Wednesday, January 16, 2013

I want to run away to the Circus

My jaw is aching from grinning, my hands hurt from clapping and my back is aching from craning forward in my seat. Not because the seats are bad, far far from it. Our seats are amazing.

The problem is you want to see every single milli-second of the show. The feats the preformers are executing are insane. And its only the first half as I write this - the Wheel of Death is still to come.


I went to Cirque du Soleil intentionally not knowing what to expect, except that it would be "absoloutely amazing". I refuse point blank to go to circuses with animal acts, and this was the first human circus I've been to in a long time and it was incredible.

The sheer variety of the acts, the flamboyantly exotic costumes, the choreographed music and the feats of daring all created to show of the incredible muscular flexibility of the performers including;

  • Balancing on chairs
  • Charivari
  • Contortion
  • Hand to hand
  • High wire
  • Hoops manipulation
  • Solo trapeze
  • Teeterboard
  • Unicycle duo
  • Wheel of death

  • The Wheel of Death was simply gravity defying, the Teeterboard with acts flipping in the air on their 26ft stilts and the Clowns. I loved the Clowns. Slapdash, embarrassing, slick and very very loud.

    The basic idea is that The Innocent character, is pulled by the Trickster into the abstract world of Kooza with it's otherworldly performers and characters.

    The story wasn't so much of a narrative, just a thematic link for the acts, and it adds to the whole dreaming world of Kooza. I understand that inspiration for the characters was drawn from graphic novels, comic books, Gustav Klimt paintings, as well as Indian and Eastern European art.

    All performed in the beautiful Albert Hall.


    I was never a child that knew what I wanted to be when I grew up, except maybe Peter Pan. Some kids know from the start, Fire Fighter, Truck Driver, Open Heart Surgeon, but I always treated it more like choosing lunch - a bit of this, a touch of that and something yummy but without any proper proper deep consideration.

    Well, at the ripe of age of ... actually a lady never tells... I think I've finally worked it out. If only I could do handstands - I have a feeling they won't take me if I can't do the basics!


    Right, I'm off to practice!

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