Broadway To Vegas

Copyright: December 29, 2019
By: Laura Deni
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THE WORLD RINGS IN 2020

A time to say good-bye to the old and hope for the best of what's to come in 2020.

That doesn't mean that current unrest in the world doesn't trump a good time.

Hong Kong is an area which gets a party hardy jump on other parts of the world.

"New year in Hong Kong is as exciting as it sounds! This city knows how to celebrate every moment, especially the new year's eve. The party vibes start to crawl in right from Christmas and last till the Chinese New Year, which is celebrated in February."

However, last Thursday it was announced that the "Hong Kong Tourism Board just announced that the New Year’s Eve fireworks had been called off due to safety consideration. This is the first time for the last 10 year that this traditional event is cancelled. "The fireworks event will be replaced by an enriched version of “A Symphony of Lights” for the New Year’s Eve countdown, starting from midnight January 1st 2020 and lasting for 10 minutes.

"The New Year Fireworks harbour tour will be changed to the New Year’s Eve countdown celebration cruise tour. You are still able to celebrate this special moment with the stunning night views on Victoria Harbour.

"Due to the current situation in Hong Kong, many traditional events have been cancelled in the past few months, including the annual Wine & Dine Festival, Hong Kong Tennis Open and Clockenflap Music Festival. Although Hong Kong Tourism Board decided to continue the annual New Year’s Eve Countdown Fireworks display and in the end still announced to cancel it."

In a kick start position to party until you drop is Sin City. Over 333,333 revelers are expecting to ring in 2020 in Las Vegas.

Famed Grucci will orchestrate the legendary pyrotechnic show display from seven hotel rooftops: MGM Grand, Aria, Planet Hollywood, Caesars Palace, Treasure Island, The Venetian and Stratosphere.

The new show is dubbed "Comet Etching" by Grucci which explained: "This will be an etching of the ten digit count-down going from the tops of four of the properties: MGM, Aria, Venetian and Stratosphere," said Grucci Director of Business Development Scott Cooper at a press conference, "obviously strategically placed north, south and in the middle so everybody has a view of this amazing countdown going up about 200 feet."

No backpacks, coolers, glass bottles or cases of beer.

About 1,700 officers and personnel will be on duty - some uniformed and some in plain clothes - keeping an eye out. Police drones will watch overhead.

A what used to be called Casino Center, party goers can stand beneath the famed Fremont Street Experience canopy and see for the first time the $32 million renovation of Viva Vision – the world’s largest single video screen.

The upgrade to 16,433,152 pixels means the screen will glow seven times brighter than the existing canopy with four times the resolution.

Live entertainment abounds with 12 bands on 4 stages.

You can say good-bye to 2019 by watching some super stars.

Lady Gaga

Christina Aguilera wraps up this leg of her Christina Aguilera: The Xperience residency at Zappos Theater inside Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino, with shows December 30-31.

One of the world's greatest rock bands – Journey – will bring the crowd inside The Colosseum at Caesars Palace to their feet with shows December 30-31.

Celebrate with Lady Gaga as she puts on three shows New Year's Eve weekend at Park Theater inside Park MGM. The superstar will perform her famous pop hits during Lady Gaga Enigma December 28 and 30. And close out the decade in style on December 31 at Lady Gaga & Piano with stripped-down versions of those hits alongside music from the Great American Songbook.

Maroon 5 will bring their annual New Year's Eve shows back to Mandalay Bay Events Center for the ninth consecutive year, December 30 and 31. Jam out with rock band The Offspring at the Pearl Theater inside Palms Casino Resort on December 30 and close out the year with an intimate performance by Puerto Rican superstar OZUNA on New Year's Eve.

Ring in the new year with Paula Abdul as she performs her greatest hits at the Flamingo Las Vegas on December 31. Guests looking to slay the remaining hours of 2019 can join multi-platinum artist LIZZO as she bring her captivating performance to The Chelsea inside The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, New Year's Eve.

