Poker madness has crossed all barriers of entertainment and is invited at the Cannes Festival 2008. The prestigious movie festival invented and organized, for the first time in Cannes Festival’s history , a poker tournament which is held at Palm Beach Hotel, on the 17th of May. The cocktail of player participating at the tournament is beautiful: Salma Hayek, Goldie Hawn, Denis Hopper, Woody Harrelson, Edward Norton and Tim Robbbins.These six players will gather around a Texas Holdem Poker table and practice their acting talents in dissembling their hands (two cards given by the croupier en.) and bluffing.
These poker games between the Hollywood stars are strongly promoted in the mass media in order to make profitable the million dollars award that the winner will donate to a charity organization.
The Partouche group sponsors this major event at the Palm Beach Hotel. The group leader of the french terrestrial casinos will place on the table the million dollars for that certain poker match, which shouldn’t exceed four hours in order to respect the prearranged evolution of the festival.
The Cannes casinos have quickly understood that Texas Holdem Poker will be The Game en-vogue.After the Official Journal mentioned the poker game as legal in terrestrial casinos, the Cannes casinos rushed in proposing them to their players. The success was just a matter of time. The players meeting in tournaments organized by a particular person or in small rooms, or even the ones playing on the online poker sites, changed their direction towards terrestrial casinos.
The Patrouche Poker Tour is the proof of poker’s success in real casinos as the lucky winner of the Main Event will be awarded with 2 million Euro by Eric Cantona, Patrouche’s group mascot. The finals of this poker tournament, lyeing on few months, whose satellite games are held in different casinos belonging to the group, will be organized in Cannes.
The Partouche group won’t delay in showing its name in the mass media, considering the fact that the satellite tournaments will be transmitted on Eurosport and the final game on TF1.
The Patrouche group presumed that poker has a great potential starting and since 2007 has opened three poker tables inside its casinos. Today, the Palm Beach casino gathers each Tuesday and Thursday over 30 poker players, confronting each other in the Sit’N'Go tournament. These tournaments begin the moment the number of players is reached. The Casino Croisette of the Barrière group was also concentrated on poker games and has opened two tables last month. A third Poker Texas Holdem table is to be opened
next autumn, as long as the concern for the casino youth is over. The casino Les Princess de Cannes of Barrière group will open its own poker table as soon as the usage authorization will be issued.
The poker game can attract the poker players inside casinos and gives them the possibility to discover casino games like slot machines, baccarat tables, roulette or even blackjack. The poker players still not adapted to these casino games attend these games and finally play.
In fact, the activity of casino games compared to poker is multiplied by two for game tables and by three for slot machines in the evenings hosting the poker tournament of Palm Beach.
The poker tournaments in Palm Beach are expensive as long as the players must pay 200 Euro and even 250 Eros for its colleague Casino Croisette.
Poker has become the most fashionable game and the show biz stars can confirm this. Because poker was invited to the biggest movie festival, there is no doubt that this game takes part of our everyday life and that its image was considerable improved.
Harrah’s Entertainment has officially announced the dates and places for the second European World Series of Poker event presented by Betfair. The 2008 edition of WSOP Europe will be held again in three Londoner clubs and international casinos, the same places where the maiden event was held last year – St. James (Fifty), Leicester Square (Empire Casino) and Marble Arch (Sportsman).
EWSOP 2008 begins September 19 and is held until October 1st 2008, but the exact days are still processing.
Betfair returns as the main sponsor of this event, and brings the champion on the main event EWSOP 2007, Annette “Annette_15” Oberstad from Norway as their professional poker player. The Internet star has proven that her online success was not a game and that she has managed to defeat the aces, including former winners of EWSOP, poker legends: Doyle Brunson, Phil Hellmuth and Johnny Chan. Oberstad’s victory was worthed ₤1 million ($2,013,102), the biggest award ever to be won by a woman at poker. Oberstad is still too young to compete at the WSOP events in the United States, where the minimum age is 21, but she will compete at the London events in order to protect her title.
“It was a very long action range for Europeans last year”, said Jeffrey Pollack, World Series of Poker spokesman.”There are many, many talented players in the European Poker Comunity, and I think this fact has taken by surprise some of the world’s best poker players. I believe they have not forgotten what has happened last year and i think young players will carry a stronger battle in 2008.”
“Last year held an exceptional tour that defeated any expectation”, said David Yu, CEO, Betfair, and the qualification stages have already began on this site.