Names and faces

Pop star Britney Spears has begun her early retirement in Las Vegas with a show that looks strikingly like the eye-popping Cirque du Soleil productions found elsewhere on the Strip. The debut of Spears’ long-term casino gig Friday night kept an audience of about 4,500 on their feet for about 90 minutes. The young-for-Vegas crowd was there for the danceable hits and the spectacle, which included acrobatics, a ring of fire, confetti, a live band, frenetic costume changes and a frequently airborne Spears. The show’s high-concept set pieces featured a cadre of backup dancers who danced in human-sized hamster wheels and somersaulted over the Grammy-winning star. Spears, 32, has signed on to perform 50 shows each in 2014 and 2015 at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino. She cuts a different figure from typical Las Vegas Strip headliners, who have generally attracted older audiences. Still, Spears’ show, Piece of Me, is not immune to nostalgia, one of the prime currencies in Las Vegas entertainment. It includes several callbacks to the 1990s and early 2000s and clips of Spears’ early performances playing on huge monitors. Notably absent from those monitors, to the displeasure of some fans in the cheap seats, were any live close-ups of what was unfolding onstage. Speculation abounded ahead of the show that Spears would not be singing live, a claim that officials with Planet Hollywood parent company Caesars Entertainment Corp. denied. Entertainment Programming Vice President Kurt Melien said Spears sings against a recorded track of her vocals to help her through the more physically grueling parts of the set, and add the electronic undertones that characterize many of her songs.

The long-planned stage musical based on the life of Harry Houdini has lost its leading man, with Hugh Jackman withdrawing from the role. The Australian actor, who stars as Wolverine in the X-Men movies but who also has performed on stage in Oklahoma! and The Boy From Oz, cited scheduling difficulties, saying he wasn’t able to commit to the time that the part required. Writer Aaron Sorkin had been working on the musical, which is still expected to feature music by Stephen Schwartz. But the Oscar-winning screenwriter and playwright also departed the project and has been replaced with playwright David Ives, whose most recent success was Venus in Fur. No opening date has been announced for the musical.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 12/29/2013

Upcoming Events