In Vegas wedding chapels, a red carpet for gay couples

The Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel’s first same-sex ceremony Friday was traditional by Sin City standards: no Elvis, no Marilyn, no glitzy faux backdrop of Blue Hawaii, Egypt or Camelot.

But for Chris Brentin, 31, a psychologist who grew up dreaming of eloping in Vegas, walking down the aisle to the chapel’s outdoor gazebo draped with plastic vines and Pachelbel’s canon piped through hidden speakers was everything he had hoped for.

“I personally have always had a love affair with this city,” Brentin, who lives in Sydney, Australia, said as a staffer pinned a red rose boutonniere to his navy blazer before he wed his partner of eight years, Ben Fidden, 32. Then the couple headed to a Cirque du Soleil show.

A day after Nevada began issuing same-sex marriage licenses, the city synonymous with quickie weddings — as well as offbeat ones — was scrambling to embrace weddings with two grooms or two brides.

The Viva Las Vegas marquee flashed a rainbow advertising, “Walk in specials — it’s legal!” down the street from the Aruba, Shalimar and A Little White Wedding chapels, the latter featuring a drive-through tunnel of love. The owner of nearby Chappelle de L’Amour flew the Human Rights Campaign equality flag and promised to stay open 24 hours, officiating for free.

As of Friday afternoon, 73 same-sex couples had received marriage licenses in Clark County, and chapel owners expected a flurry of business on Saturday, National Coming Out Day, along with a mass same-sex ceremony.

Weddings have long been part of the city’s identity. Couples have 48 chapels to choose from, and last year Clark County issued 80,493 marriage licenses. Studies show that 4% of all visitors come here for weddings. That works out to about 1.6 million people a year.

Couples say “I do” here for many reasons. There’s the outrageousness — this month some chapels offer vampire ceremonies for Halloween — but also no waiting period and no blood tests. Licenses are relatively cheap at $60.

Mya Reyes, president of the Las Vegas Gay Visitors Bureau, a private information resource on LGBT marketing, said it was hard to estimate how same-sex weddings would affect the local industry. She added, though, that gay marriage has been worth about $250 million a year to New York.

Viva Las Vegas co-owner Ron DeCar claims to have been the first on the Strip to perform commitment ceremonies when he opened the chapel in 1999, and his staff members have been calling those couples, inviting them to return to get married.

“Hopefully they’ll come back and do a themed wedding,” DeCar, 56, said as he stood with one couple after their ceremony, in a room done up as Donna Reed’s kitchen on one side and a 1950s diner on the other. An off-duty Elvis impersonator waited in the wings. DeCar, who sports a thick head of black hair, also used to play Elvis at weddings.

“Anybody doing a same-sex wedding will probably be traditional,” he said. “We’ve waited so long.”

As for DeCar and his partner, they have set a date — Dec. 17, the 20th anniversary of the day they met in Sedona, Ariz. They would like to get married there, but most likely will stay home and take their time.

“We’re not going to rush down there to get a license. We’re going to plan it just like anyone else,” he said.

Other same-sex couples had reason to hurry and exchange vows.

Among those lined up at the county marriage license bureau was Luis Garcia Jr., 40, a hospital administrator diagnosed last week with AIDS and cancer.

After Garcia received the diagnosis, his domestic partner, Howard Hancock, 56, a middle school math teacher, called his school to ask about taking family medical leave, but was told he would have to be married. The court decision allowing same-sex marriage was “a godsend,” Garcia said.

Hancock, who met Garcia a year ago on Match.com, had proposed on Valentine’s Day. They considered traveling to California or Hawaii to get married, but held out for Vegas, their longtime home. Garcia’s mother, Fanny, 72, a sports book writer at a local casino, served as a witness.

After the couple got their license, the trio walked down the street under a row of palms to the Vegas Weddings chapel, with Garcia marveling aloud at how times had changed.

“The state has always been so conservative,” he said. Even Vegas has its conservative side — older residents or tourists from the Midwest versus the raucous, liberal crowd of transplants who work and party on the Strip.

“Often in my life, I feel we’re living in two Vegases,” he said as they arrived at the chapel and entered a lobby full of wedding dresses and a stack of caps labeled “Mr. Right.”

Their bare-bones $50 ceremony did not include flowers, music or a reception. Afterward, instead of celebrating, Hancock planned to drive Garcia to his latest doctor’s appointment. They didn’t even have rings.

“We didn’t have time,” Garcia told the officiant.

“That happens a lot in Vegas,” he said, before pronouncing them a married couple and giving them a souvenir: a gambling chip.

“Of course — it’s the Vegas way!” Garcia said as they left.

Across the street at Chappelle de L’Amour, owner Jim McGinnis had already performed half a dozen same-sex ceremonies, including a Jewish woman whose father draped her in the family’s prayer shawl before choking up; an elderly woman with cancer whose partner wanted to be sure she would be able to visit her in the hospital; and a couple who had been together for more than 44 years.

Jim Hook and Peter Schmitt met at a friend’s house in Vegas. Hook, now 65, who designed store displays, was shy. Schmitt, 74, a strapping German dry cleaner, was not.

“I said I’d get him sooner or later,” Schmitt said.

They have lived in Vegas for years, spending their spare time raising Boston terriers. They never really came out. Co-workers and bosses assumed they were brothers. But their relatives knew.

For their wedding, they wore suit jackets, Boston-terrier-theme ties and American flag lapel pins. They bought the $199 “Lovely” package, including a ceremony, bridal suite, flowers, music, photo session and limo.

After they walked down the aisle and exchanged thick gold bands, Schmitt proposed celebrating with an early dinner.

“How much money did you spend so far?” he asked his husband.

“I don’t know — I don’t care. It’s a special day,” Hook replied.

“So … El Cortez for prime rib?”

molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com

Twitter: mollyhf

Times staff writer Michael Muskal in Los Angeles contributed to this report.