Shania Twain, back in the spotlight in Las Vegas

USA Today - November 28. 2012


Shania Twain, back in the spotlight in Las Vegas

Can the country-pop legend "take the Vegas residency to the next level"?
Starting Saturday, the world will find out.




By Marco Della Cava, USA TODAY


LAS VEGAS – There's a telling lyric in Man! I Feel Like a Woman! off Shania Twain's Come On Over, her monster 1997 release whose global sales of 40 million copies make it the biggest album ever by a female artist.

"The best thing about being a woman," sings the Canadian-born siren, "is the prerogative to have a little fun."

But the thing is, Twain wasn't.

"For a good 10 to 12 years, I was working non-stop and I wasn't really enjoying my success," says Twain, 47, draped in black leather and lace and nestled in a suite high above the glittering Strip. "What was there to enjoy about it, really? I wondered, 'What is success exactly?' "

Now, it seems, she knows. There's being with Frederic Thiebaud, 42, her husband of nearly two years, and son, Eja, 11. There's riding horses and writing songs. But an activity even she didn't anticipate is committing to Shania: Still the One, a two-year concert residency at Caesars Palace that begins Saturday.

"I won't lie, I've had a lot of discouraging moments in the past years, moments I wasn't sure about things and doubted myself," says the singer, whose personal journey has known more than a few unpleasant turns. "I didn't know Vegas was where I'd end up at the end of my climb up that big mountain of life, but here I am."

And this time, she's taking her own lyrical advice.

"My husband, my manager and my sister Carrie (Ann Brown) have all been saying, 'Enjoy your talent for a change, just have fun with it,' " Twain says. "The only reason I have this opportunity (to perform at The Colosseum) is because the talent is already there and the dues have been paid. So, right, I'll have fun."
Famously hands-on, Twain helped steer her own groundbreaking career – which controversially fused country with pop long before Taylor Swift donned that mantle – by writing songs, choosing her outlandish outfits and even staging and editing cheeky music videos typified by her midriff-baring swagger through That Don't Impress Me Much.

So there's little surprise that she charged into Still the One determined to create a Vegas spectacle that both leverages her assets (from natural beauty to engaging showmanship) and reflects her personality (rugged individualist with a passion for nature). And she's got one more thing going for her – the incalculable appeal of having been a cultural phenomenon only to then leave the eye of that hurricane. Her last tour was in support of 2002's Up!.

"When she was big, there were none bigger," says Ian Drew, senior music editor at Us Weekly. "Vegas is not a place for teeny-boppers, and many adults who go there are the folks who still hold Shania in their hearts. For someone who had her status, this is a logical move."

Twain will perform approximately 60 shows a year with one run now through Dec. 15 and another in March and April. The remaining dates are still to be scheduled; prices range from $55 to $250.

"I think she can take the Vegas residency to the next level," says John Meglen, CEO of AEG Live, who has built a small stable of legends for the 4,100-seat Caesars venue that include the pioneering Celine Dion, Elton John, Rod Stewart and now Twain. "The Colosseum works if you've been a very successful singer, songwriter and performer. But that last one is key for us, and she's one of the best."

Meglen says he's been pursuing Twain going back 10 years, when The Colosseum had just been constructed for Dion. Twain's glam fireworks-laden halftime performance of Man! I Feel Like a Woman! at the 2003 Super Bowl only further convinced him that she'd score in Sin City. Two years ago, Twain finally took the bait and started mulling the notion.

"Women drive most of the show ticket purchases, and when I hear them walking out of Celine, there's a lot of talk about the glamour and the spectacle, both of which Shania brings to the table," he says.

Twain plans to bring more than just that. Like a horse. And her sister.

"It's true, I'll have both up there with me," she says with a booming laugh. "When I agreed to do this show, I said I will only do it if I'm surrounded by my favorite things, and I've stayed true to those wishes."

Twain won't reveal just how or when a great black horse will become her co-star (the regal equine is featured in posters for Still the One), but says Brown – along with a Canadian singing duo of twin brothers called RyanDan – is part of the entire show.

