Pawn Stars Play Pennsylvania and Pilfer Picasso
The "Pawn Stars" strike again!
Cast members from the hit cable reality TV show "Pawn Stars" hit a Pennsylvania casino over the weekend and made off like bandits--buying an original Picasso for a mere $350!
The "Pawn Stars" travelling road show made an appearance Saturday at the Mount Airy Casino in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, USA, doing a stage show version of their television program and meeting, greeting and buying from fans in the audience.
The live show was cheap by casino entertainment standards--just $10 a ticket.
For $15, however, you could not only attend the show, you could also meet the cast members and try to sell them an item.
About 2,000 fans attended the show, with several hundred offering up items for sale.
Heading the "Pawn Stars" crew--which runs the Gold and Silver pawn shop in Las Vegas--was Rick Harrision, the bald former drug addict who originated the idea of a pawn shop reality TV show and sold it to the History Channel two years ago.
He was accompanied at the gig by his father, Richard, aka the "Old Man," who started the pawn shop 20 years ago.
Rick runs the shop and stars on the show with his dad and son, Corey, but Corey did not make the trip to Pennsylvania.
The fourth member of the cast, Corey's flabby childhood pal, Austin "Chumlee" Russell, who also works in the shop, was there, to the delight of fans of brain-dead TV stars everywhere.
Basically, the six-hour show went like this: Rick, Richard and Chumlee sit together behind a big table and the $15 fans file past, showing their items and trying to work a deal for the often-times wacky or obscure wares.
One lady offered up a vintage Barbie and was seeking $100.
Rick offered her $6.99 and she refused.
A man wanted to sell a brass masthead light from a Japanese World War II ship.
He turned down the $350 offer.
Another man had a large bell from a boxing ring he wanted to sell, but Rick turned him down.
"We've had one just like it at the shop for years and no one has wanted it," Rick told him.
But plenty of people did sell their items at the casino show, including an American military uniform, a German beer stein, an autographed baseball and a set of shark's teeth.
The big splash of the day, however, came when a woman brought over to the "Pawn Stars" table a watercolor sketch she said she bought at a yard sale for $5.
Rick immediately recognized the sketch as an original Pablo Picasso drawing, then offered a measly $350 for a work worth thousands.
The woman accepted--in her mind it was a $345 profit.
One man, who came all the way from Baltimore, Maryland, to attend the show, was not able to sell his item--but not because the "Pawn Stars" didn't want it.
Fred Trust was trying to peddle a first-edition copy of Frank Baum's "The Wizard of Oz" and Rick was interested--very interested.
"Why don't you come on the show with the book," Rick told the flabbergasted Trust, who took a millisecond to accept the offer.
"We'll get an expert on old books to also appear on the show, and when we know what it's worth, we can negotiate," Rick added.
"The Wizard of Oz" meets the "Pawn Stars"--coming soon to a TV near you.
By Tom Somach
Gambling911.com Staff Writer
