Despite the hostile social climate in Las Vegas the Moulin Rouge quickly became a hot spot that attracted crowds from the Strip to its after-hours club where artists like Sinatra gave impromptu performances. Other performers at the Moulin Rouge included the Platters, Count Basie, George Burns and Gregory Hines. Just six months after opening, the Moulin Rouge closed under suspicious circumstances.
It reopened in 1960 and served as a hub for activists who helped negotiate an end to segregation in the downtown and Strip casinos. The ensuing and perpetual decline of the site has been interrupted sporadically with hopes for a revival and it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1992. But so far none of the proposals have ever made it off the drawing board.
"It's in a low-income area, which makes it tough for something that elaborate to make it," historian Michael Green said in 2004. "It's not that it is in a jinxed location, I hope, but the history almost reads that way.
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