100 year battle to ban circus animals - in The Stage this week

Elephants on the front page
The Stage, June 12

Calls to ban animals from the circus have been with us for 100 years. The issue has been debated in Parliament and the House of Lords. As recently as two weeks ago, it looked as though the Government would be bringing in a ban on wild animals from next year. But when the Queen made her speech to Parliament last week, the long-promised Bill wasn't among the legislation for the coming session.

As Britain's last two circuses with wild animals breathe a sigh of relief at their latest reprieve from the threat of a ban that has hung over them for years, I have traced the 100 year history of the bitter battle over circus animals in this week's edition of The Stage.

Nice to see the story flagged up on the front page. Click here to read the 100 year history of opposition to animals in entertainment.

Circus Mania author
Douglas McPherson meets
one of Britain's last
circus elephants

For more on the rights and wrongs of animals in the circus click here.

Circus Mania author Douglas McPherson Banned from the Big Top - why circuses don't get reviewed



Circus Mania
author Douglas McPherson
-banned from some
circuses for telling it
like it is.

"He went berserk and accused me of stabbing him in the back."

Actors are often portrayed as being over-sensitive to criticism, but it's circus owners who are really thin-skinned, I've found - as I wrote in this article, which originally appeared in the world's oldest theatrical newspaper, The Stage.


Circus folk think nothing of being fired from a cannon, walking a high-wire or turning somersaults on the flying trapeze. Offer them a review of their show, however, and their bravery deserts them.


Just this month a showman who would clearly prefer not to be named in print refused to give me press tickets for his show because he was still smarting from a bad review I gave him three years ago.

“A bad review is worse for me than no review,” he emailed - which didn’t show much confidence that he might actually get a good review. In fact, I’d seen his show, but not reviewed it, last year and it had improved a lot on the one I’d criticised. There was every chance I would have given him a better review this time, but clearly he wasn’t prepared to take the risk.

This is not the first time I’ve effectively been banned from a circus for daring to criticise the show - something I have never experienced in twenty years of reviewing music or theatre.

"He shouted. He waved his arms about."

In 2010 I arrived at a box office and was told the boss wanted to see me. As I’d been giving him favourable reviews for several years, and had written a number of features about his circus, I was expecting a friendly greeting. But clearly my most recent notice hadn’t been favourable enough.

He went berserk. He shouted. He waved his arms about. He accused me of “stabbing him in the back,” and told me he didn’t need a review in The Stage.

Naturally, I couldn’t review his show after such an outburst. Irrespective of the show’s merits, if I gave it a good review it would appear I’d been intimidated into doing so. If I gave him a bad review it would look like I’d acted out of spite. So we’ve respected his wishes and not reviewed him since.

The BBC has sought out the views of
Circus Mania author Douglas McPherson
but his opinions have made him unwelcome
in certain circus tents.

The irony is that traditional circuses frequently complain about a lack of publicity. Unlike progressive circus companies on the arts festival circuit, which employ PR firms and acquire a trendy reputation through reviews in the national press, traditional British circuses almost never get written about unless in connection with animal rights issues.

I would have thought that a critic with a keen interest in circus actively seeking to write about the traditional big top would be welcomed with open arms. But that would mean accepting that critics are not part of the PR machine and that to be reviewed means having faults and flaws reported alongside the highlights. Circus owners, it seems, are too thin-skinned to be told they could do better.

Of course, nobody likes to get a bad review - it’s always going to sting. But everyone likes a good review, and most theatrical professionals accept that you can’t have the latter without occasionally getting the former. However badly they may react to a sniffy notice in private, most also know better than to complain to the critics or newspapers concerned if they want to be in with a chance of a better write-up next time.

Perhaps circus owners should remember that there is no such thing as bad publicity. You only have to open a paper to see the harsh words handed out daily to the biggest names in show business. But does it harm their fame or fortune? Quite the opposite.

Gerry Cottle (L) and Dr Haze (R) from the
Circus of Horrors join Douglas McPherson
at the launch of Circus Mania
but other showmen are less keen on his writing.

The power of a bad review is often overestimated. There have been countless examples of shows and performers panned by the critics who have gone on to be an enormous success with the public.

I’ve often read a bad review and, putting aside the critic’s judgement, decided the show was something I wanted to see. In some cases, if it hadn’t been for that bad review, I would not have known the show existed.

But reviews are more than heckles from the stalls. The opinion of experienced, impartial critics can help directors and performers improve their work, and raise standards across the industry, by pointing out faults that the creators are too close to their own work to see.

"My crime was to single out the boss' son."

In the second instance I described above, the one where the showman really blew his top, I’d actually given the show a broadly positive review. My ‘crime’ had been to single out the boss’ son who had been promoted to a major role he was neither ready for nor particularly suited to. I’d obviously hit a raw nerve by attacking the showman’s kin. But the nepotism was hurting the show and surely by pointing that out I was helping him.

When Bobby Roberts' stood trial over
Anne the Elephant, The Guardian 
commissioned Circus Mania author
Douglas McPherson to write this article
- but some circus owners are less keen on
his opinions.

Then again, perhaps he reacted so badly because he knew I was right but couldn’t bear having an uncomfortable truth exposed. If so, he shouldn’t kid himself that silencing the critics will stop audiences noticing and perhaps not coming back next year.

Most areas of the arts have long benefited from robust and illuminating criticism keeping the artists on their toes. But when I wrote my book, Circus Mania, I realised there was almost no serious criticism of circus.

