Just as Suzanne Somers is talking about bringing her throwback show to a throwback hotel run by a throwback figure, David Siegel makes a throwback move.
He strides up the steps to the stage at Shimmer Cabaret, which is to be renamed Suzanne’s and where this interview is being conducted. He is carrying what seems to be an iced tea and pushes the drink and himself into the middle of the conversation.
At that moment, Somers is saying, “David Siegel has welcomed me with open arms. When he said, ‘The deal is done. What do you want?’ Um, OK … A restaurant, a spa …”
“I love her!” Siegel says, suddenly, as if beamed over from the old Starship Enterprise from the Star Trek Experience.
“I was just talking about you,” Somers says, smiling.
“Lemme tell you something, years ago, when I was watching ‘Three’s Company,’ if somebody had told me, ‘Someday, you’ll own a large casino-hotel in Las Vegas and have Suzanne Somers sitting on your lap and on your stage, I would have said, ‘What are you smoking?’ ” Siegel says, referring to an earlier photo op with the star. “What can I say? We have Chrissy Snow on our stage.”
So it is that Somers, the TV star from the 1970s and early ’80s on “Three’s Company” and stage performer in Las Vegas a decade later, has returned to live performance in a city she loves. “Suzanne Sizzles” is the name of the show, opening May 23 and playing at least 28 weeks.
The show is a rollout of numbers from The Rat Pack and Great American Songbook, typical fare for any entertainer who wants to revive the heady days of classic Las Vegas stage shows.
Somers is to be backed by a live band in a room being prepped for a refreshing of seats and carpeting; video screens, too, will be added to what is planned as a multimedia presentation.
Somers will perform at 7 p.m. five days a week at Suzanne’s at Westgate, dark Sundays and Mondays. Tickets are $65 (absent fees), with VIP meet-and-greet packages available (call 800-222-5321 and go to WestgateVegas.com for information).
Somers performed her cabaret-styled production first at Circus Maximus at Caesars Palace and later the Shimmer in the days when the hotel was the Las Vegas Hilton. She lived in Las Vegas for nine years until that run ended in 1990 (friends of hers in those days remember some pretty entertaining barbecues hosted by Somers).
Astonishingly, Somers is 68 years old. She is a grandmother six times over but is obviously in great health and condition, owed to her all-organic diet and fitness regimen. Her current appearances include ABC’s “Dancing With the Stars,” where she is paired with Tony Dovolani (the two have thus far survived in the show’s 10th anniversary Season 20).
It’s a fortuitous turn of events for a hotel that one of its headliners is on TV and performing in a venue that Siegel himself considered taking apart when he assumed ownership on July 1.
But now …
“I think this is one of the greatest pairings ever in Las Vegas, I really do,” Somers says. “We are compatible. I am compatible with this man. He reminds me of Clifford Perlman (the former owner) at Caesars. He’s that type of man.”
“Well, with me, what you see is what you get,” Siegel says.
“Me, too,” Somers says, in step.
Siegel also is underwriting a pool-deck cafe of Somers’ favorite recipes and a spa on the property.
“I want to be here for a long time,” she says. “I saw my name today for the first time on the marquee and thought, ‘This feels right. I want to be here and make it my home.’ ”
Somers is far removed from her entry point in Las Vegas, but she does remember that period very well. She visited the city for the first time when she was just 19 years old, living in Sausalito, Calif., before she was discovered by Johnny Carson and booked just about every month on “The Tonight Show.”
She was invited to the city on a date and brought to the just-opened Caesars Palace “by a guy I didn’t like very much.”
“It was one of those things where I didn’t have a room. He had the room,” she recalls. “It was awful. I was so naive back then. I knew nothing. That was my introduction right there.”
But the trip was not a total loss.
“He took me to see The Fifth Dimension,” she says. “That was great. That’s where I got the bug. They were so great. I thought, ‘I’d like to do that someday.’ ”
And, adhering to the idea that life is like a song, Somers can now let the sunshine in on her new gig in Las Vegas.
Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at Twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow “Kats With the Dish” at Twitter.com/KatsWiththeDish.
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