They did this once already: Eydie Gorme and Steve Lawrence at the final show in the Circus Maximus at Caesars Palace on Sept. 3, 2000. This weekend they bring the curtain down on the Stardust. Photo by Jeff Scheid.

"We're starting to take this a little personally," says Steve Lawrence. "We're not going to hold the last note too long because I believe the wrecking ball's in the parking lot."

Lawrence and singing spouse Eydie Gorme have the honor of bringing down the curtain on the Stardust Theater today and Saturday. Mostly by coincidence, they also were the last act to perform in the Circus Maximus showroom at Caesars Palace in September 2000.

"We have a plaque now: 'Book Steve & Eydie. They're dynamite,' '' Lawrence quips.

The venerable couple brings the right touch of old-Vegas class to the bittersweet occasion. The long-married crooners first started working the Strip in 1957, a year before the Stardust opened on July 2, 1958. But they never performed at the Stardust until 2004. And the theater had a very short resume until 2000, with only two shows on its stage in all the years before then.

It was the Stardust that cemented the iconic image of the Las Vegas showgirl by importing "Lido de Paris" for the hotel opening. The revue ran through February 1991, followed by "Enter the Night," an attempt to update the showgirl format. Headliners arrived only in the new century, at first to cover for resident star Wayne Newton when he was performing for U.S. troops overseas.

But it's "Lido" that will most likely remain synonymous with the Stardust after the casino closes Wednesday, to make way for Boyd Gaming's $4 billion Echelon Place. The lavish floor show had two hallmarks that still distinguish Las Vegas entertainment to this day: spectacle and topless women.

"It was the forerunner of all those great, beautiful-lady shows," Lawrence says. "That was the style of that day. And that day lasted for many years."

"Lido" was the one good thing to come out of the long, troubled effort to build the Stardust. The building project was delayed for three years when its original visionary -- Tony Cornero, the "Mr. Lucky" who operated offshore gambling ships -- dropped dead of a heart attack on the Desert Inn casino floor in 1955.

During the time it took for new investors working with Desert Inn operator Moe Dalitz to emerge from bankruptcy court, Dalitz and Frank Sennes, the Desert Inn's entertainment director, had time to scope out something completely new for the Strip.

They knew their choreographer, Donn Arden, traveled back and forth to work on "Lido de Paris," and decided to license the "Lido" from its French producers. While the casino itself had a utilitarian design and its five motel wings were lined up like military barracks, the investors spared no expense on the Cafe Continental showroom.

The stage was outfitted with six hydraulic lifts that could be raised and lowered separately or locked together. There was a 30-foot swimming tank, and an ice rink that could be brought to stage level in 15 seconds. Each show included an eruption of fireworks from an Eiffel Tower replica.

But the human cast, including French figure skater Jacqueline du Bief and "The World-Famed Bluebell Girls," was not to be upstaged. The topless showgirls were the first to be seen on the Strip outside the context of a burlesque revue.

Over the years, Las Vegas audiences witnessed live elephants, jousting knights on horseback and simulated disasters such as the bursting of Hoover Dam. Every two years, the old feathers and costumes were taken out to the desert and burned to avoid paying import taxes, and a new edition with a new cast of showgirls was flown in from Paris.

The last all-new edition of "Lido" opened in late 1977. By then, it was becoming cost-prohibitive to update the show, and popular tastes were changing. Though Siegfried & Roy injected new interest with their headlining spot from 1978 through 1981, the show grew faded and tired after the magical duo departed for their own show at the Frontier.

By 1991, Boyd Gaming realized the name it had paid to license wasn't buying much anymore and the showgirl had become a public-domain symbol rather than one synonymous with "Lido." After 32 years, the curtain fell on Feb. 28, 1991.

"Enter the Night" followed that summer, and was partly successful in its attempt to fuse the showgirl revue with elements of a Broadway musical. The show ran through 1999, but had only a couple of years in the spotlight before Cirque du Soleil's "Mystere" arrived in late 1993. The show, like the Stardust itself, dropped from a "must-see" to a more value-focused middle tier.

To bring back some old-Vegas marquee value, Wayne Newton's name went on the theater from 2000 through early 2005. During that time, the vintage showroom also hosted the Cuban revue "Havana Nightclub" and headliners ranging from Bob Newhart to Kevin Spacey's tribute to Bobby Darin.

"The only thing constant is change," Lawrence says. "We keep going through it not only in Las Vegas but in every part of our business and culture."

Lawrence and Gorme are keeping up with some of the changes -- Gorme recently started a blog on steveandeydie.com. And the 71-year-old Lawrence recently returned to the historic recording studio at Capitol Records to do vocals for a new big band album.

He and his wife would like to record together again, and Lawrence is "looking for material that we haven't done." Or that hasn't been done by Rod Stewart. "The only thing that pleases me about that is he did bring that music to a new audience," Lawrence says of Stewart's big-selling albums of standards.

He doesn't know where Steve & Eydie will resurface, but there are still a few vintage hotels to be closed.

"After this we're going to be in the coffee shop at the Rio," he jokes.