Words of wisdom still hold true on Strip

As much as Vegas has changed, one thing hasn't.

"You gotta have an act."

This sage advice was passed along by Bob Anderson, the singing impressionist who received this carved tablet of wisdom from both Milton Berle and Merv Griffin. So you know it must be true.

Anderson, who last week packed the house for an orchestral pops concert, explains it thusly.

An act is "a reason for them to come see you. You can't just get up there and sing, unless you have your own hit records."

Berle further delineated that said act has to play across the board. "One week you're at Caesars Palace and the next week you're at the VFW hall in Toledo, and your act better work in both places."

Those of you too young to be impressed by name-checking Uncle Miltie may still connect the dots to the modern-day Strip. This wisdom has been carried to such extremes that now?

We have nothing but acts.

What is a Cirque du Soleil, if not essentially one act after another? Merv never said your act couldn't be balancing a bald dude on your head.

But if you want to see something besides acrobats, it's a little more frustrating. Like Anderson and too many others before them, Gordie Brown and Greg London do impressions. Why? No one would pay to hear them sing in their own voices.

I cheer, and yet I fear, for three guys who have decided the human voice may be just the thing to wake up the sleepy north end of the Strip.

Rick Faugno tap dances as well as singing on Fridays at the Las Vegas Hilton. Is that enough to be an act?

On Nov. 9, Frankie Moreno makes the leap from lounges to a ticketed showroom act at the Stratosphere. Moreno has made a good living by being versatile, touring and writing songs with Air Supply when not resurrecting the freewheeling spirit of Louis Prima-era lounge.

"I'm just singing a Frank Sinatra song. It doesn't mean I'm a crooner," he declared from the stage of the M Resort last weekend. But you see, it would be easier to market him as a Michael Buble or Harry Connick Jr. than to explain all that he really does.

The longest shot of all might be Pat DiNizio digging in at the Riviera to do "Confessions of a Rock Star" starting Wednesday.

The title flatters. DiNizio didn't scale to Axl Rose heights, but had a solid career fronting The Smithereens. Wait: "Blood and Roses"? "Only A Memory?" Those were hit records! See Paragraph Four.

Hope springs eternal. Just the same, all three of these guys might want to start polishing up on their impressions.

Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0288.