FLASHBACKS: ANN MARGRET’S WEDDING, WAYNE NEWTON’S DEBUT AND LIZ TAYLOR TIES KNOT
May 6, 2007: HBO chairman Chris Albrecht, credited with developing many hit TV shows, is arrested for assaulting his girlfriend in the MGM Grand parking lot after a boxing match at the hotel. He blames a relapse of alcoholism and is forced to resign.
May 7, 1972: John Newcombe defeats Cliff Drysdale, 6-3, 6-4, to win the first Alan King Tennis Classic at Caesars Palace. Celebrities play for fun, but the pro portion of the tournament hosted by the popular comedian and Vegas headliner is an important stop on the tennis tour until 1985.
May 8, 1967: Ann-Margaret, who was discovered by comedian George Burns in Las Vegas and starred with Elvis Presley in Viva Las Vegas, marries actor Roger Smith at the Riveria Hotel.
May 9, 1959: Wayne Newton, a 16-year-old singer from Phoenix, makes his Las Vegas debut at the Flamingo Hotel with his older brother Jerry. Their two-week gig lasts three years, launches his career as one of the city’s most popular and wealthiest entertainers.
May 10, 2008: A classic ad slogan becomes a mundane romantic comedy as What Happens in Vegas earns $20 million on its opening weekend. Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher are drunken strangers who impulsively wed in Vegas, are forced to live together and, of course, fall in love.
May 11, 2012: Gordon Ramsay, TV’s favorite abusive chef, opens his first Vegas outpost, a steakhouse at Paris Las Vegas. The Hell’s Kitchen star gives a cooking demonstration/press conference laden with comedy, cheery insults and F-bombs. “I’m at my all-time best,” he says.
May 12, 1959: After converting to Judaism, Elizabeth Taylor marries singer Eddie Fisher (who divorced Debbie Reynolds earlier the same day), at Temple Beth Sholom in Las Vegas. They divorce five years later.
May 13, 1967: Actress Lesley Ann Warren marries hairdresser Jon Peters at the Sahara. They divorce 10 years later and one son later, after he becomes an obnoxious and widely detested Hollywood mogul and takes up with Barbra Streisand.