Say adieu to 2019 with pop rock band Third Eye Blind at House of Blues Las Vegas at Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino also on December 31.

The Big Apple - aka New York City - does a ball drop like no other.

They also have a lock on market for live television coverage.

At 6:25 p.m. The Times Square Alliance sanitation crew clad in bright red uniforms begins to distribute tens of thousands of fun handouts to the Times Square revelers for cheering in the New Year. Planet Fitness is providing festive purple and yellow New Year’s Eve hats along with purple & yellow balloons tied with gold mylar ribbons. The Sino-American Friendship Association is providing beautiful red scarves.

At 6:46 p.m. to 6:52 p.m. FOX New Year’s Eve Performance by the Village People singing their hit song YMCA on the Planet Fitness Center Stage. LL Cool J takes to the stage from 7:39 p.m. to 7:49 p.m. NBC New Year’s Eve Performance by Julianne Hough is followed by ABC’s “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve” - Broadway Musical Jagged Little Pill with Alanis Morissette perform on the Countdown Stage. Post Malone performs medley of his hit songs on the Countdown Stage.

Expect to see the usual on air suspects pretend to be comfortable although their toes and fingertips are numb with cold.

Carson Daly will live stream for NBC. New Year's Eve Live with Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen airs on CNN. Host Steve Harvey and co-host Maria Menounos ring in 2019 live from Times Square with celebrity appearances from Ken Jeong and Kenan Thompson, and musical performances from Sting, Robin Thicke, Florence + The Machine, and Jason Aldean for Fox's New Year's Eve .

Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2020 marks the 48th anniversary of America's biggest celebration of the year and will include 5½ hours of special performances and reports on New Year's celebrations from around the globe on ABC. In addition to Ciara on the West Coast, Ryan Seacrest will continue his reign as host of the prime-time festivities for his 15th year and lead the traditional countdown to midnight from Times Square in New York City, joined by co-host, Lucy Hale.

Post Malone

The Jonas Brothers will deliver the first performance of 2020. Headlining is Post Malone singing a medley of his hits.

Emmy, Tony and Grammy Award-winning actor, singer, director, composer and playwright Billy Porter will host the 4th annual Central Time Zone celebration from New Orleans, providing viewers with exclusive performances and celebrity and fan interviews leading up to the midnight countdown and stunning fleur-de-lis drop at the dawn of the New Year.

The world-famous New Year's Eve confetti is released from the rooftops of buildings throughout Times Square creating a celebratory blizzard of colorful confetti as revelers welcome the New Year accompanied by colorful pyrotechnic effects. The three thousand pounds of confetti includes tens of thousands of wishes from revelers around the world hoping for peace, love, good health and a better future in the new year.

Headed across the pond?

Don't expect to catch a glimpse of Prince Harry and Meghan. It's also a good bet that their son Archie will sleep through his first New Year's Eve. However, London is a happenin' place.

The London New Year's Eve fireworks light up central London every New Year's Eve with a dazzling spectacle of pyrotechnics. The famed London show has been a paid ticket item since 2014. This year it's sold out.

That doesn't mean your only option is to stay home and mope. If you are determined to see the fireworks in person, consider viewing the spectacular from a boat.

Choose a magical New Year's Eve cruise on the Thames, where you can watch the NYE fireworks and enjoy live entertainment. Watch the London NYE fireworks from the river on one of City Cruises' New Year's Eve cruises: choose from dinner cruises, speedboat rides, traditional boat trips with champagne and live music, and even dinner in the R.S. Hispaniola ship, moored opposite the London Eye. Take a thrilling speedboat ride with Thames Rockets, before cruising back to central London in time to see the firework show. Or show down with a picnic basket celebration including bubbly on a Thamesjet speedboat as you watch sky light up.

Ahead of everyone is Australia which rings in a new decade before London or America. Bubbles in hand. Sky drenched in color. Planning to be in Sydney for New Years Eve 2019/20? Prepare to be dazzled.

