{"id":16305,"date":"2019-06-12T16:25:05","date_gmt":"2019-06-12T20:25:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/?p=16305"},"modified":"2019-08-05T10:34:53","modified_gmt":"2019-08-05T14:34:53","slug":"from-here-to-eternity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/from-here-to-eternity\/","title":{"rendered":"From Here to Eternity"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"issuuembed\" style=\"width: 100%; height: 341px;\" data-configid=\"37604829\/70585968\"><\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"\/\/e.issuu.com\/embed.js\" async=\"true\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">Summerguide 2019<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Thanks to <b>Maine<\/b>, Elvis is back in <b>Vegas<\/b>.<\/span><\/h2>\n<p>By Colin W. Sargent<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_16322\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-16322\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-16322\" src=\"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Ogunquit-Playhouse-SG19-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"An early review from John Katsilometes of the Las Vegas Review Journal reports: \u201cThe Elvis lead, Eddie Clendening, is a killer performer, and this backing band smokes.\u201d\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Ogunquit-Playhouse-SG19-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Ogunquit-Playhouse-SG19-200x134.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Ogunquit-Playhouse-SG19.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-16322\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An early review from John Katsilometes of the Las Vegas Review Journal reports: \u201cThe Elvis lead, Eddie Clendening, is a killer performer, and this backing band smokes.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">During the summer of 2017, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ogunquitplayhouse.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Ogunquit Playhouse\u2019s<\/a> <strong>Brad Kenney<\/strong> delighted Maine theatergoers with <i>Heartbreak Hotel<\/i>, a curated presentation of Elvis songs, some unknown, that Kenney created with producer\/director\/writer Floyd Mutrux from a shelved trial sequence Mutrux had originally envisioned as part of <i>Million Dollar Quartet<\/i>, also successfully produced at Ogunquit. At <em>Heartbreak Hotel<\/em>, Maine crowds rocked out to the big sounds of the smoldering, sensitive 18-year-old Elvis Presley\u2014and the tears. End of story, right? No, it\u2019s the beginning.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5 class=\"p4\"><\/h5>\n<h5 class=\"p4\"><b>Love Me Tenderloin<\/b><\/h5>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">\u201cThe phone started ringing,\u201d Kenney says, first from \u201cthe cruise ships, then Caesars Entertainment.\u201d Investors piled on board, including creatives and financiers connected to the Elvis estate. What to do? Kenney knows showbiz like Smilla knows snow. While he treated us to a sizzling season at the same time in Ogunquit, \u201cWe transferred the production to Chicago last summer. Caesars Entertainment came and saw Chicago. They said, \u2018If you can do A, B, C, and D, we can do a casino show.\u2019 I spent my spring in Las Vegas. I worked with Broadway director Jeff Calhoun. We took what went well in Ogunquit, what went well in Chicago, and curated a show for the Las Vegas concert space.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">As in Harrah\u2019s Showroom, which dates to the Rat Pack days.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">Imagine the curious and wonderful word \u201cOgunquit\u201d falling on Vegas ears. <\/span><\/p>\n<h5 class=\"p4\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rosy Future<\/b><\/span><\/h5>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>Heartbreak Hotel<\/i> opened in the city of neon in April and is still playing. But for how long?\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"s1\">\u201cForever,\u201d Kenney says. \u201cThe contract is open-ended!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">An early review from John Katsilometes of the <em>Las Vegas Review Journal<\/em> reports: \u201cThe Elvis lead, <strong>Eddie Clendening<\/strong>, is a killer performer, and this backing band smokes.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\">Which is no surprise, since Kenney conducts some of his business meetings while walking the smoky coast of Marginal Way. As for Clendening, we saw him first in the Maine version of the show, itself a world premiere.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\">The ripples go outward. While the show continues in Vegas, another version is being announced for \u201cLondon,\u201d Kenney says. \u201cSeriously.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\">view as pdf<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An Ogunquit Playhouse production opens in Las Vegas.<br \/>\nBy Colin W. Sargent<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16321,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16305"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16305\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16546,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16305\/revisions\/16546"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}