Downtown a good fit for Gordie Brown

Friday, June 4, 2004 | 9:14 a.m.

Who: "Downtown" Gordie Brown.

Where: Golden Nugget's Theatre Ballroom.

Rating (out of five stars): *****

Is Las Vegas big enough for two hugely talented comic impressionists? Veteran Danny Gans rules the Strip as the resident headliner at The Mirage.

And last week upstart Gordie Brown staked his own claim downtown, debuting at the Golden Nugget -- which has been re-energized since being purchased last year from MGM MIRAGE by Tim Poster and Tom Breitling.

It may be too soon to crown "Downtown" Brown as the heir apparent to Gans, who has missed a lot of shows in recent times due to assorted illnesses and injuries.

But it isn't too soon to say Brown will give Gans a run for his money -- which is to say, $100 per ticket for a seat in the Danny Gans Theater, compared to $55 for a seat in the Nugget's Theatre Ballroom.

At the end of Brown's 75-minute act earlier this week, fans wouldn't let him leave the stage, literally.

During a standing ovation, Brown walked along the front of the stage shaking hands and a member of the audience held on, begging him for more.

Brown obliged.

He said that during his 10-year career as an impressionist he rarely has done an encore.

"It's times like this I wish I had prpared," said the genial entertainer, who gave up his job as a political cartoonist for the Ottawa (Canada) Sunday Herald to follow in the footsteps of his mentor, fellow Canadian Rich Little.

Actually, Brown was prepared.

He simply reached into his seemingly bottomless bag of impressions and pulled out a few he hadn't done during the main part of the show.

Reporter Geraldo Rivera doing an expose on "Sesame Street" -- "A street filled with monsters and a hooker named Miss Piggy."

Ted Koppel -- "If only his hairpiece could talk."

Johnny Carson -- "Did you hear? Bruce Willis is endorsing the new Viagra pill. It lasts so long they're going to call it 'die hard.' "

Bill Cosby -- "He talks very slow. He does a three-hour show and tells four jokes."

Brown says much of his act is ad lib, so you never see the same show twice.

He has never stopped to count the number of voices he does, but in his performance earlier this week he did more than 50, among them Carlos Santana, Julio Iglesias, Willie Nelson, Neil Diamond, Paul Simon, Elton John, Billy Joel, Tracy Chapman, Katharine Hepburn, Billy Ray Cyrus, Garth Brooks, Vanilla Ice and M.C. Hammer.

Some of Brown's voices are better than others -- his Christopher Walken, Clint Eastwood and Louie Armstrong are especially well done. But his act is more than sounding like a particular personality, it's about the comedy.

Brown is a spontaneous, creative performer.

Who would have thought of doing an impression of actors Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd in a scene from "Back to the Future" -- in Japanese?

Or stuffing a hand-held microphone down his pants during an impression of Tom Jones, and then bending over to talk into the mike?

Brown's list of voices includes country singer Randy Travis. The impressionist opened for Travis for a couple of weeks and has the vocalist's mannerisms down pat.

"Randy doesn't move his lips when he sings. How lazy is that? Even the lip-synchers move their lips," Brown noted.

Much of his act consists of song parodies, such as a takeoff on Roy Orbison's "Only the Lonely," turning it into "Only the Baloney."

But there is plenty of diversity in his performance, such as his impression of Mike Tyson announcing his comeback: "I'm sharpening my teeth as we speak. Remember the fight I had with Evander Holyfield -- my motto, 'You can't beat 'em, eat 'em.'

"I tried to apologize, but he couldn't hear me."

But Brown's fans hear him loud and clear. They want more from the new kid on the block -- and if Vegas isn't big enough for two giant impressionists, Gans might have to move over.