"There’s something about Sydney on New Years Eve. Humans from every corner of the globe congregate to celebrate the year that was, welcome the year to come, bathe in the company of their most loved ones and gaze in wonder at the sky. It’s a neon energy that needs to be experienced at least once in your lifetime."

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This is not your typical, totally boring textbook.

In the pages of How To Earn A Living As A Freelance Writer (the first to be lied to and the last to be paid) you'll find sex, celebrities, violence, threats, unethical editors, scummy managers and lawyers, treacherous press agents, sex discrimination; as well as a how-to for earning money by writing down words.

ART AND ABOUT

PRE-RAPHAELITE SISTERS

Marie Spartali Stillman by Ford Madox Brown - an accomplished painter in her own right. Photograph: National Portrait Gallery

170 years after the first pictures were exhibited by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1849, Pre-Raphaelite Sisters, explores the overlooked contribution of twelve women to this iconic artistic movement.

Featuring new discoveries and unseen works from public and private collections across the world, this show reveals the women behind the pictures and their creative roles in Pre-Raphaelite’s successive phases between 1850 and 1900.

"The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, formed in 1848, was a trio of rebellious young men – William Holman Hunt, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Everett Millais – who had become disillusioned with what they perceived as a lack of natural beauty in art. They wanted to paint from life, and so enlisted a number of women – dressmakers, servants, sisters, mistresses – to model for them. They placed them in famous settings from literature or legend, and by so doing found a way to explore the most pressing social anxieties of the time: sex, death and disease. Not only did these women’s influence have an immeasurable influence on the Brotherhood’s output, but they produced their own work too – poetry, paintings and sketches – that is just as worthy of study as their male peers."

Some were models, plucked from obscurity to pose for figures in Pre-Raphaelite paintings, while others were sisters, wives, daughters and friends of the artists. Several were artists themselves, with aspirations to match those of the men, sharing the same artistic and social networks yet condemned by their gender to occupy a separate sphere. Others inhabited and sustained a male-dominated art world as partners in production, maintaining households and studios and socializing with patrons. Some were skilled in the arts of interior decoration, dressmaking, embroidery, jewellery-making – the fine crafts that formed a supportive tier for the ‘higher’ arts of painting and sculpture. And although their backgrounds and life-experiences certainly varied widely, all were engaged in creating Pre-Raphaelite art.

Curated by Dr Jan Marsh and Alison Smith.

On exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery in London.

ECLECTIC ECOLOGY: LANDSCAPE PERSPECTIVES FROM PONCE DE LEON TO FLORIDA MAN is a focused exhibition of 10 artworks from the 19th century to the present day. Organized by the Cummer Museum and drawn primarily from the museum’s collection, the installation examines the ways artists across the centuries have explored the Florida cultural landscape, with its density of vegetation, people and mystery.

Florida’s geography suggests images of a lush tropical paradise, with vast natural resources and endless opportunities for those most daring to try. Ponce de León was one in a line of countless fortune-hunters attracted to the landscape, from white sand beaches to murky swamps.

Jacques le Moyne, the first European artist known to have visited Florida, arrived in 1564. Since then, artists have wrestled with how to capture the dichotomy of Florida’s cultural landscape, which is a combination of nature and humanity: light, bright, expansive and ripe with potential, but also wild, untamed, ambiguous and obscure. Eclectic Ecology considers how Florida and humans coexist, whether in harmony or imbalance, and invites viewers to reflect on what is lurking beneath the literal and figurative shadows.

Curated by Holly Keris, Chief Curator, Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens. opened December 26, 2019 and is on display through Fall/Winter 2020 at the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, Jacksonville, Florida.

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SWEET CHARITY

SPOILED The Hess Collective Fundraising Reading at TheaterLab in New York City takes place January 7, 2020. All proceeds go towards the upcoming world premiere at La MaMa.

A diverse ensemble of female performers will present different stories from the Spoiled canon.

Secrets about gender-based violence.
From the male point of view.
Ripped open by women.

