Viva Cirque Du Soleil!

Just when you think you've seen it all, along comes a new Cirque du Soleil.

For 20 years, a band of French-Canadians has been re-inventing the circus, creating shows that are ever more magical, daring, exotic, stylish, and sophisticated.

But its biggest productions are in, of all places, Las Vegas – the land of the glitz.

As Correspondent Lesley Stahl reports, Cirque du Soleil doesn't just dominate entertainment in Las Vegas. It's also changing the city's entire economy.

The first was "Mystere." It was so successful – packing crowds in for two shows a night – that they opened a second, "O," and called it Cirque in water.

Then, there was a third show, the R-rated "Zumanity," and now a fourth, "Ka," in which not only do performers fly, but so does the stage.

Cirque, headquartered in Montreal, is run by its founder, Guy Laliberte. "It's pretty good," he says of the group's success in Las Vegas. "For a little frog from Montreal."

It's pretty good for a guy who began as a street performer in Montreal, stilt-walking and breathing fire for tips. Twenty years ago, he put together his first traveling tent show. Today, he's sole owner of a global showbiz empire that includes 3,000 employees, about 700-750 performers.

Laliberte says there are 10 shows, including tent shows, up and running -- and three are in preparation.

Cirque's tent shows, each one completely different from the next, tour all around the world. But the most elaborate, over-the-top productions are in Vegas. Every night, roughly 10,000 people pay between $60 and $150 apiece to see their shows.

"Cirque du Soleil put an entirely new face on entertainment in Las Vegas," says Bobby Baldwin, a top executive with the MGM/Mirage hotel chain, Cirque's business partner in Vegas. "Ka," the newest show, is at the MGM Grand.

"I think when all the money is counted, it's gonna be about $185 million, for one show," says Baldwin.

There are entire hotels in Vegas that have been built for less than that. Most of the money went to build a huge new theatre just for "Ka," with a giant moving stage that weighs 175 tons, powered by super-computers – and super-hydraulics.

Just like the acrobats, the stage itself contorts into a boat, a beach, and a battleground. Cirque spent four years and millions more to develop the show, an epic tale of war in which the staging is so elaborate – and the stunts so risky – that 170 behind-the-scenes technicians are needed to support the cast of 80.

"These shows are designed to last forever. Some people, they say, 'Well, the Broadway show ran 32 weeks or 18 weeks. 'Mystere' at Treasure Island has been running for 14 years," says Baldwin.

Back in 1990, bringing 'Mystere' to Vegas was a big gamble. At the time, entertainment in Vegas consisted of fading stars, comedians and a couple of guys with white tigers.

"Our approach was very simple. It was about creating a universal language," says Laliberte. "A show that will be attractive toward every people coming from all over the world. And that was a big thing."

"I said, 'What language?' And they said, 'It's Cirque du Soleil language,'" says Baldwin. "So everything they do is different. And at the beginning, that's what made it so scary as an investment."

Before Baldwin was a casino executive, he won the world series of poker. Some of Cirque's own people had their doubts, like Gilles St-Croix, the vice president of Creation.

Did he think it was a crazy idea? "In '89, I went to Vegas for the first time. I was in Vegas and I said, 'What am I doing here, this so far away,'" says St-Croix. "So foreign and so far away from everything. … And Guy said, 'We will not do a show like Wayne Newton. We will do a show like Cirque du Soleil.'"

That first Cirque show, "Mystere," was a sellout within 10 days of opening. It was the beginning of a sea change for Las Vegas that hasn't stopped."

The profile of the "typical" Las Vegas visitor has changed dramatically over the last couple of years. Retirees from Middle America, who play the nickel slots, don't come to Vegas anymore. With Native-American and riverboat casinos popping up across America, they can find slot machines closer to home.

Today's Las Vegas visitors are wealthier, younger, more international – and far more sophisticated.

"We had contributed this city to grow culturally, artistically," says Laliberte. "We had proved that people could be sophisticated."

