: for food, to nest, and for security. "The number one thing for birds is safety," he says. "Everyone is their predator."

Although the bird show will probably make quite a flap among spectators, Krathwohl points out that the use of homing pigeons is nothing new. "It's been done for 5,000 years," he says with a shrug. Pigeons were used to transport messages in World War II and medical samples into the depths of Zimbabwe, and have even shuttled film taken of rafters on the Colorado River back up to their landing site.

Still, he concedes, this will be the "largest collection of free-flying white homing pigeons in any location -- and that is in keeping with Las Vegas' megaresorts."

Waxy buildup

What do Lance Burton, Liberace and Luciano Pavarotti have in common?

All three will be among the 100 or so celebrities featured in Madame Tussaud's Las Vegas wax museum, a $20 million attraction scheduled to open this summer.

True, the famous 19th-century wax museum's origins can be traced to both France and Britain, making it a strange match with an Italian-themed casino.

But general manager Wyatt Foley, an ex-Stratosphere executive, says the wax museum is a "good fit," pointing to the "European flair of the Venetian."

Marie Tussaud was a 19th-century Frenchwoman who inherited the collection from her benefactor and began making masks of noted French citizens, including the writer Voltaire. During the French Revolution, she was called upon to make death masks of the royal victims of the revolution, such as Marie Antoinette. Tussaud eventually moved herself and her collection to England, touring around the country and eventually selecting a permanent spot for the exhibition in London in 1835.

Today, the London version is the U.K.'s most popular attraction, with more than three million visitors a year. New Madame Tussaud's wax museums have opened in Amsterdam and Australia.

This is the company's first foray into the States -- and for once, New York actually plays second fiddle to Las Vegas, with its own version not opening until September 2000. Tickets for the hour-long attraction will be $12.50.

The 30,000-square-foot Las Vegas version, in the Venetian's St. Mark's Library building, will host only a third of the figures of New York's, but will uniquely cater to the city with Las Vegas-oriented themes and celebrities, including many of Las Vegas' usual suspects: Bugsy Siegel, Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presely, Debbie Reynolds, Tony Bennett, Englebert Humperdinck, Tom Jones, Liberace, Neil Sedaka, Wayne Newton, David Copperfield and, naturally, Siegfried & Roy.

"It's a face-fits-the-place theory," Foley jokes.

There are a few British stars with crossover American appeal: Hugh Grant, Michael Crawford, Elton John and Mick Jagger. But most are typical Hollywood glitterati: Cher, Judy Garland, Mel Gibson, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Bette Midler, Marilyn Monroe, Brad Pitt, Oprah Winfrey and Barbra Streisand.

"To be asked by Madame Tussaud's to be in an attraction is quite an honor," Foley says. "Every (British) head of state since George III has requested to be done."

OK, but one wonders what the British must think of our culture when they grant celebrities such as Jerry Springer, Ivana Trump and Don King that "honor."

Madame Tussaud's does have some standards, though. O.J. Simpson was not replicated. Mike Tyson was deliberately bypassed in favor of Evander Holyfield. And although the London version hosts President Bill Clinton, a Monica Lewinsky wax figure is not in the works.

"Oh gosh no," Foley gasps at the thought. "No, no, no. Wouldn't touch that.

"We don't do people who are a flash in the pan," he says. "That spoils our name, it tarnishes our reputation."

Although some, such as sports stars, have declined the honor, others have wheedled to be included, to no avail. The museum won't produce a wax figure for purchase, even when asked by people with wealthy pockets (and healthier egos).

Each celebrity chosen undergoes an extensive four-hour measuring and photography session. Nicolas Cage had his last week in Los Angeles, and TV personality Al Roker had his done in New York, Foley confides. Cybil Shepherd burst into song during her sitting.

The biggest misconception is that one must submerge themselves in a vat of clay. A plaster cast is only made of the person's hands. For the face, the artist sculpts a clay mask using the photos and measurements. Then, the clay is made into a wax figure, which is covered with body makeup.

Each hair is inserted individually, taking about five weeks (Don King's unruly mane took artists an extra two weeks to complete). The teeth are made of porcelain, while the part of the body that is unseen is made of fiberglass. It costs $20,000 in labor to produce a head.

Finally, artifacts and costumes are either donated from the stars themselves or picked up at auction houses.

It takes four to six months to create the entire piece. No, they won't release anyone's exact measurements. And they won't shave off those 10 extra pounds either. In fact, they produce the figures 2 percent larger than life size to allow for shrinkage of the wax.

The attraction features a "Behind the Scenes" section that allows visitors to observe the process of creating the wax portraits.

But the main part of the interactive attraction will consist of seven vignettes, including "The Big Night," a VIP pre-party featuring Jerry Springer and Arnold Schwarzenegger, the "Sports Arena," a fantasy boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Evander Holyfield, "Rock and Pop," featuring stars such as Bruce Springsteen and Tina Turner, "Las Vegas Legends," featuring celebrity Las Vegas weddings such as Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward (because the Elvis wedding is so "overdone"), and "The Finale," featuring a theatrical film tribute to Las Vegas legends.

Finish it all up with a retail store where you can buy the typical T-shirts, mugs and, at Madame Tussaud's, a wax candle shaped like a foot.

"It's very glitzy, very glamourous, exactly what you'd expect of a Las Vegas attraction," Foley says. "This is an attraction, not just a museum. It's not a walk-through, look, and go, 'oh that was nice' (place). It's very interactive. It's highly-themed, multimedia. Americans expect that -- especially in Las Vegas."

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