Las Vegas Strip · Family Shows · Cirque du Soleil and Magic · $975 for Four (Both Shows)
We saw two shows on our Vegas trip with the kids, three days apart, and both of them are getting recommended to everyone we know. Mystère by Cirque du Soleil at Treasure Island on our first night, and Mat Franco at The Linq two nights later. Different shows, different rooms, different experiences. Both worth the money. If you can only do one with the family on your next trip, the question we’re really answering in this article is which one to pick first.
This article is not sponsored. We bought our tickets ourselves on vegas.com, and nobody at either show knew we were coming.
For both shows we booked through vegas.com. We weren’t trying to be in the front row. We wanted seats close enough to the stage and close enough to center to actually see everything, including the small audience interaction beats that the cheap seats can miss. That single decision did more for our experience than anything else, and it’s the first thing I’d tell another family. Don’t bottom out on Vegas show tickets. Go a tier or two up from the cheapest, and aim for center.
Mystère by Cirque du Soleil at Treasure Island
Mystère runs in a dedicated theater inside Treasure Island. The lobby itself is nothing to write home about, sitting right next to the gift shops off the casino floor. The theater itself is a nice big room, not the tent setup you might picture from a traditional Cirque du Soleil show, but a proper roomy permanent theater with good air conditioning. That mattered more than I expected on a Vegas afternoon when it was hot outside. What actually makes the room look nice is the lighting and the effects, and that only really kicks in once the show starts. Then it’s really pretty.
For Mystère we paid $450 for four tickets after tax, which put us in row D, five rows from the stage, slightly off center. From there we saw the full stage, all the action, and the audience interaction. I think a lot of the seats in this theater have a similar view, but if you’d ended up further back I do think you’d lose some of the small-stage moments and the closer audience bits. The family photo above is from the end of the show, when the giant red snail comes out on stage.
The whole family loved Mystère. It’s extremely entertaining. The clowns were excellent. The storyline is slightly difficult to follow if you’re trying to follow one, but you don’t actually need a storyline to enjoy the show, and after about ten minutes I stopped trying. The acrobats were the part that stood out the most for us. The tricks they were doing above the stage were spectacular and breathtaking, and it’s hard to imagine that this is what’s happening inside a hotel on the strip on a random weekend. The stage drops and rises. Performers jump off the stage into what looks like the abyss. Acrobats come down from the ceiling and along the walls. The whole show is action packed, and there’s a layer underneath all of it that I really liked, which is the hidden ones. There are musicians and singers up above the stage who you have to look for, but they’re playing live and singing live the whole time. Once we noticed them, the show got bigger.
One small but useful note. Mystère lets you take photos. We grabbed a few from our row, which is why this article has show photos in it. They’re not strict about phones for photos, just no video, and no flash during the show, at least when we went.
Mat Franco at The Linq
Mat Franco (note: one T, MAT) is the magician at The Linq Promenade theater, and the show is on a totally different level than what we expected. There’s nobody flying above the stage. There are no aerial drops. The whole runtime is just you sitting there going “how did he do that,” realizing it’s an illusion, knowing it’s tricks and misdirection, and still being genuinely unable to figure it out. It’s one thing to watch this kind of magic on a TV special from your living room. It’s a completely different thing to watch it happen from a few rows back, on someone you can clearly see is not lying to you.
For Mat Franco we paid $525 for four tickets after tax, which got us the premium seats. What we didn’t realize when we booked is that premium at this theater means you’re sitting on what is essentially a couch a few rows back, dead center. Pretty much everywhere else in the room you’d be on regular chairs, some hightop and some standard. Couch was a fun surprise but not the deciding factor. Going forward I’d probably book a couple of rows further back and save the difference. Our view from the couch was excellent, but I don’t think two more rows would have hurt the experience.
The other thing I want to flag is the photo policy. Mat Franco is very strict. If you take your phone out for even a second, somebody comes up to you and asks you to put it away right now. We saw it happen to a couple of people in our section who tried to take a quick picture of a family member who’d been pulled on stage. They were told immediately. Nobody got kicked out at our show, and I don’t think that’s the goal, but you will be told. Plan to put the phone away for the runtime.
The show itself reads like a magician, an illusionist, a comedian, and a talk show host all wrapped into one runtime. The biggest tell that this thing works is Vika, who actively does not like magic, loved it. Through the whole show she and I were looking at each other going “how the heck did he do that,” and that’s not a reaction she gives to magic. The kids were locked in for the same reason. It was unbelievable in a very different way than Mystère, but unbelievable all the same. Worth the money, easy.
If You Can Only See One
Knowing what we know now, if our family had to pick exactly one of these two on a Vegas trip, we’d pick Mat Franco. Mystère is not far behind, and on a different night I might flip the answer, but Mat Franco is the one we keep coming back to in conversation. The “how did he do that” feeling stays with you longer than the spectacle does.
That said, the answer changes based on the kids you’re bringing. If your kids are on the younger side (think five or six), book Mystère. The visual spectacle works for any age, the humor lands across the board, and there’s no part of the show that requires understanding subtle misdirection. Mat Franco’s magic is sophisticated. Nothing in it is inappropriate, but the illusions and the misdirection are the kind a young child won’t fully read, and the comedy is geared slightly older. Our kids are at an age where they understood what was happening on stage at Mat Franco, and that was a big part of why they loved it. With smaller kids, that pull-the-thread part of the experience would be lost.
The Price
Including the totals because most show roundups skip it. Mystère: $450 for four tickets after tax, row D, slightly off center. Mat Franco: $525 for four tickets after tax, premium couch seats, dead center. Combined: $975 for two shows on the same Vegas trip, both booked on vegas.com. For two production-level shows on the strip with kids in tow, that’s the price band you’re looking at if you want real seats. You can do this cheaper by going further back, and Mystère in particular reads well from anywhere in the room. Mat Franco is where I’d think harder about how close you want to be.
What we paid: Mystère $450 after tax for four (row D, off center). Mat Franco $525 after tax for four (premium couch, dead center). Total: $975 for both shows. Booked on vegas.com.
Would It Work for the Family?
Yes, both. Both shows are family friendly, both rooms are kid friendly, and Josh and Emily were locked in at both. The age caveat above is the real one. Younger kids (under about seven): Mystère. Visual spectacle, broad humor, no decoding required. Older kids and teenagers: Mat Franco. They’ll catch the comedy, follow the misdirection, and probably ask better questions on the walk back to the hotel than you will. If you’ve got a wide age range in your group, Mystère is the safer single bet. If you don’t, you can’t really go wrong with either.
The Verdict
Mystère for the spectacle, the live music hidden above the stage, and the all-ages family room. Mat Franco for the disbelief that follows you out of the theater. Both worth the money, both worth booking a tier above the cheapest seats, both family friendly within the age caveat above. If we’re back in Vegas, we’re seeing more shows. That’s the lesson of the trip.
A full video walkthrough of our Vegas show experience is on the way to the Travel and Food Guy YouTube channel. If you’re planning Vegas with the family and you want to see the Mystère theater and the Mat Franco room before you book, head over and subscribe so you catch it the moment it goes live.
Want a closer look at the Mystère theater and the giant snail prop? We posted a few extra photos from inside on Instagram. Head over to @travelandfoodguy and check them out. Neither show allowed full video, so photos are what we have to share.
Have you seen Mystère or Mat Franco with your family, or do you have a Vegas show we should add to our list for the next trip? Tell me in the comments. We’ve got more trips planned and the kids are already lobbying for show number three.
