Las Vegas singer and burlesque artist Melody Sweets sounds terrified to take the stage with Jeff Goldblum, and not because she hasn’t performed live in Las Vegas in more than two years. “When I was a kid I used to have nightmares about him from [the 1986 film] The Fly. That ruined me for years,” she says. “I can still see him peeling his body parts off.”
In all seriousness, though, Sweets says she’s over the moon to be returning to the Vegas stage for a pair of March 11 shows at Virgin’s intimate 24 Oxford, during which she’ll perform alongside the iconic actor and sometimes jazz pianist. She says Goldblum’s team sought her out, which was a surprise to her, and that she has been rehearsing songs from his latest album, along with standards by the likes of Nina Simone and Rosemary Clooney.
“I’ve been doing all my Jeff Goldblum,” she says, “including watching his show on Disney+ where he’s ... traveling around introducing you to all these cool things and his point of view on them. It’s weird and interesting.”
Sweets, who first came to Las Vegas from New York to originate the role of the Green Fairy in Absinthe, says she has had other chances to return to live performance during the pandemic but opted to wait. Eschewing her former scenester status, she has kept secluded to keep some members of her family safe, while waiting for a special spark to pull her back out.
“I’ve been asked to do a few things and turned them down because I haven’t felt the passion for those projects, she says, “and I feel like I need to be passionate in order to put it on a stage, because the audience wants to see that passion.
“I’m so ready to be back onstage, and this has kind of pushed me to get back on the horse.”
The horse she’s referring to is actually a show, one that had been in development for quite some time and was preparing for a possible launch at Cleopatra’s Barge at Caesars Palace pre-COVID. The pandemic dusted her plans twice over when Caesars closed that legendary lounge venue, also dashing Sweets’ dreams of “sharing a venue with my husband, Wayne Newton,” she giggles.
“One of the [reasons] I hopped on this opportunity [with Goldblum] is that I get to be back onstage with a beautiful band,” she says. “There’s definitely live music in my [show], and of course some burlesque, although I had to promise I’d keep my clothes on for these shows, or at least most of them.”
With the success of sexy, smaller-scale Strip productions like Absinthe and interesting new entertainment venues popping up all over town as the city tries to put the pandemic in the rearview mirror, Sweets sounds optimistic that the next version of her show will find the right home and audience.
“I would most definitely like to be on the Strip, but Downtown has some really great stuff happening right now and ... I wouldn’t be opposed to that,” she says. “This [gig] is definitely pulling me out of the pandemic shadows and has given me a lot of inspiration and motivation to go into high gear. And I’m just looking forward to having fun and to see my friends in the audience again, and make new friends in the audience and finally connect with people again.”
JEFF GOLDBLUM & THE MILDRED SNITZER ORCHESTRA With Melody Sweets. March 11, 7 & 9:30 p.m., $49-$149. 24 Oxford, 702-693-5000, virginhotelslv.com.
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