Danny Gans shows up in The Hangover

The late Danny Gans makes a cameo appearance of sorts in this weekend's #1 box office attraction, The Hangover. The Las Vegas Strip headliner shows up near the end of the movie about three guys who lose their buddy on a Las Vegas bachelor's party bender. In a daytime scene on the rootop of Caesars Palace, Gans' name and image can be seen clearly on the giant marquee for the Mirage Casino Resort next door, where he'd reigned for years before moving his musical impressionist act over the road to Steve Wynn's Encore. Gans does not appear physically in the film, as do a couple of other showmen synonymous with the town in a hiliarious-- and surprisingly hardcore-- stills sequence during the credits.


The film was shot in Vegas last year. Danny Gans died in his home on May 1st, of still-undetermined causes.

Steroids? Curse? Terry Fator, who succeeds Danny Gans at The Mirage, speaks about the star impressionist's shocking death

Police say they do not suspect foul play in the death of Las Vegas superstar Danny Gans. People we've spoken to say two things: "steroids" and "Mirage curse," neither of which has been proven or considered.

However, Terry Fator, the America's Got Talent winner who took over Gans' showroom at The Mirage Hotel and Casino on the Vegas Strip after Gans defected to Steve Wynn's Encore across the road (and follows Siegfried & Roy and Gans as the Mirage star attraction), spoke to the Las Vegas Review-Journal today:

“I’m just in shock. Danny was a huge inspiration for me. I absolutely loved him. I’m just heartsick. I only met him once, and the thing I’m most crushed about is that I was truly looking forward to becoming a colleague and a friend of his. I saw his show four times, and in my autobiography, I wrote that seeing him perform was the inspiration that got me to change my show and go to Las Vegas. He was a phenomenal entertainer and a great show.


“He lit up a room when he came in. He came to see my show and said he loved it. He was very comfortable onstage, extremely natural, and it’s rare to find someone who is natural onstage and he had that. With some great entertainers, you can walk in the room and feel you’re with a great presence, and he was one.”


UPDATE: A Las Vegas online forum contributor writes: "I'm beginning to think that the Encore/Grail/Broadway Theater is cursed. Avenue Q closed after nine months, Spamalot lasted slightly under 17 months, and Danny Gans shuffles off this mortal coil barely two months into his run there. Is Bobby Darin haunting the place?"