Las Vegas Strip’s ‘love’ message spreading internationally

Love is universal, from Niagara Falls to Las Vegas, New York City to New York-New York, all around the world.

Look no further than the lights from international hotel rooms. Love is everywhere.

That unifying message has graced the hotel rooms of Las Vegas Strip resorts. We’re now seeing it on resorts in such international outposts as Dubai, Belgrade, Florida, Aruba, Hawaii, London, Canada, Germany and even Serbia.

“It’s wonderful that it has spread all over Las Vegas within a week, and it’s spreading all over the world through the hospitality industry,” New York-New-York President and CEO Cynthia Kiser Murphey said in an interview Friday afternoon. “It applies to our employees, our community, all the first responders, all the health-care employees as well as all of our guests around world. I like it because it is so much the hospitality industry. It’s so truly what we do.”

Kiser Murphey came up with the idea to illuminate New York-New York after she saw images of hotels in Niagara Falls lighting up guest rooms in the shape of hearts. She had been recording videos at the top of the New York-New York parking garage, and thought to light the rooms behind her. The images hit social media, and Kiser Murphey expanded the idea.

Our hotels and casinos in Niagara Falls are lighting up glowing hearts as a sign of hope and solidarity. As a community, we are united on the fight to stop the spread of the virus.#NiagaraFallsStrong #NiagaraHeartOfHope #FlattentheCurve #UnitedWeStand #forglowinghearts #canada pic.twitter.com/Fq2tBreUVy

— Niagara Falls Tourism (@NFallsTourism) March 22, 2020

“We thought, ‘What if we put one behind the Statue of Liberty?’ ” Kiser Murphey says. “We put the heart up there simply as a message to tell people how much we care about them.”

Kiser Murphey used photos to map which rooms to light up. Members of the hotel’s bare-bones staff still on property pulled back drapes and moved floor lamps into position, close to the tinted windows.

This process followed at MGM Grand, Aria, Delano and Park MGM. The concept of guest-room messaging has advanced along the Strip to neighborhood resorts Wynn/Encore, Venetian/Palazzo, Flamingo, Paris Las Vegas and Hilton Grand Vacations.

The opportunity to make these messages is finite, of course. It requires a dearth of tourism, a widespread lack of room reservations. The American Hotel and Lodging Association reports that, as of March 25, 70 percent of hotel rooms across the U.S. are empty. The industry has lost a reported $5 billion in room revenue just since mid-February.

“You can’t normally do this. Normally, hopefully, you have a lot of people in your hotel rooms,” Kiser Murphey says. “It’s a very unique time in our world when the hospitality industry has buildings that don’t have wonderful guests in them, or wonderful employees working. We hope never to be able to do this again.”

We have groovers

The casts of “Fantasy” at Luxor and the Mayfair Supper Club at Bellagio posted dance videos Friday.

Vocalist Lorena Peril led the “Fantasy” team in a home-bound spin through “Can’t Stop The Feeling,” from the Luxor production. The clip is on the show’s Facebook page.

In times like this, we all need a little swing ✨ #TheMayfair pic.twitter.com/Uf2pRi3EIn

— The Mayfair Supper Club (@themayfairlv) April 4, 2020

The Mayfair troupe put up a version of “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing), worth a look-see on the show’s @MayfairLV and @Bellagio Twitter pages.

Go, Joe

Veteran Vegas comic actor Joe Trammel had been prepping for a guest spot in “Crazy Girls” at Planet Hollywood when the coronavirus outbreak took hold. Trammel has been a stage performer for more 25 years in Las Vegas, dating to his days as a specialty act in both “Splash” and “Crazy Girls” in their days at the Riviera.

Trammel had been scheduled to return to the stage March 28, as a way to preview segments of a one-man show he’s been developing over the past few months. He’s also recently recovered from a non-coronavirus respiratory condition, which had forced him inside for several weeks.

While sidelined, Trammel has a series of wild videos, titled “1 a Day,” on his Joey Vegas YouTube page. The clips show Trammel in full costume (as “Tiger King’s” Joe Exotic) and with props (a shower cap doubling as a face cover).

Trammel is posting at least once per day. Know that some of the content is for grown-ups; the performer is forever a kid.

Virtual cool hang alert

A common friend once accurately described Brody Dolyniuk as an “alien talent.” No argument here. The guy is so good. Dolyniuk’s Facebook Live/coronavirus debut posted Friday afternoon and lives on his FB page.

Ignore the original “Standby …” message at the beginning (technical problems), but stay for the full dance. Dolyniuk’s renditions of U2’s “Stuck In A Moment,” “Like A Stone” by Audioslave and Elton John’s “This Song,” with the appropriate lyric, “My gift is my song …” is really worth the time.

John Katsilometes’ column runs daily in the A section. His PodKats podcast can be found at reviewjournal.com/podcasts. Contact him at jkatsilometes@reviewjournal.com. Follow @johnnykats on Twitter, @JohnnyKats1 on Instagram.