Las Vegas had big plans for Whitney Houston. Back in 2009, there was a ton of talk around town concerning the legendary songstress setting up shop on the strip with her own residential show production that would have seen her join the likes of Celine Dion and Elton John as an iconic performer bringing her magic to Sin City.
On February 11th Whitney Houston was found dead in the bathtub of her Beverly Hilton Hotel suite in Beverly Hills, California before she was to appear at Clive Davis’ annual pre-Grammy Awards party Saturday night. According to reports, her death was probably caused by a deadly combination of Lorazepam, Valium, Xanax, and sleeping medications mixed with alcohol which sent shock waves throughout the world.

When hopeful rumors of Houston’s show coming in to town, Planet Hollywood and Paris Las Vegas had been specified as possible destinations for the production with producer, Joey Battig being cited for fronting the project.
In the wake of her death, there were some fancy designs released of what Houston’s set would have looked like. Emmy Award-winning set designer and Las Vegas resident, Andy Walmsey has made public two versions of a set he designed during his brief collaboration with Battig in ’09.
“It was one of those classic Vegas things that never had a chance of happening,” said Walmsley, whose work on the set of “American Idol” earned him a 2002 Emmy for Outstanding Set Design and who also has designed sets for “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” “So You Think You Can Dance” and “America’s Got Talent.”
Having developed set designs for Nathan Burton’s afternoon comedy-magic show at Flamingo, Terry Fator’s ventriloquism production at the Mirage and “Name That Tune” at Imperial Palace, Walmsley was sought to bring his originality to Houston’s production.
Walmsley says the show starring Houston was targeted for Paris and would have been a simpler production than what Dion had previously rolled out in “A New Day …” at Caesars, which was laden with Cirque-styled dancers and acrobats and a raked stage that doubled as a series of video panels.
“It was just her and the orchestra onstage,” he said during a phone conversation late Saturday. “I made a 3D computer model of the set after (Battig) found me and called about it. I was looking for a big breakthrough in Las Vegas, something really big, and at the time nothing would have been bigger than Whitney Houston.”
All we can do now is imagine. Her loss was not only Sin City’s but an entire world’s.