Frank Marino (female impersonator)

Famous for his lavish on-stage wardrobe (much of which was designed by Bob Mackie, who has also done fashions for Rivers), Marino has received two Las Vegas Walk of Fame stars[2] and received another star when Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman honored his hard work and commitment to the Las Vegas performance world with "Frank Marino Day" on February 1, 2005.[3]

Marino has been playing Joan Rivers in Las Vegas drag shows since 1985 and, according to his 2005 appearance on the Discovery Health Channel series Plastic Surgery: Before and After, once held the unofficial record for the longest continuous performance run at a single casino in Las Vegas when he played Rivers for more than 20 years at the Riviera Hotel and Casino in the long-running drag show An Evening at La Cage;[3] according to his website, he now holds the record as the longest-active and longest-running headliner on the Strip.[4]

In 2010, Marino moved his show to the Imperial Palace Hotel and Casino, and renamed it "Frank Marino's Divas Las Vegas". He has appeared both as his Joan Rivers persona and as himself in several movies and TV shows. Once sued by Rivers for $5,000,000 (US) in the 1980s,[5] the pair later reconciled and appeared on TV shows together.[5] Frank Marino is the highest-paid female impersonator in the world bringing in over $2.5 million a year for his show Divas Las Vegas and is worth over $20 million.[6] [7] He has earned the title of "Entertainer of the Century" from Las Vegas Today Magazine.[8]

In 2018 he appeared in ITV's Last Laugh in Vegas.

The longest-running headliner in Las Vegas history, Frank Marino, joins the longest-running production show, Legends in Concert in its legendary home at Tropicana Las Vegas. “I’m truly honored to be joining the cast of Legends in Concert for a limited engagement. I think it’s the perfect marriage of Las Vegas’s longest running show and the longest running headliner. I’m simply ecstatic to be going from Diva status to a Legend inside the world famous iconic Tropicana Las Vegas where I’ll be retiring the Joan Rivers character from my act. As Joan would say “Can We Talk? This is the last time you’ll be able to see me play tribute to the legendary first lady of comedy.”

“Legends in Concert continues to evolve with each new incredible cast, and we are very excited to bring legendary comedy to our fans with the talents of the one and only Frank Marino,” said Mark Mercer, Corporate Marketing Director of Legends in Concert. “It is truly fitting that he will perform his tribute to Joan Rivers in the same showroom she once headlined.” 1

Marino currently resides in Las Vegas.[9] In late 2004, Marino, his birth mother Mary Mastrangelo, and his then-longtime partner's mother Malka Schechter were filmed for a feature for Plastic Surgery: Before and After, having a family outing at Dr. Goesel Anson's plastic surgery practice; the trio's plastic surgery results were shown for the first time on national TV in May 2005.

• https://www.frankmarino.com/