Alice Cooper tour brings ‘Theatre of Death’ back to U.S. for fall shows

Theatrical hard rock veteran Alice Cooper is returning to the road with a revamped stage show on the latest U.S. leg of his on-going Theatre of Death Tour. The fall 2009 jaunt launches with a September 17 appearance at the York Fair in York, PA, and closes with a Halloween gig at Harrah’s Rincon Casino in Valley Center, CA.

The six-week trek will spend most of its time running down the eastern seaboard before hopping across the country for a few final performances on the West Coast. Highlights include a September 25 concert at the House of Blues in Atlantic City, NJ, an October 2 show at Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater, FL, and an October 23-25 engagement at The Orleans Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, NV.

Tickets are already available for the tour, which maintains Cooper’s reputation for staging highly theatrical concerts. Each performance includes four onstage “deaths,” as Cooper guides the audience on a journey through his classic catalogue and the various stages of his “Alice Cooper” character.

While most critics have praised Cooper’s latest theatrics, the show has been met with some early criticism and controversy in Europe. Management at Tampere Arena in Finland has banned Cooper from his planned December 11 concert at the venue, citing the performer’s “suspicious values” in its decision. The show has since been relocated within the country for Barona Arena in Espoo, about 10 miles from Helsinki.

“What’s really ‘suspicious’ to us is the act of judging something that one has never seen, heard or otherwise experienced,” Cooper’s management said in response to the censorship.

Cooper has gradually distanced himself from his onstage persona since the early days of his solo career. As he recently told the Quad-City Times, “When I got sober, I realized this Alice character — this vile, arrogant villain — doesn’t want to live in my world and I don’t want to live in his. It’s fun to jump into his skin every night for an hour and 45 minutes and kill the audience with being this person that I’m not. [But when] I get offstage, I leave him up there.”

Cooper is currently in the middle of an Australian tour leg, which continues August 26 at Royal Theatre in Canberra. Then, following the performer’s U.S. tour plans, he heads overseas for his year-end outing in the UK and Europe, beginning November 24 at the Apollo in Manchester, ENG, and ending December 15 at Bombadier Arena in Vasteras, SWE.

Alice Cooper itinerary:
(Dates are subject to change.)