Written by Elizabeth Hess, Spoiled was conceived following her play, Dust To Dust, based on systematic wartime rape, performed at the UN Conference on Gender Violence. Spoiled explores the epidemic of violence against women around the world.

SEX GAINS PROMINENCE AT CES

Vibrating money.

Sex toys.

Even the once stodgy Consumer Electronics Show which - for decades - prided itself on geek speak has finally conceded that techs like mechanical sex.

This year - for the first time - sex toys will be eligible for awards and the Lioness vibrator has become a finalist for the CES 2020 Final Gadget Standing Award.

The 2020 Finalists along with short versions of their official descriptions are:

Lioness Smart Vibrator Lioness (2nd Generation) makes a great thing even better.

MedWand (MedWand solutions, Inc) fulfills the potential of telemedicine. MedWand houses multiple diagnostic tools in a single, easy-to-use handheld device.

Octobo Thinker-Tinker. Robots don’t need to be hard! We create tech with innovative, soft interfaces to provide immersive experiences

WOWCube (CubiOs Inc) is an awesome Rubik's cube inspired gadget and powerful open development platform

This next generation Orbi Mesh WiFi System (NETGEAR) is designed for the connected world of today and the future.

ClearUP Sinus Pain Relief Tivic Health. Whether you’re one of 50+ million people who suffer from seasonal or year-round allergies you can now get drug-free sinus pain relief

The Phyn Smart Water Assistant (Phyn) finally makes leak detection and water savings simple, affordable and engaging for homeowner

Flic 2 Smart Button FlicPushing a tactile button is the most satisfying and straightforward way to send a command.

DoodleMatic Mobile Game Maker Tink Digital Inc. DoodleMatic enables kids to explore their creativity and unleash their imagination in new, exciting ways

Ambassador Interpreter (Waverly Labs Inc)is the highest quality translation tool out there for professionals and travelers of all backgrounds

" Each year more than 3,000 products launch. Some make it. Others don’t. For the past 20 years at the Last Gadget Standing we’ve left you, the audience to pick the next winner. And it’s worked. You’ve picked greats like Roomba, Onstar and Palm Pilot. You’re on a roll. To celebrate the big 20 we’ll invite past winners, past celebrities and feature some great moments!"

At the live event on Thursday, January 9th attendees can experience electrifying demonstrations of the top ten products that have been selected by a jury of expert judges. The audience then votes on the product they believe is most likely to go on to CES fame. The voting is done using a non-scientific, but outrageous, applause-o-meter dependent upon microphones having been secretly placed around the room. Those who can't attend the live event have been invited to vote for the People's Choice Online award online which ends January 7, 2020..

The 20th Annual Last Gadget Standing is hosted by Jennifer Jolly, Emmy award-winning tech-life TV show host and writer for The New York Times. She's touted as "your BFF for advice on all those digital doodads, techy tools, and cyber services that are supposed to make your life easier, more organized, and just plain better."

The contest’s media and production partner, Getgeeked.tv, produces the atrocious halftime trivia contest where the audience can win goodies by correctly answering obscure CES history questions.

Keynote speaker at 2020 CES will be Ivanka Trump.

SPREADING THE WORD

MARIAH CAREY'S

Designer Alina Anwar Khan created Mariah Carey's pine green sequined cocktail dress. Photo: Alina Anwar Couture

choice of a sparkly pine green-colored scooped neck, fully embedded sequined long sleeved cocktail dress, the pop star wore on her remake of her holiday hit All I Want for Christmas is You has generated publicity for Dubai, UAE designer Alina Anwar.

Originally from Pakistan, Anwar studied in London before starting her own label Alina Anwar Couture. Now based in Dubai, UAE the designer starts each day with a gym workout and "is best known for her sophisticated yet visually stunning gowns."

Anwar has dressed such Bollywood and Hollywood stars as Kareena Kapoor, Jacqueline Fernandez, Bhumi Pednekar, Janhvi Kapoor, Malaika Arora, Yami Gautam, Sheheryar Munawar, Roslyn Sanchez, Jenna Dewan, to name just a few.

