My Town: Penn Jillette’s Picks for Las Vegas

Penn Jillette, 68, and his magic partner Teller are currently performing multiple times a week with a Las Vegas residency at the Rio Las Vegas Hotel and Casino, and a new season of their CW reality competition show, Penn & Teller: Fool Us, launches Oct. 27. On the show, magicians perform their best tricks, and if Penn & Teller can’t guess how they were done, the competitor wins an appearance at the pair’s Vegas show. After you’ve checked out their magic act for yourself, Jillette shares which Sin City hot spots you should visit for the best food, entertainment and people watching.

Catch more magic at …

Fortunately, two of my best friends have two of the best shows. The best comedy magician in the world is Mac King, and he does afternoon shows at the Excalibur [The Mac King Comedy Magic Show]. And when magicians come in from all over the world, they’re all going to see Mac King in the afternoon. He’s just fabulous. And then my other really good friend is Piff the Magic Dragon, and he also does one of the best shows in Vegas [at the Flamingo Las Vegas Hotel and Casino].

You can see Piff the Magic Dragon perform at the Flamingo Las Vegas Hotel and Casino.

AaronP/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images/Getty Images

Satisfy your hunger at …

Edo Tapas & Wine. The best. My favorite place in Vegas. … My Spanish friends, when they come over to visit, they can’t believe it’s in a strip mall. I’m an insufferable vegan. So, Edo has that. … There’s no place my wife [producer-director Emily Zolten Jillette] and I would rather go than Edo. My wife is a real gourmet — which I’m not —  a real foodie. And she goes to New York often, and goes to all the restaurants, and I was shocked when she said the other day that Edo was her favorite restaurant, bar none. … [And] Crossroads [Kitchen] — which is at Resorts World — it’s just fabulous. It’s such a good vegan restaurant that I’m always wondering: Is their secret ingredient meat? Do the tasting menu. Just say, “Bring me everything.” They have an amazingly good risotto and their pasta is fabulous.

Edo Tapas & Wine offers classic Spanish dishes with modern and innovative twists.

Louiie Victa

Coffee talk at …

Sambalatte. Teller and I do our writing at coffee places all the time. We go to a place called Sambalatte and a place called Madhouse Coffee, which is really delightful. What I love about Madhouse Coffee is that I know the owner. He hires the people that work behind the counter based on their happiness and their friendliness and not necessarily on their skill.

Sambalatte offers a variety of freshly roasted artisan coffee sourced from sustainable farms in Brazil and around the world.

Roger Kisby

People watch at … 

I really love Fremont Street [Experience]. It’s downtown. It’s what Vegas used to be. It’s neon-y instead of video screens. It’s just funkier. You know, there’s street performers there doing really questionable acts. You have topless people posing on the street, people dressed as [the band] Kiss that are nearly naked, and people doing very, very Times Square acts. And very county fair. Just that kind of funky, and I love it.

The Fremont Street Experience is a six-block, pedestrian-only thoroughfare lined with shops, casinos, restaurants and open-air bars.

Roger Kisby