Street performers scratch out livings
Hard times have spawned a new phenomenon on the Strip: dozens of panhandling superheroes, street performers and celebrity impersonators trying to survive.
You can’t walk from Tropicana Avenue to Flamingo Road without encountering an iconic cast of characters who solicit tips to pose for photos with tourists.
During five hours of random interviews on the Strip last Monday, a busy holiday, I saw Superman, Batman, Michael Jackson, Jimi Hendrix, Ozzie Osborne, a KISS member, a male showgirl, and a helmeted Spartan from the film “300” (who accepted my $10 tip for a photo and then declined to chat.)
A Latin Elvis who said he was an unemployed welder brought his own foam Welcome to Las Vegas sign for a prop. Hello Kitty danced to attract attention. Nintendo characters Mario and Luigi acted as a team and a local teen wore a crudely made tinfoil robot suit. “Just for hugs,” he said.
Those are far cleaner images than in the days, not so long ago, when parents cringed at hordes of street walkers in stilettos or the porn card workers.
It’s not easy money making a living this way, enduring 100-degree heat in body-hugging costumes and standing for 10-12 hours a day. Few have medical insurance.
And there are the wisecracking, hostile drunks looking for kicks.
“I thought Superman was in a wheelchair,” cracked an adult male as he walked past Superman character Michael Duran, a Dean Cain look-alike.
“That’s the flip side,” said Duran, a fixture at the intersection of Las Vegas Boulevard and Flamingo. “We get people who put their hands on us and spit on us. I’ve had a knife pulled on me.”
There’s a heightened sense of fear among his fellow street performers, he said, since an older Batman character was body-slammed on the sidewalk last month and a Transformer character was viciously tackled by a British thug who had it filmed for a YouTube clip.
He is one of the many street performers, maybe 35 to 40 percent of about 100, he says, who migrated from Los Angeles for greener pastures in Las Vegas.
Many who show up regularly on the Strip formerly worked Hollywood Boulevard before business dried up.
They share rides to Las Vegas and split flophouse motel rooms for 3 or 4 nights a week to conserve their cash, several street performers confirmed.
“Many of us live here and pay taxes,” said Chris Gardener, a Michael Jackson impersonator. “Some of the people from California are robbing us.”
His pal, Duran, moved here a year ago, a few months after being laid off at Disneyland, where he worked as a costume designer.
“The final straw,” he said, “was living in a tent in a friend’s backyard.”
He put his costume designer skills to work and created a $3,000 Superman suit, including the superhero’s signature red calfskin boots, which cost $1,500.
Tall and buff and sporting an “S” hair curl (for Superman) on his forehead, he’s proud to be representing his lifelong hero.
Before growing up in orphanages, his mother made him a red Superman cape. A framed photo of a 10-month-old Duran wrapped in the cape hangs proudly in his tiny living room at the Budget Suites on East Tropicana.
The apartment is a monument to Superman, with everything from posters, CDs, a T-shirt collection, vintage comic books, and action figures.
Duran shares the $200-a-week space with his girlfriend, Jasmine, who said she made $80 in two hours as Wonder Woman before getting a job at the Palms. They make enough to pay for their $450-a-month car payment and $100 in cellphone bills.
“Many of us are wearing the costumes of the characters we love. Some are doing whatever it takes to keep their families afloat,” Duran said.
THE PUNCH LINE
“Sunblock boy, senior citizens’ nude beach.” — From David Letterman’s Top Ten Worst Jobs.
Norm Clarke can be reached at (702) 383-0244 or norm@reviewjournal.com. Find additional sightings and more online at www.normclarke.com. Follow Norm on Twitter @Norm_Clarke.
