Celebrity no-shows raise casino questions-WEB ONLY

Days after the no-show of announced A-list celebrities Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel to the grand opening of Indiana Live Casino, questions remain as to whether organizers truly expected the star couple to attend the highly publicized event.

Mark Hammerle, general manager for the Shelbyville casino, insisted this morning that he believed the stars actually were going to be there for the Friday night event, which drew highway-exit-closing traffic on Interstate 74.

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. No notice was given 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.”

Calls to publicists for both celebrities were not returned this morning.

“Let the casino know that I would love to get them celebs next time who will actually post,” Freedman added.