Unlv Gaming Podcast

The latest UNLV Gaming Podcast is up.  Our May Gaming Research Fellow, Laura Cook Kenna, talks about: "The Promise of Gangster Glamour: Sinatra, Vegas and the Allure of Excess" Abstract: In the 1950s and 60s, both Vegas and Sinatra linked the conspicuous display of excess with a promise that tourists could be participants--not just onlookers--in their glamorous realm.  The city and the star, however, also had something else in common: both were allegedly underwritten by the mob.  This paper/talk examines how Rat Pack performances and Vegas spaces offered access to "the good life" even as innuendos of gangsterism tacitly associated that lavish lifestyle with ethnic difference.