Sheldon Adelson The Venetian Resort Hotel Casino Media Man Australia

Sheldon Adelson

The Venetian

The Venetian Resort Hotel Casino is the largest AAA Five-Diamond rated Resort in the Americas. This Venice-themed luxury hotel and casino is located on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, on the site of the old Sands Hotel. The Venetian is owned and operated by the Las Vegas Sands Corporation.

The Venetian has 4,049 suites and a 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2) casino. It is located on the east side of the Strip, between Harrah's and the The Palazzo.
Combined with the adjacent Sands Expo Convention Center and The Palazzo Hotel and Casino Resort, The Venetian is a part of the largest hotel and resort complex in the world --- featuring 8,108 hotel rooms and suites, outnumbering the MGM Grand.

History

On November 26, 1996, 8 years after it was bought by Sheldon Adelson, the Sands Hotel was imploded to make way for The Venetian Resort Hotel Casino. Ground was broken April 14, 1997.

The resort opened on May 3, 1999 with flutter of white doves, sounding trumpets and singing gondoliers, with actress Sophia Loren joining The Venetian Chairman and Owner, Sheldon G. Adelson, in christening the first motorized gondola. Built at a cost of $1.5 billion, it was one of the most expensive resorts of its kind when it opened. A brief time line of the hotel's history:
September 24, 1997 — Announcement that the Venetian's Grand Canal Shoppes will be managed by Forest City Commercial Management.
November 14, 1997 — $1,000,000,000 financial package secured.
August 18, 1998 — Venetian Resort tops out.
August 24, 1998 — Venetian begins accepting room reservations, by phone and on-line.
May 3, 1999 — Grand opening of first phase of complex.
October 7, 2001 — The Guggenheim Hermitage Museum opened within the resort, featuring its first collection: Masterpieces and Master Collectors: Impressionist and Early Modern Paintings.
August 30, 2002 — The museum opened its second collection: Art Through the Ages: Masterpieces of Painting from Titian to Picasso.
May 15, 2003 — Museum opens third exhibit: American Pop Icons.
June 27, 2003 — The Venezia at the Venetian opened as an additional tower, adding 1,013 suites and a new wedding chapel.
November 7, 2003 — Museum opens exhibit: A Century of Painting: From Renoir to Rothko, featuring paintings by Gauguin, Matisse, Picasso, van Gogh, Renoir, and others.
March 19, 2004 — "The Nevada Gaming Commission Thursday reluctantly imposed an agreed-upon $1 million fine on The Venetian for rigging contests and violating state gaming regulations but only after chastising other state agencies for not pursuing the case more vigorously. Chairman Peter Bernhard and Commissioner Art Marshall, who called the violations the "most serious" they have dealt with during their tenures on the commission, criticized the state attorney general's office and the Gaming Control Board for taking a year to bring the eight-count complaint before the commission. ... "This is the most serious complaint I've seen since I've been on the commission. The issues go to the heart of the integrity of the industry," Bernhard said. ... The Asian high roller at the center of the case, who was also the big loser in the casino over the Chinese New Year weekend in 2002, was preselected to win a Mercedes-Benz. The complaint said a Venetian executive who rigged the drawing with a cohort hid the winning ticket in his shirtsleeve and pretended to draw it randomly from a batch of entries before announcing the "winning" ticket."
October 10, 2005 — Blue Man Group officially opens at the Blue Man Theatre.
June 24, 2006 — Phantom - The Las Vegas Spectacular opened at a new theatre at the Venetian.

Film history

Building the Venetian was the subject of an episode of the show MegaStructures.
Various Venetian locations were the setting for the introductory scenes of the 2001 movie, Rat Race.

A suite from the Venetian is featured as a location in the 2005 movie Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous

The exterior of the Venetian is portrayed in the movie Resident Evil: Extinction. There is a dramatic zombie attack scene which takes place on the Venetian's replica of the Rialto Bridge.

Casino and other attractions

The Casino at the Venetian offers more than 122 casino games. In addition to slot machines and table games, there is a state-of-the-art sports lounge.

One of the largest and busiest poker rooms in Las Vegas is located in the Venetian.

The Venetian has an extensive indoor retail mall called the Grand Canal Shoppes, which covers 500,000 square feet (50 000 m²).

