His Observation Deck

John Ridley nurses no illusions. He’d be the first to tell you that it’s been quite some time since Vegas has been the Neverland of pocket squares and peau-de-soie; since Rat Pack high style and high jinks gave way to ... well ... Peter Frampton, and Vicki Lawrence as “Mama,” headlining in the Strip’s plush main rooms.

No matter. As a writer, he knows all one needs is inspiration. And as a gambler, he knows you have to telegraph your intentions to orchestrate just the right atmosphere. “Putting your money on the table,” Ridley lays out the rules, “is demonstrating your action.”

Fresh off the plane from L.A., standing at the taxi stand at Mandalay Bay and thumbing through a thick fold of bills, Ridley is ready for another weekend of conversation, cocktails, casino hopping and come what may. Friday night in Vegas lies ahead like an open stretch of desert road

He’s been on a roll of late. There’s a new film in the theaters: “Undercover Brother,” for which he’s got another screenwriter credit; a new book on the shelves with his name on the jacket: “A Conversation With the Mann” (Warner Books, 2002); and many more manuscripts and pitches on the front burner. So he’s come to Vegas to check his baggage, literally and figuratively.

More weekends than not, Ridley, 35, decides to trade the artifice of Los Angeles for the artifice of Las Vegas--the hyper-unreal for the hyper-surreal. Often in a heartbeat.

The author of four novels, he has found a hazy spot squeezed between old Vegas and new Vegas, high Vegas and potboiler Vegas, and made it his own--both in life and on the page. While some of his previous novels sniffed around Vegas’ seamier back streets, his new book is set center stage in the golden age of clubs and carousing.

For 10 years, Ridley’s been returning, accumulating some of the details that wound up in his “Conversation.” Work doesn’t interfere with his visits. Marriage hasn’t curtailed them. “I stay up here, she [his wife, Gayle,] stays downtown. We have different tastes.”

Tonight he spins through a few possible scenarios: “I figure dinner. A little gambling, maybe a live act. Or not ... ,” he says, eyes trained beyond the taxi’s smoked glass and taking in Vegas’ oddly amalgamated skyline--the Sphinx, the Chrysler Building, the Eiffel Tower. “There are times when I come here every weekend. I couldn’t imagine living so close and not.”

For Ridley, Vegas isn’t as much a destination as a musical key, a mood. And though that glittering necklace of grand-style casinos is but a mirage, Ridley’s tack is to find the reality below the rippling air. Instead of a tipsy romp, the night life in his new novel is set against the contours of the civil rights movement, and he’s chosen a struggling black comic, Jackie Mann, to be the eyes and ears of this tale.

There is a moment early in “A Conversation With the Mann” that is as poignant as it is prescient. Mann, high on the laughs and applause at the Sands’ Copa Room, decides to venture onto the strictly segregated casino floor:

“More than anything in the world I wanted to gamble,” says Jackie. “Not for the jazz of laying the bet, or the sake of wagering money. What I wanted was to stand at a table with all those people--suited men, ladies in their best dresses--living high and living fast and living Cocktail Society. I wanted to see them do a Red Sea-part as I made my way to the roulette wheel and listened to all their star-struck bits: ‘Great job tonight, Jackie!’ ‘Heck of a show, Jackie!’ ... I wanted them to fawn and gush and throw me their love same as they threw it at me when I was performing, when I was standing three feet above.... Then I did it. No back-and-forth debate with myself, no working my way to a decision. I just did it. I just pushed open the doors and walked out of the Copa Room and into the casino.”

Ridley’s riffing on that very style: As he strides into the casinos of the new Vegas, his Vegas, he still wants to test the limits. That’s the whole point, he figures. To push it. Shake it up. He’s learned that the many worlds he navigates are simply a collection of high-stakes games that are as much about luck as timing--skill, he believes, is irrelevant. And, like Mann, maybe, for him the gamble is about more than the money. It’s the heads turning, and those “star-struck bits.” It’s the idea of being “three feet above” it all--if only for a moment.

He can make the waters part in Vegas. A nice suit, a big bet and $200 tips all around ensure a trailing spotlight, gratitude, even respect--Vegas style. Here, he’s a winner, even when he loses. All this runs counter to Hollywood and its inherent gamble, going to the table and coming back on the downside.

He scored big in 1999 with “Three Kings,” but was infuriated when George Clooney was cast in the lead, even though the character was written as an African American male. (Though he wrote the original screenplay, he protested changes and wound up with a “story by” credit.)

“I don’t have a problem with George Clooney,” Ridley says, “But I do have a problem when there are too few roles for black guys and here’s one.... They didn’t even look” for a black star for the lead.

And though “Undercover Brother” (based on his popular UrbanEntertainment.com Internet series) has been a surprise summer hit, he finds himself wishing that it were Jackie Mann--not the prodigiously afro’d Undercover Brother who was propelling him through the interview circuit.

