Beginning producer has faith in ‘The Gambler’

In Las Vegas, people gamble on all sorts of things, from slots to sports to the silver screen.

That explains why a movie crew is staked out downtown, one recent sunny morning, to shoot a pawnshop scene for the appropriately titled "The Gambler."

An update of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's classic novel, shooting through early February, "The Gambler" ranks as a made-in-Vegas production with a Hungarian director, a Romanian star (Andi Vasluianu) and a roll-the-dice sensibility.

Then again, producer Zoltan Miklos Hajdu has been here before.

A former performer in Cirque du Soleil's "Ka," Hajdu (now a personal trainer) teamed with his director brother, Szabolcs, for a contemporary, Las Vegas-based version of "The Gambler," because "where else you can make this movie?" Hajdu says. "It's a free adaptation, written for today's society."

Making a movie is far from free, but Hajdu attributes "The Gambler's" low budget to support from multiple sources, including Hollywood equipment sources and local financial backers and crew members.

"I'm a beginning producer," Hajdu acknowledges. "I have only one thing: faith."

LOCAL MOTION: A second Las Vegas-based feature, "Liars, Fires and Bears," continues production this week at a variety of hometown locations, from downtown to the Decatur-Flamingo and Rancho-Alta neighborhoods.

No glitzy Strip vistas for writer-director Jeremy Cloe, whose feature debut focuses on a street-savvy 9-year-old orphan (played by Megli Micek) and an immature 27-year-old (Lundon Boyd, Cloe's co-writer) she enlists to help her reunite with her brother.

"Liars, Fires and Bears" is an expansion of a short Cloe made while a student at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas; because the original "left off at a point where we had open-ended questions" he notes, the feature enables the filmmakers to explore "a lot of ideas we couldn't really expand upon in the short."

GOOD TIMES BOWL: Las Vegas may be renowned as a boxing town, but this week it stakes its claim to yet another sports title: bowling capital.

That's because Las Vegas is hosting its second televised Professional Bowlers Association tournament in as many weeks.

Over the weekend, ESPN and ESPN2 were at the South Point for the PBA World Championships. Starting today, the action shifts to the Red Rock for PBA's signature event, the Tournament of Champions, which airs Saturday on ABC.

"Las Vegas is a popular destination for bowlers," points out PBA spokesman Jerry Schneider. "It's really another capital of the sport."

Little wonder, then, that PBA officials are "very happy with Las Vegas," comments Rich Williams, ESPN packaged show unit producer. "There's an excitement to Las Vegas" that complements the "tough athletic competition" with "an international cast of athletes."

CAREY ON: Drew Carey and his partners in improvisational comedy are a Super Bowl season fixture on the Strip.

This year, however, the fun extends far beyond the MGM Grand's showroom stage, because scheduled live performances of "Drew Carey's Improv-a-Ganza" (which continue Thursday through Saturday and Feb. 3-5) will be taped for a new weekday prime-time show on GSN, debuting March 28.

REALITY CHECK: Las Vegas is no stranger to strange sex, so no wonder TLC's "Strange Sex" is in town for a second-season episode, scheduled to shoot at the Bootlegger and a southeast Las Vegas residence.

And Langley Productions, the folks behind Fox's long-running "Cops" and truTV's "Las Vegas Jailhouse," are back on the beat with "Vegas Strip," which follows Las Vegas police officers on patrol.

Also scheduled to roll this week: History's "Pawn Stars" and its "American Restoration" spinoff, Animal Planet's "Tanked" and E!'s "Holly's World."

Carol Cling's Shooting Stars column appears Mondays. Contact her at (702) 383-0272 or e-mail her at ccling@ reviewjournal.com.