Treasure Island Hotel & Casino (also known as "TI") is a hotel and casino located on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, USA with 2,664 rooms and 220 suites, and is connected by tram to The Mirage as well as pedestrian bridge to the Fashion Show Mall shopping center. Since March 2009, TI is owned and operated by Phil Ruffin.
The hotel received the AAA Four Diamond rating each year from 1999 through 2013.
History
Treasure Island was opened by Mirage Resorts in 1993 under the direction of Steve Wynn at a cost of US$450 million. The initial plans called for a tower addition to The Mirage, but later evolved into a full-fledged separate hotel casino resort. Treasure Island originally intended to attract families with whimsical pirate features and icons such as the skull-and-crossbones strip marquee, a large video arcade, and staged pirate battles nightly in "Buccaneer Bay" in front of the casino entrance on the Strip.
The resort was originally designed by architect Jon Jerde in collaboration with Steve Wynn along with Roger Thomas who designed the interior of Treasure Island Hotel and Casino.
In 2003, the hotel largely abandoned its pirate theme for a more contemporary resort choosing to provide primarily adult amenities and services. The original video arcade and kid-friendly pool areas were replaced with a party bar, hot tub, and nightclub. The famous skull-and-crossbones sign at the Strip entrance was replaced by a dual-purpose "TI" marquee displaying the hotel logo and serving as a large LCD video screen. The exterior color of the hotel was also changed from a light orange to a darker maroon color.
On December 15, 2008, MGM Mirage announced the resort would be sold for US$775 million to Phil Ruffin, former owner of the New Frontier Hotel and Casino. Ruffin took full ownership of the hotel and casino resort on Friday, March 20, 2009.
On October 21, 2013, the Sirens of TI pirate battle show closed in order to add a new multi-level shopping and entertainment center which opened in April 2015 with a 24-hour CVS as the anchor tenant along with the Marvel Avengers S.T.A.T.I.O.N. exhibit, which opened May 26, 2016.
On June 18, 2016, Michael Steven Sandford attempted to assassinate presidential candidate Donald Trump during a political rally held at Treasure Island.
Film and television history
- In 1994, shortly after the hotel's launch, a promotional TV movie, Treasure Island: The Adventure Begins debuted on NBC. The film, starring Jason Beghe, featured the implosion of The Dunes.
- The sign for Treasure Island is shown in the 2003 film Looney Tunes: Back In Action
- In the 2004 movie Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, while Steve the Pirate is walking down Fremont Street, someone drives by yelling "Go back to the Treasure Island". An alternative ending to the movie was that the Average Joes lost the dodgeball tournament, but got their money back when Steve won it at Treasure Island.
- In the movie Miss Congeniality 2, a climactic fight scene took place in the lagoon, with a main character trapped inside a sinking ship.
- In the movie Beavis and Butthead Do America, the original Treasure Island sign, along with the pirate ship outside the hotel, are briefly seen as Beavis and Butthead are driving down the Las Vegas strip in a limo.
- Treasure Island appears in the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. In the game it is called "Pirates in Mens Pants" (a pun referencing Pirates of Penzance).
- In the movie Knocked Up, Ben (Seth Rogen) and Pete (Paul Rudd) see Mystère by Cirque du Soleil at Treasure Island during their road trip to Las Vegas.
- In the video game Driver 2, Treasure Island can be seen in the Las Vegas level where it's been named "Pirates Island".
- In the manga and anime "Eyeshield 21", the Deimon Devil Bats end their 2000km "death march training" from Houston, TX by reaching and staying at Treasure Island.
- In the NBC television show Las Vegas, the ending of the season 2 premiere episode was filmed at the hotel.
- Treasure Island is often seen during fly-over images of the Las Vegas Strip in the mega-hit television drama series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.
- Many shots in the television show Las Vegas are filmed as though they are in Treasure Island.
Entertainment
The resort is home to Cirque du Soleil's Mystère, which introduced the entertainment style of Franco Dragone. The show opened in 1993 as the original Cirque du Soleil production in Las Vegas. Mystère has been voted nine times as the best production show in the city by the Las Vegas Review Journal reader's poll. With the sale of TI, it is the only hotel on the strip to host a Cirque du Soleil show that is not affiliated with MGM Resorts International.
Treasure Island opened with the free "Buccaneer Bay" show in a large man-made lake fronting the resort along the Las Vegas Strip. Presented several times nightly with a large cast of stunt performers, the show depicted the landing and subsequent sacking of a Caribbean village by pirates, serving to attract gamblers from the strip and into the casino after each show in the same fashion as its predecessor, the Wynn-conceived volcano fronting The Mirage casino. Notable special effects included a full-scale, manned British Royal Navy sailing ship that sailed nearly the full width of the property, a gas-fired "powder magazine" explosion, pyrotechnics, and the sinking to the bottom of the sailing ship "Brittania" along with its captain.
In 2003, "Buccaneer Bay" was replaced with "Sirens' Cove" and the new show, "The Sirens of TI" utilizing many of the technical elements of its predecessor. The live, free show was intended to appeal more to adults by including singing, dancing, audio-visual effects, bare-chested pirates and attractive women in the large outdoor show produced by Kenny Ortega.
The Sirens of TI was closed on October 21, 2013. The closure was initially intended to be temporary, but in November, it was made permanent, to the dismay of the show's actors. The reason cited by Treasure Island was the construction of new retail space nearby.
References
External links
- Official website
- Google maps with StreetView
- Entertainment Engineering Inc., Buccaneer Bay Construction
- Treasure Island Facebook Page
