Human Nature featured in PBS special

“Basically, ever since we started working in Vegas, everyone was telling us we should do a PBS special,” says Andrew Tierney of the vocal quartet Human Nature.

And no one needed to tell Adam Steck, producer of the Australian quartet’s Motown tribute at the Imperial Palace. “We’ve been trying since day one to get on national television,” he says. However, none of the late-night talk shows would open the door.

But after nearly a million dollars mostly financed on the group’s end, Dec. 4 brings the local PBS debut of “Human Nature Sings Motown with Special Guest Smokey Robinson,” the Motown legend who is billed as “presenter” for the group’s ongoing residency.

The special was helmed by Ken Ehrlich, a veteran producer of the Grammys who also staged Celine Dion’s new showcase at Caesars Palace. Robinson and Ehrlich’s credibility helped secure commitments to air the special on 85 percent of the country’s PBS stations, Steck says. (Unlike commercial broadcast networks, much PBS programming is chosen by the individual stations.)

Starting March 24, Human Nature also headlines a 34-city, PBS branded tour. It will raise money for affiliates while increasing awareness of the group.

“We’d like more people when they arrive in Vegas to have heard of Human Nature,” Tierney says.

Human Nature was Australia’s equivalent of a Backstreet Boys-style “boy band” before reinventing itself with Motown covers and essentially starting over again as unknowns in the United States.

“These guys haven’t been on tour since their heyday in Australia,” Steck says. “This is unprecedented, breaking an act in Vegas. It’s almost always done the other way around.”

The show moved from the Imperial Palace to film for two days in the Paris Las Vegas theater. Paris is a larger venue that also eliminated a comical technical problem you will remember if you have seen the show at the Imperial Palace: When the group gets everyone on their feet, the old showroom literally starts shaking.

Tierney says Ehrlich made small changes to the regular show, mostly to maximize Robinson’s presence. Performance segments are interspersed with discussions of how the Motown classics came to be.

The special airs at 4 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. Dec. 4 on KLVX-TV, Channel 10. …

The album came out in early October, but it just seemed too early to play it before today. “Seasons Greetings: A Jersey Boys Christmas” extends the hit Broadway musical into new branding ventures. The Christmas album is produced by Bob Gaudio, whom you know as the musical architect of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons if you’ve seen the play.

Gaudio arranges Christmas favorites for members of different “Jersey Boys” casts. Travis Cloer from the Palazzo’s edition sings “Silver Bells/Silent Night” and “Breath of Heaven/We Three Kings.” Rick Faugno, who recently left the Palazzo cast, sings “Winter Wonderland” and “Do You Hear What I Hear?”

By the way, Graham Fenton, who has worked the Las Vegas production as a swing, now alternates the Valli role with Cloer at the Palazzo. Faugno performs his cabaret act on Fridays at the Las Vegas Hilton. …

Penn Jillette once congratulated the Blue Man Group for being able to clone themselves, which Penn & Teller couldn’t do. Along those lines, if you watch the only four members of Recycled Percussion jump off ladders and stuff, you can wonder what happens if someone gets hurt.

Apparently, they play hurt. Group founder Justin Spencer’s “severe viral infection” was cited in the group postponing a 24-hour marathon concert for charity this week. But it has not felled him from the regular show at the Tropicana or altered plans for a different benefit for the Josh Stevens Foundation on Dec. 11 at the Hard Rock Cafe. …

Rick Thomas opens his Christmas show at the Tropicana on Dec. 9, which would preclude him from performing “The Nutcracker” with the Carolina Ballet even if they knew he once was a competitive ballroom dancer. But Thomas and Bill Smith, the Las Vegas-based builder of illusions for many a magician, hope to start a cottage industry with the eight illusions they are contributing to the company’s “Nutcracker.”

“Everything makes sense within the show. It’s not just doing illusions,” Thomas says of the props he hopes other ballets around the country will license down the road. …

Finally, news of two awards you might have survived this Thanksgiving without, since one is obvious and the other obscure.

Based on box office performance, the Colosseum at Caesars Palace wins the Billboard Touring Award for top venue of under 5,000 seats. This one’s a no-brainer because neither the nominated Beacon in New York City nor the Fox in Atlanta book acts that could play larger rooms at premium ticket prices.

The obscurity is mentioned because Bill Cosby is due in town Friday at Treasure Island. Did you know The Recording Academy behind the Grammy Awards has a Hall of Fame for famous or historic recordings?

You now know Cosby’s 1964 comedy album “I Started Out as a Child” has been inducted alongside Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech and the Rolling Stones’ “Exile on Main St.”

Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0288.