The deconstructed musical trip through the Beatles' past is filled with characters from their songs -- the walrus, Lady Madonna, Sgt. Pepper -- parts of songs, outtakes , and fragments that are sure to please fans and at the same time leave them full of questions.
``John? Who knows about John," said George Martin, the Beatles' longtime producer , about John Lennon, who was shot and killed Dec. 8, 1980.
``If he saw the show, he'd probably say, `Yeah, but it could be better,' " said Martin, who worked with his son, Giles , to create the 90-minute show's soundscape. ``John was never satisfied with anything that he ever did in his life. In his mind, he had a dream world which could not be realized."
In ``Love," the Beatles' dream world does appear onstage.
The performance explodes early at the hotel-casino's $130 million, 2,013-seat theater in the round with ``Get Back," the band's 1969 hit, as dancers and acrobats jump and twirl in the air.
Set to blended, reversed , and enhanced parts of 130 songs and unpublished outtakes, the acrobatic and dance spectacle takes the audience through World War II, the 1960s era of ``Beatlemania," the band's reclusive studio years , and a psychedelic time that produced songs such as ``Strawberry Fields Forever" and ``Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds."
Some moments allude to real events, according to creator Dominic Champagne. Hooded figures throwing knives at a cross hint at threats made by the Ku Klux Klan against the Beatles after Lennon proclaimed in 1966 that the band was ``more popular than Jesus."
Also dramatized to ``A Day in the Life" is Julia, Lennon's mother, whose death in a traffic accident early in his life is thought to have created a bond between Lennon and McCartney, whose own mother died when he was young.
``I tried to get inspired by the lyrics, but also the moments and the motion of their careers," Champagne said. ``We tried to be spiritual and physical without trying to be too didactic. I didn't want to do the live version of `The Anthology.' We're not here to teach the Beatles story to people."
What emerged is a multitude of symbols and metaphors that will have dedicated fans dusting off their LPs and looking through lyric books.
