Mariah Carey to see in the new year with Melbourne Crown casino performance

The US singer is dating Crown tycoon and Australian billionaire James Packer and will become the star attraction for 1,200 Melbourne partygoers

 

Mariah Carey performing her second annual All I Want For Christmas Is You concert in New York on 18 December 2015. Photograph: Kevin Mazur/WireImage

Mariah Carey will perform at the Crown in Melbourne on New Year’s Eve. She is dating Australian billionaire James Packer, who has a majority stake in Crown.

The American singer responsible for hits Dreamlover and Hero will appear at the Palladium ballroom for 1,200 partygoers, as reported in the Herald Sun on Monday.

Carey said: “I can’t wait to get back to Australia, I have so many of my friends and fans there and the country really means so much to me.

“To be heading over for New Year’s Eve with James and to be able to put on a performance at Crown, it is incredibly ­exciting. Australia really will be the place to celebrate in the new year and I am counting down the days.”

Carey and Packer are currently at the US ski resort of Aspen – where they first met in 2014, although according to media reports they did not begin dating until June – celebrating Christmas with Carey’s four-year-old twins Monroe and Moroccan.

It is not the pair’s first Crown appearance. In October they walked the red carpet for the launch of Melco Crown’s $4bn Studio City casino in Macau.

Carey, 45, recently discussed with American chat show host Steve Harvey how she met the 48-year-old businessman. “We were at the Hercules premiere. We were talking and laughing, and people were getting mad at us and stuff like that. So we hit it off.”

Since January, Carey has been a resident performer at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, in a show performing 18 of her US No 1 hits.

She recently made her directorial debut with a Christmas television film called A Christmas Melody, starring herself alongside Lacey Chabert.

Mariah Carey and James Packer reported to be engaged

E! Online says the Australian businessman presented the singer with ‘what can only be described as the most breathtaking engagement ring’ in New York

 

Mariah Carey and James Packer met in 2014. Photograph: Neilson Barnard/Getty Images

James Packer and Mariah Carey are reportedly engaged, marking the second betrothal of a member of an Australian media dynasty this month.

Packer, the 48-year-old son of the late Australian media mogul Kerry Packer, who has turned his fortune to building multibillion-dollar casinos, has been dating 45-year-old Carey since June.

According to E! Online Packer presented Carey with “what can only be described as the most breathtaking engagement ring” in New York on Thursday night. The breathtaking ring is reportedly a 35-carat diamond.

TMZ elaborated, saying Packer gathered a selection of Carey’s friends “so he could get down on one knee and propose in front of the most special people in her life”.

Carey has been married twice before, to American rapper and actor Nick Cannon and music executive Tommy Mottola, and has two children with Cannon.

Packer has also been married twice, to model Jodhi Meares and model and singer Erica Baxter, and has three children with Baxter.

The news, which has not been confirmed by the couple, follows Rupert Murdoch’s announcement earlier this month that he was engaged to former supermodel Jerry Hall. The 84-year-old announced his engagement by placing an ad in his flagship newspaper the Times on 12 January.

Packer and Carey met at a movie premiere in Aspen in 2014 and recently celebrated New Year’s Eve at Crown casino in Melbourne.

Packer stepped down as chairman of Crown Resorts, the $9bn company that represents the bulk of his wealth, in April, and resigned from the board in December, saying he wanted to focus on development projects in Sydney, Melbourne and Las Vegas.

His $4.5bn Studio City casino in Macau was launched in 2015 with the most expensive advertisement of all time, costing $US70m. The 16-minute short film starred Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Brad Pitt and Martin Scorsese, who were each reportedly paid a $US17m appearance fee, and was directed by Brett Ratner.

Carey and Packer made their first red carpet appearance as a couple at the launch for the film in Macau in October.