Liberace Museum To Close In Las Vegas

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Sep 12th 2010 at 4:01PM

Our friends at AOL News delivered the sad news that a Las Vegas institution, the Liberace Museum, will be shutting down next month. The glitter-filled museum can no longer afford to stay open putting 30 people out of a job. The unique building is topped by a keyboard sculpture and full of Liberace's sequined costumes, jewelry and famous rhinestone-covered pianos.

The museum is operated by the Liberace Foundation, which had decided to narrow its focus to raising money for the music scholarships it has awarded for decades. Liberace Foundation board chairman Jeffrey Koep told AOL News the organization's endowment has shrunk from $12 million to $5 million and visitors had plummeted to 50,000 last year. The foundation owns the entire strip mall where the museum is located about three miles west of the Las Vegas Strip.

Some artifacts including Liberace's awards, pianos, candelabras and outfits, may be shown in other cities on a tour. But interest in the museum has been waning in recent years. There are plans for a Steven Soderbergh biopic about Liberace with Michael Douglas as the pianist and Matt Damon as his lover that could renew interest in the performer but overall Liberace is seen as an symbol of the older, gaudier Las Vegas that the hotels and casinos have tried to distance themselves from.

Tags: las vegas, liberace, liberace museum