“I felt that we could have pushed it more. It was supposed to be an in-your-face social satire.... They just saw it as Austin Powers.” His face goes from detached to joyless. “I didn’t go to the premiere.... I can’t just smile and pretend that it was all great.”

Dancing Fountains

He lightens somewhat as the taxi closes in on the Bellagio. Through the revolving door, across the rose-lit casino, we arrive at Shintaro, the hotel’s tony Japanese restaurant. Passing a bank of tanks filled with fluorescent jellyfish, we wind through a low-slung dining room and toward a table with a sweeping view of the Strip in stunning mid-transformation to after-5 glitter. “In a few minutes,” he says glancing at his watch, “we’ll get to see the dancing fountains.”

Ridley knows this city’s history and ritual, chapter and verse. He recites it as some do a favorite poem. How and when the Strip began to change. Who the high-rollers are. How to spot them. “It was [casino developer] Steve Wynn--that whole trend of building a hotel and putting big things in front of it,” he says. Every hotel has its gimmick.

On cue, the waters shoot up, moving in sync like the June Taylor dancers, to Elton John’s “Your Song.” Ridley watches. Not a smirk. Not a smile. He appreciates the show, not the “irony” of it.

Over tataki-style Kobe beef and a glass of pinot noir, Ridley begins to thaw and riff. He’s vibing on the hum. The room is a waltz of types: high-rollers, swingers, tough guys, summer-break frat boys. “See that guy over there?” he says, nodding toward a cozy banquette, “He’s got two women.... No one blinks. Here you’ve got so many people from all over. What I really like about Vegas is that almost everything is acceptable. I like to watch what people do with their freedom.”

Vegas has changed remarkably in the decade he’s been visiting. Who wouldn’t have wanted to be along for the ride “when you put on your jacket and have a steak and do some gambling?” he asks. “But what you see now are people in wife-beaters and flip-flops.” The distinctive high style has faded like an old snapshot. “Something like 60% of revenues come from the slots. That’s the old ladies, the tourists, not the million-dollar credit lines.”

Ridley’s introduction to Vegas was a day trip with an old high school friend. He was put off at first. “The more I came, the more I talked to people, it got to be interesting. I just love to listen to people. How people talk. What they talk about. It’s a big adult playground.”

For all its cacophony, it is Ridley’s best antidote for Hollywood and its contradictions. “At home, all I do is work. Go to meetings. Listen to notes. Here,” he doesn’t hedge, “I come to drink and to gamble.” To watch the waters to part.

Crossing the casino, Ridley pulls a silver cell phone from his pocket. He speaks briefly to his wife, who is in for the evening at the California Hotel downtown. They sketch a plan for the next day. Phone clamped shut, he’s pulled toward the high-limit games. He makes a turn around a nook dotted with baccarat tables, taking the pulse of things, and settles at a table away from others.

There sits a distinguished-looking dealer named Duke, adorned with a fancy gold ring and a fanciful brogue. Ridley hands over a stack of hundreds. The dealer counts four rows of five bills. A stack of chips slides his way. He makes his wager, orders a Stoli Vanilla and OJ. (“It’s like a 50-50 Bar”-- Creamsicle tasting--he explains) as Duke begins to deal from the shoe.

Each hand is more take than give. His stack dwindles. But he’s having fun, rapid-fire wisecracking--Preston Sturges-style--with the dealers who have migrated from surrounding tables and now cluster around him. He milks the moment, has a quick retort for everyone. “There’s a reason I come to gamble: so people nearby can say, ‘Well, at least I didn’t do as bad as that guy!’ ”

Duke takes pity and bellows out a consolation prize, a rap made elegant with his brogue.

“Ah,” says Ridley. “Sort of like that Steely Dan song: I want a song when I lose!”

Pockets lighter, but spirits soaring, Ridley decides to forgo the crowded taxi stand and instead hails a sleek Town Car. The driver snakes through a collection of dim alleys, dropping us at the front door of the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino. “An entirely different scene,” Ridley has promised. He’s delivered.

‘Crazy All Weekend’

At the stroke of midnight, its glowing blue, gold and green casino floor swells with silhouettes. Ragged guitars and bass shake the floorboards. Two days after the Who’s bassist John Entwistle died in a room upstairs, the place is far from spooked. “No one canceled,” remarks one dealer. “It’s been crazy all weekend.”

In one corner, soccer star Cobi Jones nurses a drink. On the other side of the space, hard-core rapper DMX hovers over a blackjack table. One of the dealers buttonholes Ridley: “Hey, man, I saw the movie, really liked it.” Though Ridley smiles warmly and offers sincere thanks, his body language suggests something closer to unease.

Ridley finds a game of baccarat. A man in the corner has amassed a stack of chips that resembles a skyline. Ridley joins in, drawing from his house credit. Ordering another drink, he quickly takes another drubbing. His thoughts wander: “I wonder if we can get into Entwistle’s room.” His eyes cut through the dimness looking for his friend the manager. “Can we see a room?”

