‘Time to evolve’: BattleBots hits rough patch in Las Vegas

If you do business in Las Vegas long enough, you come to appreciate how potentially lethal is the term “hiatus.”

We know what a Vegas hiatus can look like. It can take the form of a blonde icon taking an indefinite break for a makeover, never to return. Or a band of magicians halting as the NFR comes to town, not to share the stage again. Or a lounge show featuring retired sports stars spinning yarns taking a hiatus to shore up funding, promising a comeback that never materializes.

So when “BattleBots – Destruct-A-Thon” announced in-house it would be on hiatus after its Aug. 10 performance, it seemed the show, like its famous Bots, had crashed and burned.

The Formula One Las Vegas Grand Prix had pushed “BattleBots” off the stage for five weeks in ‘23. Tickets have been slow for this show — and most Vegas shows — this summer. The F1 is again looming on the horizon, ready to overtake BattleBots’ neighborhood just off the Strip.

But the Bots’ creator has announced the show will be back, with a new robot fighting competition, scheduled for Sept. 6 at BattleBots Arena at Caesars Entertainment Studios next to the Horseshoe on the corner of Flamingo and Koval.

We emphasize “scheduled” in this update. Specifics are always subject to change in such restarts. Nonetheless, BattleBots co-creator and CEO Trey Roski has announced that tickets would be on sale “in the next couple of weeks” for production in a “thrilling new format.”

“Where we are is, we have done 325 shows in Las Vegas, but it’s time to evolve,” Roski said in a phone chat Saturday, following a week of promises of new details to come about the production. “Even Madonna picks a time when she wants to change, and she changes.”

But what isn’t vogue is issuing what looked a lot like a permanent send-off to the cast and crew in an interoffice e-mail on Aug. 5. Roski explained to employees that low sales and high production costs had forced him to invest more money than planned to keep the show running.

This could get legal

The crew was given less than a week to prepare for this change, which felt similar to a forced pause during the COVID days.

“It was kind of a last-minute decision to do it now, because ticket sales at this time of the year are down,” Roski said.

The show will be down again for three weeks when F1 returns in November, its back straight-away overtaking Koval Lane just behind the BattleBots venue. The producers are reviewing legal action against F1 as the show reboots.

“They haven’t offered to compensate us, and we’re talking to people involved in legal counsel right now,” Roski said, choosing his words judiciously. “Our neighbors are going after them. We’re trying to find out what they’re doing, and what their options are.”

The owners of Ellis Island, across Koval Lane, filed suit against F1 in April.

A nearly 25-year battle

“BattleBots,” for the uninitiated, premiered on Comedy Central in 2000, later moving to Discovery. The competitions have been seen in more than 150 countries. “BattleBots” has grown to more than 10 million social media followers, and more than 50 teams from the U.S., Europe, Asia, New Zealand, Australia and South America traveled to Las Vegas for the “World Championship VII” tournament last year.

For the live show, the “BattleBots” fights have been held in a battle pit surrounded by reinforced plexiglas. Fans of all ages sit on metal bleachers outside the battle facility.

Such popular Bots as Witch Doctor, Kraken, Mammoth, Hypershock and Whiplash have been built and maintained next to BattleBots Arena. Fans can tour that facility, too, and the kids especially love the experience.

Roski said he made the “difficult decision” to put the show on hiatus, with no timetable for return noted. He even arranged a pool party for the cast and crew at Silverton on the day of the show’s shutdown. Roski’s father, Ed Roski Jr., owns the resort.

But Trey Roski stresses he never intended the message to be that the “BattleBots” was closing permanently in Las Vegas. “Maybe the wording was not the best choice. But it was the right time to do it,” Roski said. “Because of the work I needed to do in the Bots, I really couldn’t go forward doing the shows.”

The pool party was planned in advance of the “hiatus” announcement, to celebrate the show surpassing 300 performances, not as a show-closing event, Roski said.

Wrangling employees

In the interim, about half of the show’s 80 or so employees have been laid off. The engineers building a dozen new robots are staying. But 40-plus cast members and stagehands have all been sidelined and eligible for unemployment benefits.

Roski says they are welcome to return and is contacting them beginning Monday with the update in the show’s plans. Rehearsals are to resume the first week of September.

The “BattleBots” stage show has been co-hosted by Steve Judkins and Bil Dwyer (from the original Comedy Central series) since opening in March 2023. Judkins, popular from his days at Mayfair Supper Club, is planning a trip to Australia this week, an indication of the hasty plans to remake and return the show to the stage. Roski says he hopes both are in the next version of the show.

Intense drama planned

The new show is to offer “more intense battles, drama, and increased jeopardy,” Roski said. BattleBots hierarchy has also announced that several weekends will stage the “Fall FaceOff” competition, with teams from across the country in a round-robin competition. The fights are planned for the BattleBots’ YouTube channel, with its 2.1 million subscribers.

Roski enforces optimism, even in the face of the abrupt shutdown and challenge of rebuilding the show and its cast. He is happy to report Caesars Entertainment is behind the show. The show has a year and a half left on its contract with the company and Roski says there is talk of an extension.

Caesars has left the BattleBots signage on the venue, a sign that the company is invested in the show’s future (the company pulled down the Donny & Marie sign at Flamingo Showroom within hours of that show’s final performance).

“Caesars is totally happy with us, they think we’re doing great, for a new show in Vegas,” Roski said. “They’re 100-percent behind this.”

Reckless in Raiders

Michael Shapiro’s Reckless in Vegas is booked at the 24th Annual Biletnikoff Foundation Celebrity Crab Fest on Sept. 27, 2024, at the Westgate. This is the first Raiders-related event event for Shapiro’s vintage-Vegas act. Prior to that gig, RiV’s “unplugged” show is at Notoriety Live at 8 p.m. Saturday.

The hosts are Super Bowl MVP and Pro Football Hall of Famer Fred Biletnikoff and his wife, Angela, who is Executive Director of the Biletnikoff Foundation.

Mark S. Allen (the seven-time, Emmy Award-winning producer, not the Raider great) and Emmy winner/Raiders in-game announcer Sibley Scoles co-host. The Raiderettes are also due to perform.

The Biletnikoff Foundation is a non-profit organization that supports youth, primarily from low to moderate-income neighborhoods or backgrounds, who are “at risk,” particularly to the realities of drug and alcohol addiction, domestic and gender violence, and human trafficking. For more information, go to biletnikoff.org.

Cool Hang Alert

Soaring Vegas vocalist Tyriq Johnson is back with The Diamonds at The Pinky Ring at Bellagio on Friday and Saturday night. There is an unbroken funk/R&B jam in store. Club visionary Bruno Mars is back at Dolby Live at Park MGM on those nights. You never know if, how or when he’ll take the club’s stage. And Johnson is with Santa Fe & The Fat City Horns at 7:30 p.m. Mondays at The Copa at Bootlegger Bistro.

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 X, @JohnnyKats1 on Instagram.