Sense of place in cinema: Las Vegas Never Plays Itself, with Tod Goldberg

“Las Vegas is hard to capture in art without leaning on cliche. The movie Casino doesn't lean on cliche because it created the cliche. The Hangover created the cliche for this next generation. Culture is is causing people to act a certain way when they get to Las Vegas.” – Tod Goldberg

In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Tod talk about how movies can "totalize" places like Las Vegas, depicting "The Strip" at the expense of other parts of the city (3:00); the way that the real Las Vegas is full of deeply weird places and people, while still being an amalgamation of American culture in general (8:00); bygone hotels and attractions and the "lack institutional memory" in Las Vegas, as well as what social classes of people are attracted to the city (16:00); the kinds of movies that have been made about Las Vegas, the cliches they entail, and what they imply about how (and where) the city should be experienced (25:00); what Las Vegas is like outside of (and in tandem with) the narrative cliches that have come to define it (39:00); how major league sports teams and Formula One racing have changed Las Vegas, and what movies about the city might look like in the future (46:00).

Novelist Tod Goldberg is the New York Times bestselling author of over a dozen books, most notably the Gangsterland series of crime novels. He is also the producer, along with Martin Scorsese and Brian Koppelman, for The Roman, an upcoming Las Vegas casino drama series at Netflix.

Notable Links:

• Kansas Never Plays Itself (video essay)
• Souvenir, by Rolf Potts (book)
• The joys of Jane’s Addiction (Deviate episode)
• Las Vegas Strip (tourist gambling area)
• The Last Showgirl (2024 movie)
• Leaving Las Vegas (1995 movie)
• The Godfather Part II (1974 movie)
• Casino (1995 movie)
• About Sunny (2011 movie)
• Dave Hickey (art critic)
• The Hangover (2009 movie)
• Las Vegas Chinatown (district)
• What Happens Here, Stays Here (2003 Las Vegas ad campaign)
• Swingers (1996 movie)
• Star Trek: The Experience (former attraction in Las Vegas)
• SEMA auto show (annual car accessory show in Las Vegas)
• Odyssey: Driving Around the World (auto expedition Rolf wrote about)
• Grosse Pointe Blank (1997 movie)
• City Cast Las Vegas (podcast)
• Class: A Guide Through the American Status System, by Paul Fussell (book)
• Last Vegas (2013 movie)
• Diamonds Are Forever (1971 movie)
• Very Bad Things (1998 movie)
• Fools Rush In (1997 movie)
• Hard Eight (1996 film)
• Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998 movie)
• Naked City, Las Vegas (neighborhood)
• Summerlin (neighborhood)
• Bugsy Siegel (American mobster)
• Sports in the Las Vegas metropolitan area
• Sphere (entertainment venue in Las Vegas)
• Honeymoon in Vegas (1992 movie)
• The Stand, by Stephen King (novel)
• Dragonfish, by Vu Tran (novel)
• Beautiful Children, by Charles Bock (novel)
• "Still D.R.E." (song by rapper Dr. Dre)
• Sassy (1990s teen magazine)

The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.

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