Venetian to Introduce Audience Participation Poker

[screamingmimi04]

The popularity of poker on television is the catalyst for the Venetian Resort Hotel and Casino to try a new audience participation show in its showroom beginning in mid-October.

The new show combines several elements, which will revolve around poker's Texas Hold 'Em, with prizes including the possibility of a lucky audience member walking away with $1,000,000.

The audience will watch a tournament which will feature some of the best known players in the world, including Doyle Brunson, Daniel Negreanu and Phil Hellmuth, Jr. These tournaments will be about 90 minutes long. Each member of the audience can play along with the help of a wireless, handheld touch-screen device which is equipped in each theater seat.

The game enables audience members to play poker in the game with the poker celebrities. Six audience members will be chosen at random at the beginning of each show. They get to sit at the poker table on stage with the two pro players. with the virtual 9th player being each audience member, who is dealt an electronically generated hand on the handheld device to go along with the cards that are dealt onstage. There will also be monitors to help everyone keep track of the action.

Each member of the audience gets 100,000 points at the beginning of the game. The goal is to increase the total points, which will be tracked by an electronic leader board.

Near the shows end, the final player from the original 6 on stage, and the final professional player will be joined onstage by the audience member with the most accumulated points.

The members of the audience will also be able to add to their total points by making simple bets, such as what the next card suit will be dealt, or whether a poker pro can correctly guess where a member of the audience is from...this all is done by way of the handheld devices.

The shows host will be comedian Paul Rodriguez, with added entertainment by the poker pros. The casual atmosphere will enable the pros to joke and needle each other in a way that they cannot due during most tournaments when so much money is at stake.

Prizes that may be awarded to members of the audience include things like jewelry, plasma-screen tvs, and logo merchandise which will be given at random and also for their performance during play.

A $1,000,000 jackpot will be up for grabs at the end of each show when some audience members are dealt a royal flush.

[hbradley]

I would love to be in that audience. I love poker but I don't know if I could really keep up. I do have a few suggestions for the players when I watch on tv and I am usually right.
It would be awesome to win stuff like that and the money dang.