“The first thing is that the music was adapted so effectively,” said John Katsilometes, a columnist who covers entertainment for The Las Vegas Sun and Las Vegas Weekly. “But also, the Beatles’ career arc, and the evolution of their music and their image, fits very well with Cirque. Cirque can do the imagery of sound very well, and they were able to match the Beatles’ artistic sensibility in a way that hasn’t worked as well with other artists. They really struggled, for example, when they tried to fit their sensibility with Elvis. With the Beatles, it feels right.”

To an extent, the show is a tongue-in-cheek fantasy version of the Beatles’ history or, at least, selective glimpses of it. As the show begins, to the unaccompanied harmony vocals of “Because,” and a mash-up of “Get Back” and “Glass Onion,” Cirque’s staging and projections suggest Liverpool’s privations during World War II, when the Beatles were born, and just after. Yet instead of Nazi bombers, we see Blue Meanies, the villains from the “Yellow Submarine” cartoon film.

But however much “Love” outlines the Beatles’ career, or amplifies their comments and philosophy (“All You Need Is Love” is the finale), it is no one’s idea of a documentary. Artistic license allows Mr. Champagne to conflate the auto accident described in the first verse of “A Day in the Life” with not only the death of Lennon’s mother, Julia, who was run over while crossing the street, but also with the consolation that Mr. McCartney offered to Lennon’s older son, Julian, upon his parents’ breakup, in “Hey Jude.”

In a way, “Love” has helped make Lennon’s notion of Las Vegas obsolete. Mick Jagger and Alice Cooper have stopped in to see it; Steven Tyler of Aerosmith has seen it five times. But the transformation of Las Vegas’s image, Mr. Katsilometes said, was underway before “Love” opened, as upgraded theaters have attracted stars at the peaks of their careers, as well as rockers like the Who and John Fogerty, who bypassed the city in the 1960s. (The Beatles actually played two concerts at the Las Vegas Convention Center on Aug. 20, 1964, and Mr. McCartney and Mr. Starr often have tour stops there now.)

“Las Vegas has become a place where established artists who still have a great deal of commercial appeal can come and play mini-residencies,” Mr. Katsilometes said of the city’s musical regeneration. He cited Mr. Fogerty, who lately has come to Las Vegas twice a year to play eight or nine shows in 15 days. “These are acts that have name recognition, multigenerational appeal, and can fill a 90-minute set with familiar songs. Diana Ross, Jennifer Lopez, Britney Spears — even at a young age — Celine Dion, Rod Stewart and Elton John all fit that description.”

For Beatles obsessives, the show has turned the Mirage into a bona fide pilgrimage site — the only place in the world you can see a Beatles-approved theatrical production with an enveloping surround soundtrack, direct from the master tapes.