A beat. “Oh, that room. Nah! It’s got tape all around it!”

“I want to get in there.”

“Man, you can’t get in there. I can’t get in there.”

“Oh, I’ll get in there,” he promises. “Eventually.”

He’s down $1,600, irritated by the crush and the noise, and money has moved from abstraction to all too real. He folds, cashes in.

Outside, the taxi line stretches--Ridley’s face registers something close to annoyance. But before he inquires, a car sweeps up, offering another driver with an open smile and a well-planned escape route: “Where do you want to go?”

Recalling Old Times

Ridley knows that just 40 years ago, he wouldn’t have been allowed to sit across a cocktail table in any lounge along the Strip talking to a reporter. Not about his movies. Not about television shows. Not about his books. Not about anything.

That’s why in many ways, he has been aching to tell Jackie Mann’s story for more than a decade. “It started as a screenplay,” he recalls of “A Conversation With the Mann,” working on a daiquiri in one of the overstuffed chairs in Mandalay Bay’s Orchid Lounge. “The bones of the story didn’t change,” he says. “When people think about Vegas in those years, they think about Sinatra, Sammy and Dean Martin. I wanted people to think about the civil rights movement” that was gathering force in the wings. “I started talking to people. Reading books.” Drinking up the era.

In the end, Jackie’s persona is a pop-culture synthesis of mid-20th century America--the comedian Jack Carter’s loquacious circuit stories, the jazz-hipster patter of Chet Baker and, of course, the biography of Sammy Davis Jr., who challenged the entertainment world’s color bar. “I love to write fact-tion--Elroy does it. Doctorow. Why not do it with a black comedian?”

Ridley admits he sees Jackie’s desire to corral success--and his understanding of what one might wager for it--as similar to his own high-stakes give-and-take with the industry. He, too, started out as a stand-up during comedy’s boom years in the ‘80s. He saw the kind of juice that notoriety would bestow. “Jackie wants the world to love him ... and I wanted to be famous, just like Jackie.”

He’s a veteran of the ups and downs that come with a long run. He’s written for sitcoms--”Martin,” “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.” He was a producer on NBC’s “Third Watch.” And Oliver Stone made “Stray Dogs,” his first novel, into “U-Turn.” But now he has a more tentative relationship with Hollywood’s promises and preoccupations. “I used to love movies. But now you’ve got 15 people telling you what they want--’It should be pink.’ ‘No, it should be blue.’ It’s like loving a magic trick until you find out how it works.”

A Place for Gamblers

The corridor of white blinking lights trimming Fremont Street looks like spilled champagne. “Here,” says Ridley, walking the length of California Hotel, “the ceilings are lower, the light is dimmer.” The room is set up less for mood than for function, the bulk of the gamblers packed in, transfixed by slots or the bright blue of video-poker screens.

Though this cluster of older casinos holds onto the raw animus of Vegas, there have been major renovations. A metal canopy covers a cluster of fast-food restaurants and crowded tchotchke shops. Ridley, not surprisingly, isn’t thrilled with the alterations. But what he does love swirls around him, and trumps it all.

As Ridley enters the Plaza, his eyes trail a man in an electric-blue sequined zoot suit and white fedora as he cuts through the busy tables. Gamblers smoke cigarettes down to the filter. One sign advertises wet T-shirt contests; another, gambling lessons. “Oh, they want you to learn,” he explains.

He considers poker or pai gow but somehow finds himself wandering back to the baccarat table. When the waitress comes by, he orders a Stoli Vanilla and O.J., but here, while there is O.J., there is no vanilla Stoli. So Ridley settles for straight vodka and juice and leans in. The Sunspots, a sextet with boot-black hair, play the nook in the room dubbed the “Main Lounge” and the lead singer, an Asian man, in a startling Louis Armstrong imitation, launches into a reassuring rendition of “What a Wonderful World.”

Ridley is finally winning.

As we step out of the Plaza, Sammy’s big voice bounces off the buildings. The champagne lights have dimmed, and the bottom of the Fremont Street canopy is alight with an animated image of a man in a bowler hat dancing to Sammy’s famous turn on Mr. Bojangles. Segueing into the light-show soundtrack of course, is the chairman of the board. Frank Sinatra serenades the dusty and sweaty, the tank-topped and the flip-flopped, with the classic “Luck Be a Lady.” Ridley stares up, transfixed, Frank’s face spinning like a lucky penny above.

“I wasn’t there for Paris in the ‘20s or New York in the ‘50s. But I have Vegas,” he says. “So much of it is almost gone. It’s a scene that I want to be a part of. I mean it’s cool to understand something. When I need to believe, when I need to be around people, to see how they look and act. How they talk. That has not changed. I sort of like being a Vegas guy.”