Anwar has been quoted as saying: "I have always taken inspiration from great Hollywood actresses, such as Jean Harlow and Grace Kelly, because of their elegance and class - they always played strong, independent characters who are also great role models for women."

LAS VEGAS GOLDEN KNIGHTS HOCKEY TEAM (speaking of Mariah Carey's All I Want For Christmas Is You) created a clever Christmas video in which five of them suited up in their steel grey home jerseys and four of them in Santa hats lip synced to Mariah Carey's All I Want For Christmas Is You.

The tough guys also appear in Carey's star studded video commemorating the 25th anniversary of the song's release and finally topping Billboard’s Hot 100 list.

DICK CAVETT PRESENTS A CONVERSATION WITH CHRISTOPHER WALKEN takes place Sunday, January 5, 2020 as part of the Hearst Media Entertaining Conversation Series at the Ridgefield Playhouse in Ridgefield, CT.

PIANIST DAVID OSBORNE a resident of Nevada, has added another presidential administration to his resume. Known as the 'Pianist to the Presidents' he has played for Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and both Bushes. On December 15 he added the Trump administration when he played at the White House for First Lady Melania Trump.

The talented pounder of the 88 keys got into the presidential serenading biz after regularly performing for Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter in Plains, Georgia. He created and organized President Carter's 75th birthday tribute in 1999.

When he isn't playing for presidents he is the Artist in Residence at two Las Vegas properties - Caesars Palace and Bellagio Resort.

LILY TOMLIN joined Jane Fonda's 12th "Fire Drill Friday" last Friday which focused on the way climate change damages the world’s forests, suppliers of 20% of Earth’s oxygen.

This week, Fire Drill Fridays began at at the Southeast Lawn of the U.S. Capitol Building. Participants walked to the steps of the U.S. Capitol Building where many committed civil disobedience and risked arrest.

Speakers included:
Alfred Lahai Gbabai Brownell who won the Goldman Environmental Prize, also called the "Green Nobel" in 2019 for his work protecting more than 500,000 acres of the tropical forest that were traditional lands of local communities.

Hana Heineken works at Rainforest Action Network to hold banks and investors accountable for their impacts on rainforests, the climate, and human rights.

Gaurav Madan is Senior Forests and Land Campaigner at Friends of the Earth US. He advocates for investors and financial institutions to stop financing climate chaos through deforestation, land grabbing, and human rights abuses.

Rolando Navarro is a Renewable Natural Resources engineer with a specialty in Forestry.
Rolf Skar is a Senior Campaign Strategist for Greenpeace USA.
Lily Tomlin is an American actor, comedian, writer, singer and producer.

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QUEEN ELIZABETH'S 2020 NEW YEAR'S HONORS LIST include a bevy of the famous.

Sir Elton John is one of two knights this year who are being elevated to an even higher echelon, Companion of Honor, which is restricted to only 65 individuals at any given time.

The other knight elevated is historian Sir Keith Thomas.

Olivia-Newton John has been made a dame and director Sam Mendes knighted.

Another damehood goes to broadcaster and campaigner Baroness Floella Benjamin.

Others honored with a foot in entertainment world include:
CBEs for actress Wendy Craig; DJ Annie Nightingale; veteran radio critic Gillian Reynolds; and screenwriter Steven Knight. At OBE, there are awards for broadcaster June Sarpong; founder member of Queen, Roger Taylor; and author and chef, Nigel Slater.

Winners will receive their medals during separate Investiture ceremonies held throughout the year at Buckingham Palace or Windsor Castle.

In total 1,097 people have received an award. 941 candidates have been selected at BEM, MBE and OBE level - 315 at BEM, 397 at MBE and 229 at OBE: 789 (72%) of the recipients are people who have undertaken outstanding work in their communities either in a voluntary or paid capacity;
556 women are recognized in the List, representing 51% of the total;
9.1% of the successful candidates come from a BAME background;
11% of the successful candidates consider themselves to have a disability (under the Equality Act 2010);
3.3% of recipients identified as being LGBT+.



