Just before the curtain went up on Celine Dion’s third, but last show of her amazing 5-year-run at Caesars Palace, husband manager Rene Angelil won a whopping $1.35-million in a poker tournament there.

He “bought in” to the exclusive no-limit Texas Hold’em tourney for $100,000—and outlasted 32 other competitive players. Although he’s played and won in similar but more modest tournaments during the 5 years of their Vegas residency this is his first major tournament title. He also won an expensive custom-designed bracelet similar to those handed out to champions of the World Series of Poker.

“It was a great coincidence since it puts a crowning touch on the end of Celine’s successful run” said Rene. “We both won—its incredible this happened three-days before we leave!” Before he posed for this official winning photo he ran off to backstage of The Colosseum theater to share the good news with Celine and show her the bracelet moments before she went on stage.

She shared the good news with her audience at the end of the show. “My husband is a gambler and poker is his passion. He used to play every game including blackjack and craps. But he’s smart and sticks to poker. I’m glad he’s a gambler because he’s taken only gambles in his life from mortgaging his home to make me sing to moving us to Vegas for the 5-year-run.”

Renee has been showing off the bracelet to family, friends and fans who have traveled in from Canada for the last shows. Last night (FRI) when I taped an interview for the 2-hour “Farewell Celine” TV special that will air across Canada on Monday night Rene was showing it proudly to all the members of the TV crew. “I am very proud of this,” he said delightedly.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 16th, 2007 at 1:19 pm and is filed under Misc. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.