Columnist Joe Delaney: Plenty of laughs to be had in Las Vegas forums

Joe Delaney

Thursday, March 29, 2001 | 8:19 a.m.

If comedy is your favorite entertainment art form, this is the weekend for you to experience an infinite variety of comedic approaches ... Jay Leno, master of stand-up, is performing in the MGM Grand's EFX Theatre, tonight through Saturday, as Rick Springfield and Co. take a break ... If you like your magic made funny, Penn & Teller are back in the Rio Samba Theatre ... Recommended.

Mac King looks like a country boy, is really a hip hayseed, has a different but also very funny approach to his legerdemain, afternoons at Harrah's ... Lance Burton features Michael Goudeau, comedy juggler, for a funny interlude.

David Brenner (Golden Nugget) looks at the world askew and gives you the funny side of the 6 p.m. newscasts at 9 o'clock each evening ... Stand-up comedy is the order of the evening at "Catch A Rising Star" (Excalibur), Harrah's Improv, Riviera Comedy Club and the Tropicana Comedy Stop ... The bill changes each week and prices are reasonable.

"The Second City" offers five performers who perform sketches, quick comedy vignettes and audience-suggested improvisations in Bugsy's Celebrity Theatre (Flamingo Las Vegas) ... For revue-type zaniness, we recommend Breck Wall, David Harris, Sue Motsinger and Billy Smith in the often hilarious "The Best of Bottoms Up," afternoons (Flamingo Las Vegas).

"Bottoms Up" offers coupon specials, also available at two more afternoon shows -- "Stars of the Strip" (Lady Luck) and "Viva Las Vegas" (Stratosphere). Robbie Howard and the Walkers are first-rate impressionists with well-developed senses of humor at the former, and Dave Swan, Bruce "Big John" Michelson and Golden Joe Baker are three equally funny but quite different comedy approaches at the latter.

Pete Barbutti (Plaza) is a musical humorist and wit and a master of "Where are you from?" as an audience involvement ... Barbutti is a classically trained musician who also plays piano with his nose and solos on cigar and acoustic broom ... The show includes a female magician and Karen Denise's Naked Angels ... Barbutti alone is worth the tariff.

Impressionist Danny Gans (Mirage) adds equal parts of satire and humor to his rapid-fire star depictions for one of our town's toughest tickets, sold-out, taking orders three weeks in advance ... Laughs and accurate impressions are also available from Bill Acosta and his "Lasting Impressions" (Flamingo Las Vegas) and Andre-Philippe Gagnon (Venetian).

The Scintas (LV Hilton Nightclub) are two brothers and a sister, of Italian descent from Buffalo, N.Y., plus an Irish-American drummer, a self-contained group, combining impressions, music and lots of laughs ... They are scheduled to move to the Rio's Copa Room in April.

"Legends In Comedy" is an afternoon offering at the New Frontier, with five salutes to five established stars -- Jay Leno, Roseanne, Rodney Dangerfield, George Burns and Bill Cosby ... Evenings there, "The New Kenny Kerr Show" is a virtuoso piece by Kerr in drag, demonstrating his superb comedy sense along with his Cher and Streisand salutes.

Justin Tranz, in his "Hip-nosis, Playing with your Head" (O'Sheas, plus Friday and Saturday midnight shows at Flamingo Las Vegas), uses his willing audience subjects for laughs ... If individuals making fools of themselves are your wont, Tranz will guarantee you a good time ... Dr. Naughty, billed as an "X-rated hypnotist," is evenings at Bourbon Street.

"Blue Man Group: Live at Luxor" came here to a 1,200-seat theater after establishing the show in venues one-third that size ... "Blue Man Group" is now doing 13 performances a week and sold-out for nearly every one ... You will laugh a lot and be thoroughly entertained by a show that defies categorization.

In addition to its award-winning Comedy Club, this week featuring the nonsequiturs of Emo Philips, the Riviera has laughs with specialty acts in "Splash," Frank Marino as Joan Rivers in "An Evening at La Cage" and Carole Montgomery in "Crazy Girls." Joe Trammel is a comedic whirlwind in "Showgirls of Magic" (San Remo).

Starting Friday and Saturday, Sonny King and Blackie Hunt, once of the lounge group the Characters (Black is also the husband of Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt), will be performing weekends at the Hunts' new Bootlegger restaurant on Las Vegas Boulevard South, near the Belz Factory Outlet mall ... King, one of our best remaining saloon singers, is a first-rate comedian as well.

This is our up-to-date laughs list ... One more entry: Tommy Chong, once of Cheech and Chong, performs at 7 and 9 p.m. Saturday at Sunset Station ... Check Friday's Accent section for complete entertainment listings with full details.

It's getting to be that time of the year ... Please send whatever you can afford to the Sun Summer Camp Fund ... Let's send every possible deserving youngster to camp this summer ... The Sun absorbs all of the overhead so every penny goes to send the children to camp ... This is so vital ... See you Friday.