Celebrity no-shows raise casino questions-WEB ONLY

Arrangements for the appearance, he said, were being handled by
Baltimore-based The Cordish Co., owners of the casino. He said there
were no appearance fees as part of the deal.

Cordish officials were not available for comment before IBJ Daily’s deadline.
 
If the celebrities were expected to attend, the casino didn’t go out of
its way to prepare for the visit. Hammerle said there were no on-site
arrangements made for extra security, logistics, transportation and
other matters that are standard for such high-level celebrity
appearances.
 
And Barbara Coles, of Indianapolis-based Coles Marketing
Communications, which handled the press release touting the
participation of Timberlake and Biel in the ribbon-cutting, said she
was aware of no plans regarding how much the duo would participate and
whether they would talk to media, etc.

She, too, said all the planning was being handled by Cordish, and that,
amid the activity of the opening, she didn’t even know whether the
stars had made it.
 
That’s in marked contrast to how such events are usually handled.
 
Patty Freedman of Los Angeles-based Andrew Freedman Public Relations –
who arranged appearances earlier this month for actresses Heather
Graham, Hayden Panettiere and others at the opening of the Royal
Hawaiian Resort – said that any such events would have a
minute-by-minute itinerary.

Freedman said, because of transportation times, organizers should have
had at least eight hours to notify the public that the two weren’t
attending. Indiana Live gave no notice, even as the event was taking
place.

“An RSVP through friends is hardly a commit,” she added. “It sounds
like someone said, ‘I can get JT there’ and it was released and
reported and got too far gone to reel back in. Happens all the time.
It’s possible that JT and JB never even knew they were scheduled to be
there.”