In late capitalism, the media are losing their hold on the simulacrum. Disney movies are being replaced by Disneylands. A pyramid rises in the desert, but not in Cheop. In Las Vegas, the "inclinators," not elevators, carry you up the angled walls to your room in The Luxor Hotel and Casino. Inside this huge pyramid, you can experience three different "virtual reality" rides, walk through a scale model of Fifth Avenue, NYC and eat in one of its restaurants, take a boat trip on "the Nile," while you listen to a narration of Egyptian history as you drift past slot machines, the poker room and other table games. The Mirage has a "live" volcano that erupts for an appreciative audience every hour. Every two hours over at Treasure Island, another large audience gathers around the two-acre mote between the casino and The Strip. Two replicas of 17th century ships float toward one another to do battle. The crowd is clearly on the side of the pirate crew over that of the stiffly dictioned Brits. So after all the acrobatics and explosions, it is the British Man-of-War that finally sinks. The crew has bailed out before this, but the captain goes down with the ship. Three full minutes later, you watch the ship rise again, complete with the British captain executing his curtain call.
These ships are replicas, but the boats springing up along the Mississippi and other rivers throughout the country are "real." Some of these riverboat casinos can make short, two- to three- hour round trips down the river and back, but most are permanently docked. Many times the river is artificially expanded and deepened to allow them to float. And like the ships at Treasure Island, these riverboats do battle against one another, but here the pyrotechnics are pure capitalism.
Gaming has exploded across the country. Now more than a $30 billion a year industry, it has surpassed the combined income of the film, television and video industries. As Illinois and Iowa float their riverboats, their neighbors in Indiana and Missouri follow suit, lest the precious tax dollars cross state lines. As happened with the state lotteries over a short two decades, the dominoes are falling, state by state. Only Hawaii and Utah have no form of gaming filling their tax coffers. The ship has arrived and it's no Mirage.
The house has a built-in advantage in all games if offers, except poker. In poker, the house has no vested interest in who wins, so it simply takes its fair rake. Theater only plays poker, never trying "to beat the house," but always conspiring with it. At the poker table, theater finds the site-specific rehearsal hall rental for its script of late capitalism.
