Sinsational Celebrity Tales

Recommended: Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist Norm Clarke’s new book, Vegas Confidential: Sinsational Celebrity Tales which is jam-packed with gossipy stories of (mostly) bad star behavior while cavorting in Sin City. Norm’s been on the Vegas entertainment beat since 1999. That he’s managed to keep a sense of humor about some of the insufferable stars he’s covered (including Jerry Lewis and Robin Williams) is remarkable.

Mark Wolf of the Rocky Mountain News and his readers interviewed Norm this morning “live”. Here’s a transcript  link with some interesting tidbits of “dish” for lovers of all things “sinsational”.

Which celebrities get the perks in Las Vegas? And which ones demand them? Who are the cheapest celebs and the most generous? Who are the best and worst tippers? And who is likely to have a public meltdown whenever they venture out?

Norm Clarke, a former columnist at the Rocky, reports on the Vegas celebrity culture for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. When celebs behave badly, Norm gets the scoop.

Norm chatted online Monday and shared the Barack Obama/Las Vegas connection. Read the transcript here.

He will discuss and sign copies of Sinsational Celebrity Tales at 7:30 p.m. at Tattered Cover LoDo, 1628 16th Street at Wynkoop.

From Norm’s Column December 31, 2008

Aussie Robbie Maddison Photo by Tom Donoghue

Don’t ask Robbie Maddison, Australia’s Evel Knievel, to compare himself to Robbie Knievel or their dueling New Year’s Eve jumps tonight.

They are oceans apart, said Maddison, in so many words.

“There is no comparison,” a fuming Maddison said Tuesday.

“He is a disrespectful drunken bum, a no talent who is making a joke of a jump,” he said.

Their feud isn’t being manufactured for TV ratings: Maddison is on ESPN and Knievel is on a Fox special.

Maddison, who grew up idolizing Knievel’s father, told him so at the iconic daredevil’s funeral a year ago in Butte, Montana.

“We sat down and drank into the night, talked, and he told me how much he respected me,” said Maddison.

The wheels came off their friendship when Maddison learned Robbie Knievel “tried to sabotage me.” The bad blood involves a confidential conversation Maddison said he had with Robbie Knievel’s stunt coordinator about bringing him on board for Maddison’s New Year’s Eve jump.

“After he (Knievel) found out, he went about planning to kill my thunder,” said Maddison, who will attempt to race his bike 100 feet straight up a ramp and land on top of a replica of the Arc de Triomphe at Paris Las Vegas and freefall into a safety net.

Down at The Mirage, Knievel will soar 200 feet over the refurbished volcano.

“There are thousands of guys in the world who could make that jump,” Maddison said. “There’s … only one guy who could do this jump.”

“New Year, No Limits” airs on ESPN beginning at 8 p.m.

Fox’s “New Year’s Eve Special” begins at 11 p.m.

From USA Today December 19, 2008:

For nearly a decade, Norm Clarke has tracked VIP high jinks for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. His new Norm Clarke’s Vegas Confidential: Sinsational Celebrity Tales (Stephens Press, $15.95) chronicles star turns that happened in Vegas, but didn’t stay there. He shares some with USA TODAY’s Kitty Bean Yancey.

Show-pals: Donny Osmond matches eyepatches with Norm Clarke. Clarke has worn one since a childhood injury. By Duane Prokop, Las Vegas Review-Journal

Q: Your book talks about Jennifer Aniston getting onstage at the Forty Deuce club to dance for Vince Vaughn, Britney Spears having to be helped out of Pure nightclub a couple of New Year’s Eves ago, the late Anna Nicole Smith coming on to Chippendales dancers. Celebs can play in L.A., too, so why do they go wild here?

A: It’s one-stop shopping. You can go from gambling to fine dining to clubs, even in one (casino resort). Celebs come to Vegas and have three shots of Cuervo and think they’re invisible.

Read entire article . . .

From Norm’s Vegas Confidential column November 24, 2008:

Michael Phelps’ passion for poker isn’t the only reason he’s been showing up in Las Vegas.

The 14-time Olympic swimming gold medalist has been seen in the company of a fetching brunette who works at the Palms.

He was spotted at Moon nightclub on Saturday and having lunch earlier at Canyon Gate Country Club.

He’s definitely getting into the swim of things in the dating pool. Last month he was spotted arriving at a Baltimore airport in the company of Nicole Johnson, runner-up in the 2007 Miss California USA pageant.

Since winning a record eight gold medals in the Beijing Summer Olympics, Phelps has spent a considerable amount of time in Las Vegas, taking poker lessons from pros, so he can enter the World Series of Poker next year.

Norm Clarke is the “Las Vegas guru of gossip” states Los Angeles Times writer Richard Abowitz in a Sunday Calendar piece. “His column doesn’t just trade in stupid gossip,” states fellow Vegas chronicler Robin Leach in the article. “Norm understands that in Vegas, buildings are the stars, architects are the stars, chefs are the stars, and the whole city is the star. And as a result, he is the No. 1 read person in Vegas.”

In an interview with Abowitz, Norm talks of the “gilded age” of Las Vegas in the past decade, where celebrity excesses and ridiculous spending have been tempered by economic reality. He said being a celebrity gossip columnist in Las Vegas was a daily embarrassment of riches. “The news for the past decade has been the exploding city and celebrity aura that has all made for this city’s success. Now the story is how that is going to be affected”.

Read the article here: Los Angeles Times

Sunday also saw Norm’s former Denver home announcing Sinsational Celebrity Tales. Columnist Bill Husted headlined Norm as the the “guy with all the luck”. Husted wrote “Even when things go wrong for Norm Clarke, they go right. The former Denver sportswriter and columnist lost his right eye as a child. Now his eye patch is his trademark.” He goes on to tell of a years-ago Colorado lottery ticket he wasn’t trying to buy . . . that won.

Read the article here: The Denver Post

From Norm’s Vegas Confidential column November 23, 2008:

One of the new restaurants at Steve Wynn’s Encore hotel will pay homage to Frank Sinatra and another will feature walls that lift up and down, transforming the room throughout the evening.

In a recent interview, Wynn revealed the Sinatra family has loaned him their father’s lone Academy Award, for best actor in a supporting role in 1953’s From Here to Eternity, and his Grammy awards.

The priceless memorabilia will be prominently featured in the Italian restaurant which will be named Sinatra. The family has so fiercely guarded the name that Wynn, a family friend, is the only person who was granted permission to use it. Among Wynn’s biggest coups was wooing Sinatra to the revitalized Golden Nugget as an exclusive headliner in the 1980s.

Wynn added that Paul Anka has promised the gold record he won for writing the English lyrics for My Way.  Anka wrote the hit song soon after Sinatra told him he was leaving show business.

“It won’t be a museum. It will be the most stunning restaurant in the country,” promised Wynn.

When Wynn recently unveiled his restaurant lineup for Encore, his $2.2 billion all-suites sister hotel to Wynn Las Vegas, the restaurant name was listed as Theo’s, after Theo Schoenegger, executive chef of Patina, a Los Angeles legend founded by Joachim Splichal.

Things change fast in Wynn’s world.

Switch, the other restaurant Wynn brought up in the interview, is so named because of the transformation diners will experience, from the changing walls and ceiling to the staff switching clothes.

Wynn’s national ad campaign, which has him standing atop Encore, is being launched today.