Las Vegas Weekly

April 9, 2009 · 11:47 AM

Photo Gallery: Miss USA 2009 is giving Las Vegas global TV exposure

By Robin Leach

Miss Missouri USA Stacey Smith celebrates her 23rd birthday with a large ice cream sundae at Diablo's Cantina.

Photo: Shelly Cook

Television cameras have followed the visiting Miss USA 2009 pageant contestants day and night as they’ve trekked up and down the Strip this week. The footage from their charity work and visits to our restaurants and shows will be edited to be shown on NBC’s two-hour live telecast April 19.

Additionally, VegasHD’s fiber-optic links that feed the broadcast live to New York for international transmission also will be used for the first time to display the program on TV screens throughout Planet Hollywood -- and on the world's largest TV billboard right there on the Strip outside the hotel for tourists to watch live!

Miss USA official photographers Darren Decker and Patrick Prather captured this new photo gallery for Vegas DeLuxe when the 51 contestants attended Cirque du Soleil’s Ka spectacular at MGM Grand and Lance Burton’s magic show at the Monte Carlo. Miss USA 2008 Crystle Stewart was even plucked from the audience to be cut in half by the illusionist! Crystle’s been put back together again safely so she can pass on the reign to her successor in 10 days.

Lance met all the contestants and performed close-up magic tricks for them that still had them baffled even though they were up close and in his face! He posed for a photo with Miss Kentucky USA Maria Montgomery, as Lance hails from the Bluegrass State, too.

Before his magic show at the Monte Carlo, the glamour girls dined at Diablo’s Cantina there, and Miss Missouri USA Stacey Smith, celebrating her 23rd birthday, proved that the calories of an ice cream sundae don’t frighten a beauty queen!

Photo: Darren Decker

Kentucky native Lance Burton with Miss Kentucky USA Maria Montgomery.

This weekend, the 51 contestants end their fun touring schedule and start five long days of rehearsals for the pageant. They will learn their walking patterns and dance routines and rehearse their introductions and onstage appearances. Vegas DeLuxe will have continuing coverage, and then of course the first interview and photos with the newly crowned champion.

Meantime, our embedded special correspondent Miss Nevada USA Georgina Vaughan will continue to file her reports from inside Pageant Center!

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

Share This