Garth Brooks is the anti-Danny Gans

Danny Gans did a Garth Brooks impression as part of his act. Over the weekend, Garth Brooks put the Danny Gans era, which ended only seven and half months ago, deeper into Las Vegas history when he took over Gans' theatre at the Wynn Las Vegas with little more than a guitar and a willingness to take requests of other people's songs (he didn't even spring for a cowboy hat) and ushered in a new phase of the stripped-down, intimate hour with a superstar that takes little effort from the performer but leaves the audience feeling they've shared something very special.


Critics, including Richard Abowitz at Gold Plated Door ("something truly special... the sort of special entertainment that allows Vegas to sometimes live up to the billing of Entertainment Capitol of the World...") and Mike Weatherford of the Las Vegas Review-Journal ("audacious and revealingly pure") have hailed the show that opened this weekend as an anti-Vegas, anti-spectacle antidote to the entertainment offered by hardworking, crowd-pleasing performers like Gans who went out of their way to put on a show to remember.

Garth Brooks defies Encore Theatre curse

Steve Wynn supplied Garth Brooks with a private jet as part of the deal to bring the country-pop star out of "retirement" to Las Vegas for a five-year residency at Danny Gans' "cursed" theatre at the Wynn Las Vegas hotel-casino on the Strip.

Brooks will play four weekend one-man shows a week (one on Fridays and Sundays, two on Saturdays), and may even draw some regular working class folk to the high-end Wynn and Encore hotel casinos on the Strip. They say all tickets will be $125. Brooks says that along with the bundles in cash, Wynn gacve him a jet so "I'd be able to go to soccer games, to practice, all this stuff.

"Taking care of my children and family is so important to me, and that will be the same for the next five years, except I'll play music."

In the five and half months since Danny Gans' death, Beyonce, Whoopi Goldberg and Larry King have taken the stage at the Encore Theater while Wynn hunted for a permament replacement for the unique musical impressionist.

Some in Vegas consider the Encore to be "cursed" in light of Gans' sudden passing, the failures of Broadway transplants Avenue Q and Spamalot, a medical emergency during Goldberg's debut-- and a show starring Larry King.

The Las Vegas Sun noted yesterday:

"Wynn also said in July that while Gans' 'tickets made money but not much,' the show brought visitors into Wynn and Encore restaurants and the casino floor. Wynn called the loss of Gans as a performer at Encore 'not a cataclysmic event by any means' from a business perspective, 'but a personal loss.'"

Photo: Las Vegas Review-Journal

Did Danny Gans' death hurt Steve Wynn's bottom line?

How did the drug overdose death of Wynn Encore Hotel & Casino headliner Danny Gans impact the bottom line for his boss Steve Wynn? We'll find out later this week when Wynn Resorts Ltd. reports its second-quarter financial results after the market closes Thursday.

Gans was three months into a longterm, multi-year, multi-million dollar contract at the Encore Theatre when he died suddenly and mysteriously in his bedroom smack in the middle of the second quarter on May 1st.

Wynn Resorts, run by billionaire and major stockholder Steve Wynn, operates casino resorts in Las Vegas and the Chinese island gambling enclave of Macau and has a resort under construction in Macau.

The $700 million Encore at Wynn Macau, due to open next year, is expected to include 600 rooms and suites along with casino, restaurant, retail and lounge space.

A subsidiary of Wynn Resorts Ltd. filed for a possible initial public offering of its Macau assets last week. The action did not come as a surprise to industry analysts.

These analysts expect Wynn Resorts to lose a penny per share on $739 million in revenues, compared with a profit of $1.11 per share on revenue of $825 million in the same period a year earlier.

Gans' death certainly did not help the Wynn Las Vegas operation, which is being propped up by the Chinese business. All casino corporations in Las Vegas are expected to have a rough year, even though many have lowered room rates to keep their hotels filled.

New hotels coming to Las Vegas in the next year will hurt everyone's revenues and earnings.

Wynn Resorts’ stock price has dropped from its 52-week high of $119.74 and closed the second quarter at $35.30.


Gans' showroom at the Encore has remained empty most of the time since his death. Though the local news media refused to investigate the circumstances of his untimely demise at age 52, publish what it knew about his use of painkillers and steroids, or speak to the many sources who claimed the musical impressionist was getting illegal prescription drugs from within his organization, most everyone in the beholden Vegas fourth estate is helping promote New York Times stringer, Gay Vegas author and comp queen Steve Friess's 3 pm "Michael Jackson’s Untimely Death Was The Best Thing That Could Ever Have Happened To Michael Jackson's Music Birthday Tribute But Not To The Man Show" set for August 29th at the Palms.