With giant scultures, marble floors, man-made waterfalls, a Babylonian-themed hotel and Feng Shui design, The Commerce Casino in Los Angeles, now part of the Crowne Plaza resort complex, makes every effort to import Las Vegas into the City of Angels. In a similar flourish, the Casino calls itself the “Poker Capital of the World.” Its 243 gaming table (more than any other land-based casino in the world, according to the Casino) and its hosting of such major tournaments as the LA Poker Classic, the Heavenly Hold ‘em Event, the World Poker Tour Invitational and the Professional Poker Tour certainly bolsters that claim.
Poker offered at the Casino include Omaha, Omaha Hi-Lo, 7-Card Stud Hi-Lo, 7-Card Stud, No Limit Hold'em, Pot Limit, Mexican Poker, Lowball, Caribbean Stud, and others. Pan and California games are also available.
Being in Hollywood’s backyard, the Casino attracts its share of celebrities. In fact, the Commerce Casino was the locale in 2004 where Ben Affleck, who seems to have a sub-career of showing up at every major poker casino in the U.S., won the California State Poker Championships. The Championships are a $10,000 buy-in event, and he scored $356,400, a seat the World Poker Championship and a place in poker history as the first film star to take first place in a major tournament. Poor Tobey Maguire, for whom Spiderman’s powers did no good in a poker game, was another star in the tournament---but he was out on the first day. But Affleck also outlasted such poker pros as Stan Goldstein and former World Champion John Esposito.
And Affleck and Maguire are only some of the famous faces huddled over cards at the Commerce Casino. For instance, the first WPT Poker Walk of Fame, held at the Casino, featured poker greats Doyle Brunson, Gus Hansen, and the actor whose most famous role featured poker as a character-defining trait—James Garner, star of TV’s “Maverick” series. And the annual WPT Invitational regularly attracts the likes of James Wood and Jennifer Tilly.
