The Other Venice, Paris,
New York, et al


Las Vegas: Almost sort of close but
still looking for the cigar

Las Vegas makes a lot of noise.

Pirates cuss and launch cannonballs, volcanoes erupt and waters dance to Frank Sinatra.

Where else can you waltz from a pirates' cove, to a street in Montmartre, to a Doge's palace, lose your virginity plus a year's income, become engaged and married and watch white tigers jump through fiery hoops.in one night.

Las Vegas is the penultimate step before virtual reality tourism.a world where you can go anywhere without stuffy airplanes, stale pretzels or mosquitoes. It is dozens of theme parks within one big theme park.electric, embracing high tech in a hurry. Spinning cherries, bells and the comforting crunch of gears are being replaced by sleight of hand animations and digital beeps and whoops. In fact, a friend of mine, who runs a think tank at Stanford claims that Las Vegas tourism is a powerful force driving technology.

Unfortunately, however, like virtual reality on computers, virtual Vegas is close.but no cigar.or, at best, a rather stubby, chubby Cagney sort of stogie.

Don't get me wrong, I have grown to like Las Vegas. I visit at least twice a year and I am always astounded by the changes. I had the best steak of my life at Gallagers in New York New York, Piero's Restaurant has the best Oso Bucco in the world (one night I was there and saw an elderly Jerry Lewis holding court) and I had a fillet of Escolar with a black bean and garlic sauce there last week that was out of this world, Mikado at the Mirage has great sushi, the pirate's battle at Treasure Island is a hoot, especially for kids, and "O", Cirque du Soliel's spectacle is a wild collage of symbolism ranging from Magritte to World Wrestling Federation.

But these new virtual tourist theme parks that have been cropping up: Paris, the Venetian and New York, New York don't quite make it as virtual experiences.

The only one that comes close is The Venetian, which does manage to emulate a Venice designed by Martha Stewart only classier and less fussy.

From the outside, New York's Skyline and the Eiffel Tower are quite spectacular but the fake streets inside look as cheesy as the sets of 1950s children's television shows. I looked at the menus in the restaurants in Paris and found basically steakhouse food translated to French. One would expect that they at least had slot machines that sounded like the police cars in Dirk Bogarde movies. My wife and I dined at a restaurant called Mon Ami Gabi and had to return both of our steaks because they tasted like liver. Our waiter, a charming man who looked like a young Truman Capote, confessed that it was probably polluted by another dish that had been thrown on the grill before it. The second time around the steaks were OK.

What I suspect is that most of these are one-joke attractions. In fact we hear that one or two of them are not doing too well, financially. The problem with them is that they are not really Vegas. Bugsy Segal's dreamtown seems to be on a crusade to take the Vegas out of Las Vegas.to change its image as the home of the 2.98 all you can eat buffet, the neon cowboy and Wayne Newton to one of a refined, cultural and culinary oasis with an international flavor. "Ne pas posible," Miss Piggy would say. As much as I like the improved quality of dining and lodging in Las Vegas, I don't think many of these new attractions are what you would call "sustainable." They are curiosities.but I doubt people will return time and time again.

Las Vegas will, somewhere along the line have to remake itself again. But, in this land of Milk and Money, all is possible. When they blew up the Dunes to make room for the Bellagio, they timed the explosives to go off with the firing of a pirate ship's cannon at Treasure Island. We suspect that these new attractions don't work.things will go boom again.