THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 7, 1994 TAG: 9408050080
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CRAIG A. SHAPIRO, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 120 lines
LAS VEGAS, the TV spots proclaim, is always on the money.
It's a magic land where King Arthur's knights joust at Excalibur, where buccaneers battle at Treasure Island, where the ``Starlight Express'' rolls on at the Hilton, where families amble off to see the wizard at the MGM Grand.
Maybe that's true.
In Las Vegas.
Vegas is different.
It's the constant jing-jing-jing of the slots.
It's old men who could use a little sun crapping out before 8 - in the morning.
It's a long-legged woman in a short skirt, flicking a yo-yo and balancing a tray of smokes and roses, pushing souvenirs to the breakfast crowd.
It's more stretch limos than you'll see in a lifetime.
It's HOT.
It's cigars.
Vegas is where kitsch is king. Vegas is a place that won't, that can't, let go of its past. And visitors - 23.5 million last year alone - can't get enough.
A statue of Elvis overlooks the casino of the Las Vegas Hilton. At Vegas World, ``Memories of Elvis'' is booked for an indefinite run. You-know-who is part of ``Legends in Concert'' at the Imperial Palace, a revue that includes Cher, Neil Diamond and Sammy Davis Jr. lookalikes.
But this day, one legend looms at the Palace Theatre. The Elvis Performers Showcase/Festival is in town for the fifth year and Elvi are everywhere. But not one gets past Ruby Robl of Sierra Vista, Ariz., who has made the trip every year with her husband.
Just now she's corralled Don Romines, an Elvis from Schenectady, N.Y. Before the three-day festival wraps up - with ``Viva Elvis 2,'' a grand finale featuring every performer from every showcase - she'll have her picture taken with all 42.
Back in the exhibit room, Mike McGregor is talking about the seven years he lived at Graceland, tending Elvis' horses, fashioning his elaborate leather belts and creating ``Jewelry Fit for the King.'' He's brought along samples.
One of the souvenir tables - the one displaying tiny trays emblazoned with that famous shot of Elvis and Nixon at the White House - is run by Teresa Williams, who operates Expressly Yours at The Pottery in Williamsburg. It's her third year in Vegas.
The first showcase starts promptly at 11 a.m. Over the next two hours, a dozen performers, backed by Chicago's Exspence Account Band, run through three songs each - with no repeats. The Elvi touch every point on the curve: 13-year-old Paul Campione wears a gold lame suit and white bucks; Charles King's black leather says `` '68 comeback''; for Bob West, Elvis begins and ends with ``Aloha From Hawaii.'' All sound amazingly real.
The other part of the show is out in the audience, where middle-aged women, roses in hand, jockey up to the stage to get a kiss, and maybe a scarf, from the Elvis of choice.
Cheesy? A little. But definitely fun, and the mood is catching. There's no question that everybody had a good time. Especially Carl Erasmus, an Elvis from South Africa.
``This has been great,'' he said before launching into ``Are You Lonesome Tonight?'' ``I'm having the time of my life in Las Vegas.''
Back in the late '70s, ``Mr. Showmanship'' purchased a shopping center on East Tropicana - down the street from the campus of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas - and rechristened it Liberace Plaza. He intended to open a museum and use the proceeds to fund a foundation for the performing and creative arts.
On Easter 1979, he did.
Liberace died before he could realize the second part of his dream, building a museum in the shape of a piano, but his legend lives on.
``It's always seemed to me,'' reads a quote in the building housing his antique pianos and vintage cars, ``that when you have something beautiful, it's a shame not to share it.''
Lord, Liberace had some beautiful things:
A Bosendorfer Grand played by Liszt, Schumann and Brahms.
A Chickering Baby Grand owned by George Gershwin.
A Rosewood Graffe vertical piano built in New York around 1860; the upper section is in the form of a harp.
The Czar Nicholas costume with 24-karat gold braiding.
A floor-length mink cape - with 125 pounds of Austrian rhinestones - valued at $750,000.
Rings and watches and pendants shaped like candelabras and pianos and elephants.
The Liberace Museum, the third-most-popular tourist stop in Las Vegas, has spread to three buildings. One houses pianos and cars, another his library and family portraits, the third the costumes and jewelry. There's a gallery devoted to his brother George; there's the bedroom suite from his Palm Springs villa. Glass cases hold miniature pianos and tiny cars, including a racer autographed by Bobby Unser.
And pictures are everywhere: Liberace with Elvis and Ginger Rogers; Liberace with King Carl Gustaf XVI of Sweden and Dwight Eisenhower. Liberace entering Britain's House of Commons; Liberace kissing the ring of the pope.
There are citations: Sept. 14, 1984, Liberace Day in Los Angeles; Liberace, Sagamore of the Wabash; Liberace, Keeper of the Great Seal.
There are Emmys, platinum records and TV scripts; and an exact reproduction of his hands cast in gold by the Disney studio.
And there's a list of scholarship grants awarded in the past year, including one to Old Dominion University in Norfolk.
Rod Short, a tour guide at the museum, is still amazed at Liberace's enduring appeal. Seven years after his death, he brings in the same mix - of age, race and gender - that he did when he was breaking records at the Hollywood Bowl and Radio City Music Hall.
``He was very astute,'' Short said. ``He knew that slice of the population he appealed to, and had the charisma to go beyond the footlights. He was saying, `I'm having fun, you're having fun.' It's amazing. People of every age and nationality in the English-speaking world come through here.
``And you don't see him in the 7-Eleven all the time, either.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
CRAIG SHAPIRO
Elvis impersonator Don Romines poses with fan Ruby Robl.
Photo
CRAIG SHAPIRO
The Liberace Museum, now the third-most-popular tourist stop in
Nevada, has spread to three buildings.
by CNB