In addition to the lake in front of the casino, canals on the second floor of building, in the shopping mall, are used to provide gondola rides. The hotel also hosts the Las Vegas Madame Tussauds wax museum. There are usually two wax figures outside of the attraction. The celebrity figures outside rotate to new celebs several times a month.

Dining, Amenities and Entertainment

The Venetian hosts 17 acclaimed restaurants, including Bouchon, which is the vision of Time Magazine's “America's Best Chef”, Thomas Keller and Piero Selvaggio's Valentino, featuring the Italian cuisine from James Beard Award-winning Chef Luciano Pellegrini. Because the hotel is composed of suites, the hotel contains an upscale specialty store that sells produce, meats, and other items for cooking.

In addition to shopping at the Grand Canal Shoppes, The Venetian offers plenty of other things to do, including:

Blue Man Group — an explosive show in the 1760-seat Blue Man Theatre
Wayne Brady: Making %@it Up - a comedy improvisation, song and dance revue starring Brady, improv partner Jonathan Mangum, singers, dancers, and a four-piece band

Canyon Ranch SpaClub — a 69,000 sq ft (6,400 m2) health spa and fitness center
Convention space — 1.9 million sq ft (180,000 m²), including the 1,200,000 sq ft (111,000 m2) Sands Expo convention center

A new production of Andrew Lloyd Weber's musical The Phantom of the Opera entitled Phantom – The Las Vegas Spectacular, which runs 95 minutes long and new special effects only seen at the Venetian. The Phantom Theater was custom built to resemble the Palais Garnier.

Pool Deck — a 5-acre (20,000 m2) deck above the fourth level of the Venetian Tower, featuring 3 pools and a hot tub

Tao Nightclub — 10,000 square foot (1,000 m²) high-energy nightclub located within the Tao “Asian Temple” Entertainment Complex.

Aquaknox - a medium sized quaint and elegant restaurant that specializes in seafood. (Credit: Wikipedia).

Website

The Venetian Resort Hotel Casino

News

Big poker weekend on tap, by Andy Samuelson - 17th April 2009
(Credit: Las Vegas Sun)

It’s a big weekend for Las Vegas’ poker scene.

Tonight Jennifer Harman’s third-annual Charity Poker Tournament kicks off at 5 p.m. in the Venetian poker room.

The event, which benefits the Nevada Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA), includes past World Series of Poker main-event champions Doyle Brunson, Chris Ferguson, Phil Hellmuth, and Jerry Yang.

Other pros that plan on playing the $330 buy-in, $100 rebuys an add-ons tourney include Phil Ivey, Daniel Negreanu, Barry Greenstein, Eli Elezra, Andy Bloch, Maria Ho, and Tiffany Michelle.

The winner grabs a seat at the 2009 World Series of Poker main event and a Curtis and Co. watch. The top 10 finishers also win prizes.

On Saturday, the World Poker Tour (WPT) Championship kicks off at the Bellagio.

The $25,000 buy-in tournament is the last stop of Season VII and will air on Fox Sports Net.

David Chiu beat out 545 entrants last year, including Full Tilt Poker pro Gus Hansen, to claim the $3.4 million top prize. Hansen snagged $1.7 million for second as 100 players finished in the money.

The London Times reported Sunday that Harrah's Entertainment hired Mitch Garber, the former PartyGaming CEO.

While his role hasn’t been defined, speculators say Garber could head a new division of Internet gambling as well as the WSOP.

According to PokerListings, Harrah’s CEO Gary Loveman said at the 2007 Global Gaming Expo that the WSOP may branch into online formats in Europe.

Legalities in the United States prevent such a situation, but a U.S.-based company can offer online services in Europe.

"Although there's plenty of support brewing for legalization and regulation of online gambling in the United States, it's not a done deal yet," wrote Lou Krieger, the editor of Poker Player Newspaper, on a recent blog.

"Nevertheless, Garber's hiring puts Harrah's out in front of the curve should UIGEA be set aside, and Garber's presence would give Harrah's a hand up the ladder in the US online poker market."

Articles

Cash-Starved Las Vegas Sands Seeks Help in Asia - 7th November 2008

Las Vegas Sands Eyes Macau Big-Time

Vegas: Fantasy meets economic reality - 7th November 2008

Macau's house take grows 23% to $8.9b, by Lisa Murray and Bloomberg - 24th January 2007

Profiles

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Media Man Australia does not represent Sheldon Adelson

Media Man Australia does not represent The Venetian