Atlantic City – Playboy Casino
The beginning -
Dead of winter 1977 and the usual suspects Angelo Lorenzo ( Chester) Johnny Falco ( John Boy), George Cohen ( George Oobatz ( Italian slang for crazy)),Fat Philly, Lenny Weissman and I are in AC researching possibilities for our casino dreams.
Casino Madeira Portugal
Currently we have a casino office in Manhattan on 60th Street around the corner from Bloomingdale's, our company is called Madeira Associates, as we are pursuing gambling opportunities on that most beautiful of Portuguese Islands, Madeira.
My partners not coincidentally operate at that time the premiere underground casino in Manhattan, located at 11 East 71st.Their clients Manhattans high rollers. They do this without first getting permission from the downtown mafia family, a fact that almost cost them their lives a couple of years later. Their lives spared only because of the fact that they were earners, and after a heavy fine stayed in action.
.Anyway and however, we are not in action in Atlantic City, a bit over our budget, but Resorts International is currently building Atlantic City's first casino of the new Atlantic City to be, it is due to open the following summer, we are standing on the boardwalk in front of the construction site, its February 1977 and maybe there are a dozen other boardwalk enthusiasts out on this brutal winter night.
A year later? The boardwalk is mobbed as is Resorts International Casino. People are lined up to play Blackjack, Roulette, craps and
the slots, thousands of them. I ask myself where were these people a year ago, my guess is home alone, with their TV set, now they have joined the cabaret so to speak. All the lonely people. Playing the slots mostly, known these days as the crack cocaine of the casino business. Addictive at a price that initially seems cheap, but ends up the opposite. The casinos best bet, one hundred machines can be operated and maintained by maybe seven employees, including two technicians, one hundred table games is labor intensive. Also the slots never lose big, those million dollar prizes are not free, they only pay that when many millions have been won. Simple math
The cash count room of Resorts casino is stacked to its ceilings with cone hundred dollar bills won from the table games, nobody expected this kind of business, people urinate in their blackjack seats rather than leave the table and lose their opportunity to become rich immediately, or rather to experience the highs and lows of life in one sitting. The BJ chairs are replaced on a weekly basis, and gladly so by the shareholders of Resorts stock, business profits in Atlantic City are 150 times greater than estimated projections. The joint is rocking.
A few years later in the spring of 1981 with many new casinos opened, the usual suspects and a few of our friends ascend upon the newly opened Playboy Casino.
Having just left Vegas we are given royal accommodations as my partners John Boy and Chester are Vegas high rollers and Atlantic City is hoping to attract Vegas regulars to its beach front casinos. A very different Vegas then, now Corporations control things not the mob and its imaginations, its different, for the worse I might add. The glamour imaginary or not is gone. Vegas these days can be a family vacation. Vegas likes that, get them hooked early.
I remember our crew laughing at a friend years ago because he had that family vision, he thought a water park would be a great idea, we laughed, but he was oh so right. The wise guys were not so wise on that deal.
The Atlantic City casinos employees are babes in the woods to the casino business,young and beautiful and still not Vegas hardened, easy prey to be concise. Unlike the Vegas employees whom over the years had become hardened to the unfairness of life, as it is difficult to watch someone your not impressed with bet more on one hand of blackjack then you earn dealing cards in one year.
The casino had three levels and views from each floor of the Atlantic Ocean and boardwalk .Sounds charming, but in fact the casino was ill conceived, it is nearly impossible to control three different floors of a casino correctly, too many scams to watch-divided, and a casino with a view? The only view should be the casino interior view, its a gambling business, not a scenic tour.
Needless to say the Playboy Casino was short lived, and our crew may have contributed to its demise. We were Playboys guests for over 30 days, everything comped. Caviar and roast duck and two eggs over light for breakfast was normal and more importantly-free.
We had the same deal at Caesars Palace in Vegas, occupying the Fantasy Suite for thirty days, fully comped, hence Playboy felt obliged to do the same, but Caesars is another story for another time. Back to Atlantic City.
Of course the best thing about the Playboy Casino were the Playboy Bunnies, and their bunny dip! This during the era when Stewardess's and Bunnies were admired for their good lucks and poise. Long before wide body jets and wide bodied flight attendants of all genders replaced them. The Bunnies as well as the Playboy Casino also a thing of the past,also their bunny Mothers,
So sad!Yes there were actually Bunny Mothers, usually a former Bunny now in charge of her baby bunnies, she now being mama material as she had hit thirty years of age or so.
In retrospect those were innocent days compared to today's, a bunny dip was considered risque,a few years before TV blocked out Elvis's gyrating hips on the Ed Sullivan show, today anything goes. To sum it up street style, the world is tackier.
Anyway not too many years later in the early 80s our curiosity about the casino business bears fruit as we become concessionaires and casino operators aboard Chandris cruise lines fleet, The SS Galileo, The SS Britannis, and the Amerikanis. New York City, Miami and Puerto Rico based cruise ships. We operate the casinos as Harrington Corporation. A name chosen for its ethnicity. My partners felt that the less known about their heritage and illegal casino activity the better, they, Harrington was their beard so to speak.
We operate weekend cruises for Chandris on the Galileo to “Nowhere” from the West side of Manhattan during the summer, these are 12 hour cruises to as it is stated Nowhere!, meaning departing the pier at 6 pm we head past the Verrazzano-Narrows bridge and once three miles from Port our casino opens as three miles from port is considered International waters, so anything goes, out there in Nowhere land,almost anything.. But that is another story.