"I told her I wasn't doing this without her," she says. "We haven't been on stage together since I was 10 and she was 8. My records feature a lot of harmonizing, and in past shows we hired someone to do that. But my sister sounds a lot like me, so it will sound more like the records than ever before."

Twain promises that her show will feature "all the big hits, some of which will be presented in very personal ways, and others will offer some larger-than-life moments that really belong to Vegas."

To create such spectacle, Twain has teamed with Raj Kapoor, a veteran director of tours for Carrie Underwood, Demi Lovato and American Idol. He says their mutual goal is to "combine a rock 'n' roll concert with real theater," adding that the production includes 13 musicians, four dancers, six costume changes, huge video screens and an unusual treat for the senses. Smell.

"She and I were talking and saying how when she comes out, there should be this overwhelming scent of a beautiful woman," says Kapoor with a chuckle. "So she created a perfume (Still the One, to be sold on site) which you'll smell in the audience, along with a few other atmospheric smells that will accompany other parts of the show."

So that's just one example of how Twain is having fun with the new show, exercising her "creative brain like crazy" in a way that helps keep doubt at bay.

Mostly gone now is the stage fright that has accompanied Twain – born Eilleen Edwards in Windsor, Ontario – since the days when she performed in bars and even strip clubs as a preteen to help her mother and stepfather, Jerry Twain, make ends meet.

And while she can't erase the darker parts of her life – abuse at the hands of her stepfather, the death of her mother and Twain in a 1987 car accident, and the surreal drama that saw her husband and producer Robert "Mutt" Lange run off in 2008, after 15 years of marriage, with her best friend while Twain fell for the woman's husband, Frederic – she's moved closer to acceptance.

"I had to put one foot in front of the other in order to move forward," says Twain, who in 2011 detailed her ordeals in both the autobiography From This Moment On and Why Not? With Shania Twain, a six-episode series on the Oprah Winfrey Network.

"There were moments I had to take a few leaps. Writing the book was a process, publishing it for the world to see was a leap. The TV shows were a leap," she says softly, brushing a stray strand of leonine chestnut-colored hair aside. "I said to myself, 'You're going to have to force yourself a little bit and face some fears in order to get to the next stage.' And that allowed me to commit to the Vegas idea. To really embrace it."

Not that she anticipates the coming years will be a walk in the park. Beyond the show, she's also promising that a long-awaited and oft-delayed new album will be a priority as soon as her concerts get under way. "I've got all these great songs," she says.

One big upside of Still the One: Her son Eja "will really get to see what Mommy does," she says with motherly pride.

A down side? "Finding a balance between my personal and professional life. I was cooking and mommying and doing all those things, and now I was having to think about how I was going to balance this gigantic career demand and still be a good mother and a good wife and be good to myself."

Beaming at Twain from across the suite is her Swiss-born husband, a former Nestle executive.

Thiebaud, whom she just calls Fred, is an affable sort who talks in animated tones about their life together along Switzerland's Lake Geneva (a favorite pastime is hitting the fabled Montreux Jazz Festival each summer) and more recently on an island in the Bahamas. "There is so much to see there," he says in accented English. "Life is an adventure."

Now add to that mix some time in the desert mirage that is Las Vegas. "It should be fun," Thiebaud says with a boyish wink.

Happy wife, happy life, the saying goes. And Twain, finally, is happy. Right?

"Yes, I am happy about a lot of things that I wasn't happy about for a long time, and it's a great place to be," she says.

So, what is happiness? She thinks about this for a blink, then answers.

"I sat down beside a technician on my new show the other day. He'd been working 18 hours straight and it was already 11 o'clock at night and I was going to bed and he was still carrying on. So I asked him, 'How's it going?' and he said with a smile, 'I'm living the dream,' " she says, beaming.

"And I go, yeah, wow, that's right, that's the reason we're all doing it, because we really are living the dream," she says. "And that's happiness."


http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2012/11/28/shania-twain-returns-las-vegas-caesars-residency/1710625/



John -

Nice to see she hasnt gone down the botox road, she looks way more natural than most celebs younger than her. I hope she doesnt give in to it.