Comedy is king. The 2nd Comedy Festival at Caesars Palace, co-sponsored by America Online, was so successful that its been renewed for at least another 3 years! Bigger and better than last year's debut, The Comedy Festival was capped with a multi-million dollar fund-raising effort marking the 20th anniversary of Comic Relief. Harrah's, which owns the host Caesars hotel, kicked off the live, near 4-hour telethon, held at its fully-packed 4,100 seat Colloseum theater. The show featured dozens of the world's top stars, with a $250,000 donation to benefit the residents of flood-ravaged New Orleans and surrounding Gulf Coast areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
Photo Highlights:
Comic Relief Red Carpet
Tribute to Don Rickles
Celebrity Poker Tournament
Soda Showers with EepyBird
Highlights from the Luxe Life notebook:
* Kid Rock was the special musical guest for the 'Salute to our Troops and the USO' hosted by curvy Carmen Electra and comic Jay Mohr. Comedians D.L Hughley, Frank Caliendo and Louis C.K also took part in the TV taping, which aired as a 1-hour TBS special last night. Kid Rock, newly-married to Pamela Anderson, won a standing ovation from the troops when he revealed he'd flown secretly into Baghdad and performed an impromptu concert using instruments from the military band there. The show honored the late Bob Hope for his 65 years service to the USO entertaining overseas members of the military. The sweet moment was during a taping break of the Troop's Tribute Carmen got off stage and went into the audience to dance and kiss many of the 500 military personnel that had been flown in for the show. Jay also posed for photos kissing the female troops. The Vegas show will also broadcast overseas on the Armed Forces Network for the next few months!
* Vegas turned into a romantic reconciliation for Chris Rock who won the Comedian Award. He was with wife Malaak despite confirmed reports that he'd filed for divorce from her 2-weeks earlier. They are working on reconciliation and the legal paperwork has been terminated- at least for now. Hopefully our wedding capital of the world and honeymoon hangout reputation will heal their differences as he celebrates the Award honor. The big news from Chris is that he says he'll be playing the main Colloseum theater at Caesars next year for several dates. The first Comedian award was given last year to his pal, Jerry Seinfeld. David Spade and Mario Joyner took part in the ceremony.
* Roseanne Barr told me her new boyfriend bought her the diamond-studded bling-bling sunglasses she wore to the charity poker tournament. "Not only don't I have to wear makeup because they cover everything but the other poker players won't see my expressions" she laughed. Roseanne, en route to her Hawaii home for Thanksgiving (coincidentally I'm there too so she gave me some dining tips for the Big island) said she'll headline next year at the Luxor but would love to live and work in Vegas as a resident headliner and already has lots of family living in our Valley. On the live-Comic Relief feed from New Orleans former husband Tom Arnold mistakenly referred to her as Rosie O'Donnell when asking they patch up their differences and get to talk again one day!! Not likely with that slip of the tongue!
* Comedienne Rita Rudner was the only fulltime Vegas headline comedy star to be selected to play the Festival...(although Excalibur's Louie Anderson did do a live-remote segment from New Orleans with celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse). When Rita had to leave for her Flamingo show her manager husband Martin Bergman took over her poker cards and won the Childrens Hospital charity poker tournament staged on the PURE nightclub dance floor. He decided to keep his winning prize of a walk-on-role on 'Entourage' but cast member Adrian Grenier who took 2nd prize of an extraordinary custom Harley motorbike donated it back to the Childrens Hospital to raise even more funds! The entire cast of 'Entourage,' including Jeremy Piven, Kevin Dillon and Jerry Ferrara, played host for the poker-party with their executive producer Mark Wahlberg. Kevin Connolly, who recently broke up with Nicky Hilton after a 2-year romance winked at me and said " You realize this is the first weekend I've been in Vegas as a single guy!!" Also playing in hopes of a Top Pair were Robin Williams, Billy Crystal, and Vegas resident and Sopranos star Steve Schrippa, who told us that he's still alive after completing the 6th show of the Soprano's final season. "We have only 3 more shows to shoot and that's it for ever. I only know there's going to be a few funerals but the endings are all so secret I can only hope I don't get whacked." He starts a new late-night Fox -TV talk show going against Leno and Letterman next year from New York but will continue in his role as entertainment consultant here at the Riviera recommending comedy talent. Robin was the first player to be eliminated but bought back in saying "I'm having too much fun. I don't want to leave." I asked if he was feeling fine after his recent rehab-stint and joked: "I'm well but can you imagine my first weekend out of rehab and I'm in Vegas with its highballs and hookers!" Billy was just one card short on his final bet to get on the final 9-table. World poker champion Daniel Negreanu walked the tab les helping the celebrities spruce up their winning strategies, to little avail I might add!