Casino owners in Las Vegas used to practically give away show tickets, hotel rooms, and food, just to lure people to the slots and the tables. But that strategy doesn't work with the new breed of visitor.

"They're very finicky as to what they eat, where they sleep and what kind of shows they go to see. And before they didn't care," says Baldwin. "They just wanted to play blackjack or shoot dice and get out of town."

But they didn't have shows like "O", with all of its "how'd they do that" numbers. There's 1.5 million gallons of water on that stage, and all of the costumes have to be replaced every couple of months because the chlorine eats away at the Lycra.

"I think people plan their trips, particularly vacations, with the idea that "O" or one of the other Cirque du Soleil shows will be on the itinerary," says Baldwin.

And that has turned the entire economic equation of Las Vegas on its head.

"I make just as much money off of you as a company, whether you gamble or you don't gamble, because most of our revenues are non-gambling," says Baldwin. "In the Bellagio hotel, 60 percent are non-gambling, and 40 percent are gambling."

He adds that "we make money off of everything," which includes shows, restaurants and the incredible shops.

Cirque, however, makes a bundle, too. Under their deal with MGM, they keep 50 percent of all ticket revenues for every show.

"So you're a billionaire," Stahl tells Laliberte.

"That's what they say," says Laliberte, who still runs his empire from French-speaking Montreal, where he may have the largest laboratory of circus arts in the world. Twenty full-time talent scouts scour the planet for the best benders, flyers, bouncers and spinners, and then bring them all to Montreal to teach them the "Cirque way."

They find talent in the smallest circus in Romania, and the biggest stadium in Athens – from the Olympics. "It's a second life for those people," says Laliberte.

Some of their most talented performers are behind the scenes in the workshops, where every costume for every show is sewn by hand. They dye and paint the fabrics themselves, hand make the wigs and headdresses, and even the shoes.

It's pretty obvious that Laliberte likes to control every aspect of his shows, and in his contracts with MGM in Las Vegas, he demands it.

Did they give him 100 percent artistic freedom? "It's not about giving. It's about, that's a non-negotiable thing," says Laliberte. "But they accept that right at the beginning."

Baldwin says he has "zero control of the creative." But Cirque continues to deliver shows that sell out night after night.

"It is important for us to make sure that every creation we'll be doing, we're doing in Vegas are distinctive, from one to the other one," says Laliberte. "Because then we start to copy ourselves. In Vegas, there's two type of people. There's the people who create, and the people who copy. And I don't want to be somebody who will copy."

You'd think they've finally reached their limit, with four shows in Vegas. But they're actually working on a fifth, set to open next year. It'll be "Cirque Meets the Beatles." Laliberte has made an unprecedented deal with Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, and the widows of John Lennon and George Harrison, to do a production based on the most famous music of our time.

"You know, the Beatles were one of the biggest things that happened in the last century," says Laliberte. "It's a serious thing. It's a risky thing. It was not about bringing back the Beatles. But their spirit will be there. That's for sure."
Now, Laliberte's creative team is brainstorming, and Cirque's scouts are searching the world for performers who can bring the songs to life.

"We discovered in India, in Agastan, a little contortionist. And all the number is done while they are carrying little bowl with a little candle on their forehead. While they're doing all their contortion," says St-Croix. "And it's so meditative, I would say, to have this tiny little girl who does that. And she climbs a rope while she's doing it. And it's just whooo."

He says he needs four little girls. "And which song is that supposed to illustrate," asks Stahl.

"'Sun King' and 'Here Comes The Sun,'" says St-Croix.

"Have you reached your point of saturation, if you have a fifth show with the Beatles," Stahl asks Laliberte.

"I don't think so," says Laliberte. "I think there's a lot of other types of shows that we could do [in Las Vegas]."

"People say that you're a real gambler," says Stahl.

"Always been. All my life," says Laliberte. "[Las Vegas] it's the perfect place for me."