Who is Wayne Newton?
'Mr. Las Vegas' has been on the Sin City show circuit for more than 60 years
Wayne Newton has become a legendary fixture in Sin City and nationwide.
Born in Virginia in April 1942, “Mr. Las Vegas” dropped out of high school in 1959 during his junior year to perform with his brother at a Las Vegas hotel. Now married with two daughters, he hasn't slowed down in the slightest.
He released his first song, "Danke Schoen," in 1963, and the hit song has been featured in major movies, such as “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”
The 1986 film included a classic parade scene in which Bueller, played by Matthew Broderick, performs his own rendition of “Danke Schoen” on a parade float as it travels along the streets of Chicago.
Though the amount of money Newton made from the song’s involvement in the movie has not been reported, he wasn’t necessarily struggling for money around that time.
A 1979 People Magazine article called Newton “the most successful performer in Vegas history.”
Newton, who split with his brother in 1972, started his Vegas show tour in the early 1970s when he would perform twice every night, every day for 36 weeks of the year, according to the report.
“Wayne Newton never plays to an empty seat,” People wrote. “Nor to an empty checkbook either.”
Newton had signed a contract with Summa Corporation that promised him $8 million every year for just over 500 performances annually, the outlet reported. At the time, he also earned another $2 million annually from his music tour.
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The longtime crooner signed a multimillion-dollar agreement with the Stardust casino-hotel in 1999 and is considered to have had one of the first headliner residencies.
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Much like the saying, Newton stayed in Vegas.
He celebrated 60 years – and more than 30,000 live performances to over 40 million people – on the Vegas show circuit in January 2019, unsurprisingly by launching a new series of shows in Sin City titled “Wayne Newton: Up Close and Personal.”
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Newton purchased his famous home, dubbed Casa de Shenandoah, in 1966, but his family sold the more than 36 acres of property for $19.5 million in 2010.
Casa de Shenandoah was later purchased by Texas-based ICSD LLC, which was owned by billionaire Newton fan Lacy Harber.
A view of the "White House" on the 36-acre property. (Courtesy Casa de Shenandoah Management via MGN Online)
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ICSD purchased the property in 2010 and transformed it into a tourist attraction. However, the tourist attraction closed three years later and was placed into Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings.
In 2013, the property was listed at $70 million, but the price later dropped to $48 million, then to $30 million in 2014.
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It was sold again in July 2019 for $5.56 million.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.