When I arrived in Las Vegas in 1977, I was both enormously naive and laughingly brazen. I set out to conquer Vegas by making cold calls to hotels and billing myself as the next best thing to hit town since Juliet Prowse or Shirley MacLaine. That works well if the hotel has a production show, but many of them didn't - Caesars being one of them. However, they mentioned that even though theirs was a star-policy hotel, many of the stars had back-up dancers.
I liked that even better. Less dancers; more spotlight. I started (and mercifully ended) my star quest with Robert Goulet. I splurged on a show ticket and tipped enough to get seated down front. I assessed the dancers and knew I could easily keep up. But how to get to the star? During the show, Mr. Goulet proceeded into the audience, weaving his way through the tables and stopping here and there to sing to fans. I grabbed a cocktail napkin, jotted down my phone number, along with the fact that I was a dancer looking for an audition and then waited for him to pass my way.
He stopped in front of me (well, he had no choice really, because I had pushed my chair back into the aisle) and reached out to touch my shoulder. I nonchalantly slipped the napkin into his palm. Not missing a beat, he stuck it in his tuxedo pocket and continued on. I realize now that Mr. Goulet probably thought I was a hooker. In any case, no one called. Imagine that.
I then resorted to traditional methods: newspaper ads. I spotted an audition notice for showgirls at the Tropicana and showed up with a resume about as long as my Vegas career. I sashayed onstage in my standard pink tights, black leotard and ballet slippers. Everyone else wore fishnets, skimpy leotards cut up to here and down to there and mile-high heels. They had foot-long eyelashes that stirred a breeze when they blinked and lipstick red enough to blind.
We were asked to walk down a staircase without looking at the steps. Piece of cake. I floated gracefully down the stairs and waited for round two. Imagine my surprise when I was cut from the audition. I hadn't yet danced a single step after all. So I flounced over to the choreographer and hotly informed him that I resented being dismissed without so much as a double turn or a simple high kick. He asked me if I'd read the ad. It was an audition call for showgirls, not dancers. That was the moment when I learned that "showgirl" wasn't synonymous with "dancer." In fact, I guess I should've realized I didn't fit in because the showgirls at the audition hovered near the cloud cover and I looked sort of shrimpish next to them. Yes, I had a lot to learn.
