I have to start off by saying I love Carrot Top! In the past, I have seen his guest appearances, live shows and meet/greets. We were looking for a quick trip and when I saw that he was back doing live shows....we booked the show then booked 2 days in Vegas around the show.
It is too soon! Vegas has lost its mojo vibe....and the strip is a seedy place with homeless sitting around, right on the sidewalks outside of many of the mid-level hotels (Ballys/Paris/Harrahs). Fortunately, we were staying at the Venetian, which was clean, safe and secure....with a fun vibe.
Luxor was dead, no video bars open and not a cocktail waitress to be seen in 4 hours of play. We could not even find an open bar to buy a drink.
No matter....we were excited to leave our hotel and finally see a live show. Carrot Top used to be in a smaller theatre that was perfectly suited to his show. Now, they have him in a 2000 seat theatre, and only allow 100 people in. No one is allowed to sit in the front 10 or so rows, so that Carrot Top can be 25 feet away and not have to wear a mask.
This is prop comedy, so you need to be close to see the props. In this theatre, they had 2-4 people per row for social distancing. It was the weirdest thing....and then he was on the monitors on the side walls of the theatre...which was more like watching him on television than being live, because you could not see the prop....especially when they sat people on the far outside of the rows...you missed all the action.
It was a long walk to the theatre entrance, by doors that lead outside. They were padlocked to not open, yet not closed completely. Freezing outside and freezing in the line (think of a disneyland line). Finally got to the ticket taker....and the family of 7 in front of us could not figure out how to get their tickets off the emails. The ticket taker was having long conversations about where they all lived in Florida, but he could not figure out how to scan their tickets. We stood in that freezing hall for 17 minutes as they fiddled around with their tickets. When we got there, we were second in line....when they finally got it all figured out....the line was at least 40 people behind us.
Nothing flowed!
We stopped at the concession stand for a soda, beer and 1 popcorn. $28....holy cow, I thought movie concessions were expensive! This beat those prices.
Finally got into the freezing huge theatre.....where we were too far back and too far over to the side to really enjoy all of the props.
Show started and the opening comedian (Rob Sherwood) was terrible. I have been going to live comedy shows for 30 years and love the talent. His act was like an opening act from 30 years ago. Stale divorce jokes.....and brought the entire theatre down. Boring!
Carrot Top did his best, and brought 1/2 the jokes/props I had seen before (but still loved them as they were laugh out loud funny). He was trying out new stuff to keep people laughing from 25 feet away. It did not really work.
After the show, we were going to give it two stars. As we chuckled about some of our favorite parts of the show today....we moved it to three stars.
Once the pandemic is over, and Carrot Top gets back to his smaller theatre....we will be back (hope he finds a new opening comedian!) Until then, unless he can get this huge theatre in the groove, and hire some of the incredible unemployed comedians to get the crowd going....we don't recommend.