Columnist Kate Maddox: Rod Stewart rocks Bellagio for select audience

Kate Maddox

Friday, Oct. 22, 1999 | 10 a.m.

Kate Maddox's column appears Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays, only in the Las Vega. To subscribe to the Sun, call 383-0400.

Rock legend Rod Stewart played Las Vegas on Wednesday night but the performance was only available to a select few. Stewart was the special guest star at the Bass Hotels and Resorts Convention held this week at the Bellagio.

Stewart closed the convention with a private concert in one of the Bellagio ballrooms. Conventioneers, most of whom own Holiday Inns and/or Inter-Continental Hotels, had the option of including Stewart's concert in their convention "package."

As for Stewart himself, he walked away with a reported $400,000. That's nothing compared to the $3 million he will receive for his New Year's concert at the Rio Hotel, but still, it's not too shabby for one night's work.

MTV Networks seems to have found a second home here in Las Vegas. After the success of events such as last week's VH1 Fairway to Heaven, and with hotels like the Hard Rock willing to participate, MTV is again betting on Vegas for yet another mega-event.

The MTV Sports and Music Festival will be here today through Sunday, and "extreme athletes" will be competing in such alternative sports as BMX dirt biking, skateboarding and in-line skating. The event kicks off with an incredible stunt: Pro skateboarder Danny Way will jump from a helicopter onto a specially built ramp atop the Hard Rock's parking garage. Talk about extreme.

The music part of the festival will feature bands including Smashmouth, Blink 182 and the Foo Fighters. The bands will play live Saturday at The Joint.

The Sports and Music Festival Las Vegas will air Nov. 13, only on MTV.

The Riviera Hotel will play host to the cast and crew of the F/X network's male-oriented hit, "The X Show" this weekend.

The show, which features four guys sitting around talking about various issues involving men and women, and women, and women some more, will film this weekend at the hotel. The stars of the show will follow Riviera Entertainment Director Steve Schirripa for a day while he performs his various showbiz duties.

The guys, true to form, will also spend some time with the ladies of the Riviera. Showgirls, cocktail waitresses and dealers will all be interviewed and analyzed by the men of "X."

Roseanne rubbed more than a few people the wrong way when she was here to host VH1's Celebrity Karaoke at the Hard Rock on Monday night.

She spent the commercial breaks during the show spewing obscenities at the crowd and proceeded to ask country star Wynonna on the microphone what it felt like to be the only other woman in the room besides Roseanne who wears a size 14-16. Wynonna tried to recover gracefully, but she was obviously a bit unnerved.

The folks at Fred Leighton Jewelers at the Bellagio also had an unpleasant run-in with the former Mrs. Barr. She walked into the boutique, which is home to some of the best rare collectible jewels in the world, and loudly asked, "All right, what's the cheapest thing in here?" Needless to say, the comedienne didn't stay very long.

Another celebrity at VH1's Celebrity Karaoke was comedian Pauly Shore, in town to do his stand-up routine at UNLV. He showed up about halfway through the show at The Joint and watched from the sidelines with a couple of friends.

After the show, when asked why he didn't get up onstage and do a number of his own, Shore replied, "good management." Enough said.

Well-known Las Vegas sports bettor Lem Banker is doing a good deed for a couple of lucky kids involved with the Make-a-Wish Foundation. Banker is taking two sick children to the Tyson fight Saturday night at the MGM Grand.

The two youngsters -- one has leukemia and the other has kidney disease -- asked to go to the fight and Banker, along with the kind folks at the MGM, secured six very prime tickets. The kids, Kristen and William, will bring their parents, and Banker will throw in some goodies of his own to make their night complete. He's treating them to a limo and dinner at one of Wolfgang Puck's restaurants.

There should be lots of stars to be found at the Tyson/Norris matchup. Scheduled to appear are Magic Johnson, Pam Grier, Dylan McDermott, Ving Rhames, Sherilyn Fenn, Keenan Wayans and John Travolta, just to name a few.