*Jamie Kennedy (pictured above) with a stunning Playboy Playmate draped around him played host at the official wrap party held at the PURE nightclub with everybody from Bob Saget, Dane Cook, Kathy Griffin, Bill Maher, Nick Cannon and funny-girl Suzie Essman attending. Guest DJ Samantha Ronson pumped out the latest hits. After actress Haylie Duff and her gal-pal posse had dinner at TI's Social House they took the cabana-bed next to Jamie and then made way for actor comedian Katt Williams who brought in music superstar Prince at 3AM. Prince sent out for an alcohol-free pina-colada topped with whipped cream and wound up staying until dawn broke and the clubs' lights were turned on at dawn to send the remaining revelers home!
* Rosie O'Donnell is such an ardent Barbra Streisand fan that she got the telethon producers to shuffle her on early so she could leave to see the Streisand concert at nearby MGM Grand. She even wore an "I Love Streisand" t-shirt under her jacket! She told me she's making a full-length documentary "Stalking Streisand" movie approved by Barbra and complete with an exclusive interview with the superstar singer. Said Rosie: "We've filmed in 7 cities during this current tour. I do the interviews and we've got some really touching stories from her fans. I truly believe she's the best entertainer of all time: in your internet terms: way beyond dialup and broadband and satellite. She's right up there at the very top. I'm such a fan I had to warn her when she came to my house in Miami that I had posters of her up on the entryway wall!" Rosie told me that originally she'd planned on celebrating Thanksgiving here in Vegas with Liza Minnelli who will be performing at the Luxor on Thursday but now she's got 28 of her live-in galpal Kelly's family coming in from New Orleans for turkey and trimmings in their Miami home.
* Star quotes: Bill told me he'd love to appear more in Vegas as a headliner; Desperate Housewives co-star Richard Chavira told me he'd won $500 playing one single turn of blackjack cards, his castmate James Denton said he wont be back for Year 2 hosting the Miss America beauty pageant in January at the Aladdin and Ray Romano says he loves Vegas with his regular Mirage appearances and golf-games here every 6-weeks he wants to get "wakeup calls changed to 'go to bed' calls"!
* My two top favorite funny sidesplitting zingers from the Comedy Festival came from Robin Williams and George Lopez. Cracked Robin: "We're here to raise more money than Kevin Federline thinks he'll get from Britney" And George asked, "If the Federal Government actually gets the Mexican border wall built who do you think they'll hire to do it? And if the river in-between is stocked with crocodiles it'll only be 5-minutes before there's a sale on wallets and handbags!" The surprise attraction at the Festival was the live performance of the Mentos & Diet Coke viral-video guys who proved that the combustible mix could shoot just as high as the Caesars fountain jets!
* Comic Relief has produced more than 80-fundraising shows over its 20-year history including the first 8 major HBO telethons, which raised more than $50-million to help the homeless.
* Congratulations to insult-tongued Don Rickles with his induction as the first honored comic on the new Caesars Walk of Fame and his "laurel wreath" plaque is now there on the front-gardens side of the Strip. Hard to believe Don is almost at the 50-year mark of his show business career. I'm sorry that due to a very late message I couldn't accept Triumph the Insult Dog's invitation to be a walk-on guest during his Poopapalooza 2 show. He wasn't the only puppet being perilously perplexing because Jim Henson's Improv troupe raised eyebrows for some very non-Sesame Street behavior for a new TV special.
* PURE nightclub turned into a nightly hangout lounge for all the comics attending the Festival. AOL hosted one party with a slew of stars attending including Whoopi Goldberg racing in before doing her radio show live from the adjoining Caesars Poker Room and curvy Carmen Electra. Katt Williams showed with his entourage which included hiphop star E-40. Dane Cook arrived at midnight. Also in the crowd: CNN's Anderson Cooper and comics Dave Attell, Bill Maher, Jay Mohr, and Sarah Silverman.
* The Comedy Festival came to a glorious ending with the million$ raised for Comic Relief and the superstars prepared to depart for Thanksgiving holidays, but all promising to be back again next year. My friend, John Meglen, president of Concerts West and AEG Live who staged the Festival summed up: "It was the best in every sense of comedy; truly the big comedy event of the year and the stars, the industry and the fans all enjoyed a true Festival."
Luxe Life returns later today with our regular journal highlighting the weekend antics of Paris, Britney and Jay-Z, plus monster money machine called Streisand and the stars who helped raise $5-millionm for Nevada Cancer Institute. We've also got the wild whispers about a long-ago provocative hedonistic heaven that may be reborn at the same time as schemers plot to finally open the Strip's first topless club!
