Popular Culture Review 29.2
The Palace caters to high-stakes gamblers , those who bet thousands of dollars , enjoy gourmet food and drink , and spend a fortune on lavish entertainment .
Sarno spent one million dollars at the inaugural party for Caesars on 5 August 1966 . Many of the eighteen hundred guests , including Adam West , Eva Gabor , and Jimmy Hoffa , received an invitation scroll from an actor dressed as a centurion . The attendees consumed two tons of filet mignon , three hundred pounds of crabmeat , washed down with fifty thousand glasses of champagne before attending headliner Andy Williams ’ show .
Sarno was a man of excesses . However , in a rare quiet moment of reflection , Sarno described himself : “ I am a loner , different , a little sad . Most creative people are ” ( Schwartz 152 ). His profligate lifestyle led to his early death . Sarno biographer David Schwartz recounted what people in the gambling industry said , upon learning of Sarno ’ s demise , “ He departed this life in the most fantastic suite , inside the most gorgeous hotel in the world , with a beautiful girl , owing the IRS a million bucks ” ( 266 ).
After cataloging a small part of the art at Caesars Palace , the authors turned to analyzing its meaning and import . They found this establishment a bastion of masculinity , a paradigmatic means of consumption , and an icon of popular culture . The challenge was to discover how art animated a theme that transformed Las Vegas .
THE DREAM REALIZED
When in Rome Do as Romans Do . ( When in Rome )
John Storey , author of the widely-read textbook , Cultural Theory and Popular Culture ( 1997 ) offered several definitions
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