FACES IN THE CROWD Valeria Luiselli’s dazzlingly original, award-winning novel, adapted by The Gate's Artistic Director, Ellen McDougall who also directs.

As a mother tries to remember the faces from her past, the lines between her and them blur, time folds in on itself and ghosts appear everywhere. Pushing the boundaries of storytelling, this dizzying, fluid and haunting adaptation explores whether our identities are more permeable than we imagine.

Featuring Jimena Larraguivel, Neil D'Souza and Anoushka Lucas.

January 16, 2020- February 8, 2020 at The Gate in London.

DRAMA AT INISH by Lennox Robinson.

Directed by Cal McCrystal.

The laugh out loud comedy features Grace Collender, Marcus Lamb, Mark O'Regan and Ian O'Reilly.

Drama at Inish is a comic play by the Irish writer Lennox Robinson which was first performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin on February 6, 1933. The storyline of the play serves as a parody of the plots and atmosphere of the plays being performed within it.

The Abbey advised: "Please Note: Drama at Inish is a comedy, but it also contains references to marital strife, domestic violence, and suicide. Audience discretion is advised."

On the Abbey Stage in London until January 24, 2020.

THE UNKNOWN DANCER IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD written and directed by Suguru Yamamoto.

Performed by dancer/choreographer Wataru Kitao.

Presented by Japan Society as part of the Society’s 2019-2020 Performing Arts Season and The Public Theater’s Under the Radar Festival. This contemporary dance theater piece is features Yamamoto's signature directing style, in which characters’ thoughts are conveyed through projected words - alluding to the millennial generation's preferred mode of communication - texting. Through movement, photography and colorful lighting, Yamamoto reveals the indifference and tenderness of a metropolis where the lives of complete strangers continuously interact and coalesce.

This production plays January 10 - 14 at Japan Society in New York City.

E-Book

Soft back Book

This is not your typical, totally boring textbook.

In the pages of How To Earn A Living As A Freelance Writer (the first to be lied to and the last to be paid) you'll find sex, celebrities, violence, threats, unethical editors, scummy managers and lawyers, treacherous press agents, sex discrimination; as well as a how-to for earning money by writing down words.

WHO'S WHERE

BILLY JOEL performing his hits Friday, January 10, 2020 at Hard Rock Live, Hollywood, FL.

ELTON JOHN in the spotlight Tuesday, January 7, 2020 and Thursday, January 9, 2020 at Qudos Bank Arena, Sydney, Australia.

CELINE DION on stage January 8, 2020 at the VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena in Jacksonville, FL. The January 11th performance is at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, GA.

BRUNO MARS headlines New Year's Eve celebrations December 31, 2019 on Yas Island, UAE.

MARILYN MAYE The 91-year-old phenom will deliver her “New Year’s Eve Extravaganza!” at 7 & 11pm, December 31, 2019 at Birdland Theater in New York City.

SYRIAN SINGER NASSIF ZEITOUN will ring in the New Year with a gala dinner and outdoor performance under the stars, where he will enthrall his audience with his songs in the magnificent surroundings of The Promenade at Dubai Opera, at the foot of Burj Khalifa. Live DJ before and after the concert. DEcember 31, 2019 in Dubai, UAE.

FINAL OVATION

DON IMUS radio legend and shock jock radio host died December 27, 2019 after being hospitalized on Christmas Eve. He was 79.

He hosted the popular radio show “Imus in the Morning” for a half-century before retiring in 2018.

He was inducted into the National Association of Broadcasters Radio Hall of Fame in 1989.

Imus is survived by two sons, four daughters and his wife of 25 years, Dierdre.

Next Column: January 5, 2020
Copyright: December 29, 2019 All Rights Reserved. Reviews, Interviews, Commentary, Photographs or Graphics from any Broadway To Vegas (TM) columns may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, utilized as leads, or used in any manner without permission, compensation and/or credit.
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