Las Vegas Weekly

July 28, 2009 · 3:01 PM

Poetry in motion: From grand closing to grand closed

By Xania Woodman

Poetry Nightclub.

UPDATE: Owner Mike Goodwin reports that Poetry nightclub inside the Forum Shops inside Caesars Palace will not reopen for a final weekend, making last weekend the bittersweet end. "I think we have a bright future ahead of us," says Goodwin in his typically lighthearted, optimistic fashion. "I think we've built ourselves a good reputation ... We look froward to achieving greater goodness in our next location." Goodwin estimates a three month hiatus until the new location can be secured, outfitted, permitted and opened. See you in the fall!

“We were always planning on leaving anyway,” says Mike Goodwin, whose high-end hip-hop club has operated—first as O-PM, later Poetry—above Wolfgang Puck’s now closed Chinois Asian fusion restaurant inside the Forum Shops since May 22, 2003.

The closure of Chinois last Saturday has precipitated the early closure and movement of Poetry nightclub to a new venue elsewhere in Vegas.

Forum Shops and Caesars Palace mandates that a particular crowd-control gate had to be closed at midnight had a devastating effect on Poetry over the last year, and Goodwin has long fought to right what he sees as an egregious and racially-motivated wrong. So, while Goodwin says he has long been looking for a new venue, news of the closure has moved up moving day for Poetry. Goodwin says he is already in negotiations with a venue on the Las Vegas Strip and will make Poetry’s new address public when the ink has dried on a new deal.

Goodwin also expects to hear at any moment whether or not he will be able to open Poetry in its current location for one last weekend, in which case Sunday, August 2 will be Poetry’s final night. “If not,” he jokes, “it would be last Sunday night!”

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