A New Drawing Card : Gambling: Southland clubs are adding Las Vegas-style entertainment in an effort to keep players closer to home. But some patrons say the gaming tables are enough.
People just do not confuse Las Vegas and Gardena--one is a glitzy gambling town where entertainers such as Frank Sinatra and Paul Anka roam; the other is a sleepy bedroom community not known for its stargazing.
But on a recent night, a small part of Gardena took on a decidedly Las Vegas air. In the showroom of the Normandie Casino, an Elvis Presley impersonator cooed to a horde of screaming women, a Dolly Parton wanna-be flirted with the crowd, and showgirls wearing sequined dresses kicked their heels to the tune of “Viva Las Vegas.”
The hoopla was part of an increasing effort by local card clubs to lure patrons. Entertainment, from elaborate musicals to karaoke contests to wandering mariachi bands, has become the draw at some of them.
Nowhere is the entertainment push stronger than at the Normandie, which recently put the finishing touches on a 240-seat showroom and is billing itself as a local alternative to Nevada casinos, a self-styled “Vegas in L.A.” Some call that comparison a giant leap of faith, but confident Normandie officials say that there were skeptics in the early days of Las Vegas, too.
“We’re going through all the growing pains that early Vegas did,” said Blaine Nicholson, the Normandie’s entertainment director. “We want the people who are going to Vegas now to become aware that we offer gambling and entertainment. The biggest obstacle is to get people to realize that we’re here and we’re legal.”
Nicholson, who has worked for several Nevada casinos, said that entertainment helped Las Vegas go from a sleepy desert town to perhaps the most famous gambling resort in the world.
“Vegas used entertainment to draw California residents across the desert to their casinos,” he said. “We’re doing the same thing. We needed a way to bring people here.”
The South Bay used to be the center of legal gambling in Los Angeles County, with six card clubs, all based in Gardena. But in the 1980s, larger clubs opened in Bell, City of Commerce and Bell Gardens, prompting all but two of the Gardena clubs to close.
Overall, the county’s six clubs, which are open 24 hours a day, have experienced a rebirth in recent years as high-stakes Asian-American gamblers have discovered the casinos.
Revenues have soared. Although neither of Gardena’s two clubs would release revenue figures, the city reported that it brought in $4.9 million in tax revenue from its two clubs last year, more than it received from six clubs a decade ago and about a 25% jump from the $3.9 million paid by the casinos in 1988.
Casino operators hope entertainment and Asian-style games will bring in new audiences and keep the cash flowing.
The Normandie, which has 80 card tables, has begun an aggressive marketing campaign that highlights its shows. Other casinos, such as the Bicycle Club in Bell Gardens, are testing smaller productions before going ahead with expansion plans. Officials at the Commerce Club say they will be the next ones to enter the entertainment business when their large showroom opens this year.
At the Eldorado Card Casino, Gardena’s second club, the owner has dabbled with live shows but considers them an unneeded distraction to those using the casino’s 35 gaming tables.
“I don’t see entertainment as the future,” said George Anthony, the Eldorado owner and a member of the California Card Club Assn.’s board of directors. “These aren’t hotel casinos. To have somebody dancing while you’re playing cards takes away from winning money. When you’re gambling you ought to be gambling, and gambling to win.”
Some of the hard-core gamblers at the Normandie seem to agree.
Slumped into a chair at a Super 9 table, a cigarette hanging from his mouth, was Sam, 54, a Lomita man who did not want to give his last name but had no problem offering his opinion of the shows.
“I ain’t getting up from this seat to see no show,” he said gruffly. “I can see shows at home on TV. I come here for the cards, and I ain’t getting up and ruining my flow. Lady Luck is with me.”
The Normandie’s first show, which opened New Year’s Eve and will run through the beginning of May, sought to bring the Las Vegas connection home with a flashy, multimedia production called “Superstars.”
At a recent performance, video clips of Las Vegas were splashed onto a huge screen as young dancers pranced about the stage wearing ornamental dice, cards and chips. A booming voice opened the show by declaring, “Direct from the Hilton Hotel in Las Vegas . . . Elvis Presley.”
Elvis impersonator Tommy Hart, his shirt opened to his navel, cooed to the crowd--perhaps a little more stiffly than the real thing but in a voice that sounded remarkably close to the original’s--before yielding the stage to other wanna-bes.
Craig Parks stood on his toes and gyrated across the stage like Michael Jackson. In other acts, the crowd was transfixed when Sammy Davis Jr., played by Robert Joseph, sang “Mr. Bojangles,” and there was giggling when Wanda Jae’s Dolly Parton seductively mingled with the audience.
“I didn’t see a bad act out there,” said Herb Fleming of San Bernardino, who visits Las Vegas half a dozen times a year and plays cards at the Normandie even more often.
“Because of the decor and the music here, you feel like you’re in Vegas. The only difference is the size.”
Jae, the cast manager who plays Dolly Parton and Ann-Margret, said she has been thrilled with the crowd reaction.
But entertainment is still on trial at local clubs, officials say, and the verdict is out as to how effective the shows will be in drawing more people.
“The people who come to see the shows are generally a different group of people from those who come to gamble,” Nicholson said as he showed off the Normandie’s $3-million renovation.
“There is a percentage of those who come to see the shows that stays to play. That is the percentage that makes this all possible.”