VEGAS HITS BLACKJACK FOR WORLD PREMIERE OF KEVIN SPACEY’S “21” MOVIE
Film-star Kevin Spacey will screen the world-premiere of his Vegas gambling movie 21 right here in Sin City on March 12—and co-stars Laurence Fishburne, Kate Bosworth and Jim Sturgess will be on hand for the glittering event.
Next night—March 13—the four-stars will receive a special ShoWest Ensemble Award on the closing night of the largest annual motion picture industry convention.
The action adventure flick 21 is inspired by the true story of a group of brilliant MIT students who “counted cards” with a mathematically created code to “beat the system” and take our casinos for millions. The students also used an intricate system of signals to beat the casinos “big time”. Kevin, who also co-produced the film, plays the unorthodox math professor who teaches the students while Fishburne plays the casino’s security chief. The true story was portrayed in Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich—and Kevin bought the movie rights. He also convinced several of our Vegas casino properties to allow filming to take place here. The film that features several Vegas locations will open nationwide on March 28.
The ShoWest convention runs from March 10- March 13 at Bally’s and Paris resort hotels drawing over 5,000 movie distributors from over 50 countries. However the 21 movie will be premiered at Planet Hollywood’s Resort with a glittering after-party at its new Prive nightclub.
A slew of Hollywood stars will trek over to Vegas this year for ShoWest including Warner Bros. “Big Picture ‘08” presentation with Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Anne Hathaway, Emile Hirsch and Christina Ricci and director George Lucas.
Steve and Anne will show advance clips of their new Get Smart movie being released on June 20.
Emile, who stars this May in Speed Racer will pick up an award for Male Star of Tomorrow at the closing night ceremony after Kevin Spacey’s cast have received their Ensemble Award.
New Caesars Palace headliner Bette Midler, during ShoWest will linkup with actress Helen Hunt making her directing debut with Then She Found Me to be released April 25. Bette stars as a local TV talk show host and apparent birth mother of Hunt’s character who seeks her out after the death of her adopted mother and the separation from her husband played by Matthew Broderick. Helen will be presented with her Breakthrough Director of the Year award at the ShoWest opening day luncheon on March 11—and expect Bette to be right there for the ceremony and then Helen will turn tables to see Bette starring in The ShowGirl Must Go On spectacular at Caesars Palace later.