The only reviews that most traditional circuses get are in fan magazine King Pole where they are almost guaranteed a reverential write-up. Most of the magazine’s notices are a simple listing of the acts and if a ‘critical’ element is introduced it is invariably to say that this year’s show is better than last.

Given such lenient reviews, is it any wonder that many traditional circuses are tatty, badly produced affairs that generally play to tents more empty than full?

Perhaps the dwindling fortunes of an art form that Britain invented could be revived if circuses opened their doors to critics prepared to tell it as it is.

Circus Mania
2nd Edition out now!

Douglas McPherson is the author of Circus Mania, described by the Mail on Sunday as "A brilliant account of a vanishing art form." 

Click here to buy the updated 2018 edition of Circus Mania from Amazon.



See also: World Circus Day - A missed opportunity?

Click here to read a dozen reviews of Circus Mania - The Ultimate Book For Anyone Who Dreamed of Running Away with the Circus.



Peter Owen New Address

Circus Mania book launch
as reported in The Stage
(L-R: Gerry Cottle,
author Douglas McPherson,
Dr Haze)

If you’d like to buy Circus Mania by Douglas McPherson at the special offer price of just £10 postage free, please note the new address and telephone number for Peter Owen Publishers:

Peter Owen Publishers
81 Ridge Road
London N8 9NP

T. 020 8350 1775

“Circus Mania is a brilliant account of a vanishing art form... an excellent book.”
- 4-star review, Mail on Sunday

Peter Owen OBE
Publisher of Circus Mania

2014 Update: Circus Mania publisher Peter Owen received an OBE for services to literature in the New Year's honours list. Click here for details.

Click here to read about the behind-the-scenes juggling that went into the Circus Mania launch party at Circus Space.

Great British Circus tiger trainer Martin Lacey

Martin Lacey and Shaka
- A picture from Circus Mania

What’s life like in a cage with six man-eating Bengal tigers? I asked Great British Circus star Martin Lacey, presenter of Britain’s last big cat show.


Tigers and lions are like chalk and cheese. Or, as Martin Lacey puts it, “Tigers are a bit like French swordsmen. If you look at them the wrong way you can lose an ear. Lions are more like all-in wrestlers. You can have a laugh and a joke and cajole them, but don’t let ‘em grab you, because they’ll all gang up on you.”

The reason for the difference lies in millions of years of evolution. “Male lions live on the open veldt. They get lots of warning if there’s problem, so they’re more laid back. Only uptight, nervous tigers have survived because when you’re going through thick undergrowth, with one step you can scare away a wild boar or walk into a trap.”

Lacey knows big cats better than probably anyone in Britain, because he’s spent the best part of fifty years working with them, currently as director and star of the Great British Circus.

Britain's last tiger trainer
Martin Lacey
pictured in the
Great British Circus's
2009 programme

“You have to become a practising animal psychologist,” says Lacey. “To train a lion, you have to think like a lion.”

He gives an example: “If a lion is going to have a go at you, they take their time and work it out. One day you’ll notice that when the lion goes from A-B, instead of moving in a straight line, he’ll bow in towards you slightly. The next day he’ll come just a little bit closer, until in the end he’s coming straight at you.

“What you do is, the day before he’s got it in his head that he’s going to hook you, you step forward, clip his ear and say, ’Hey! Behave yourself!’ And he goes, ‘Aw, I’ve been found out!’”

Watching Lacey in a cage with five tigers is a mesmerising experience. The presentation couldn’t be more relaxed or gentle. The 300lb predators are as docile as domestic ginger cats as he commands them to make an effortless leap from one pedestal to another with a shrug of his shoulder and a, “Are you ready? Go on then.”

Lacey describes training and performance as “A bit like taking your dog to the park and throwing sticks for him. It’s something you both enjoy.”

How this article originally appeared in The Stage

But tigers remain genetically programmed killers, as Lacey discovered during a practise session nine years ago, when he accidentally stood on a tiger’s paw.

“Suddenly I’ve got a tiger on one leg, then another tiger thought, ‘This looks like a good game, I think I’ll join in.’ So the next thing I know I’m on the ground with a tiger on each leg.”

He shouted to his assistant, “’Get out of the cage, there’s no point two of us getting killed!’ Because it had got to the stage where I thought I was going to become a lump of meat with two tigers fighting over me.”

Fortunately, his protégé Helyne Edmonds ignored the advice to save herself and saved Martin instead.
The aftermath “looked like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” says Lacey. It took him six months to walk properly again.

Despite that near fatal encounter, it’s hard to imagine a man talking about his animals more fondly. To quote his catchphrase, “A day without lions and tigers is like a day without sunshine.”

Lacey discovered his affinity with animals at Chester Zoo, where he rode the zebras and camels and organised chimpanzee tea parties. “I didn’t want to be a jailer. I wanted to work with the animals,” he recalls.

Great British Circus
2009 programme

During the 70s, Lacey found television fame as a regular animal presenter on children’s show Magpie and provided the tigers for Esso’s ’Put a tiger in your tank’ adverts. Moving into the circus world, he developed his own style of presenting big cats.

“I used to cuddle and kiss them, ride them around the ring, stick my head in their mouth... it was all very nicey-nicey, and fortunately, that’s what the public liked.”

Today, Lacey’s is the last big cat act in Britain, although he is training his Great British Circus co-director Helyne Edmonds to follow in his footsteps with a mixed lion and tiger act of her own.

Lacey’s sons Alex and Martin Jr present big cats in Germany. Martin Jr this year became the first Englishman to win a Gold Clown at the International Circus Festival in Monte Carlo. Lacey is “disgusted” that this achievement - the circus equivalent of winning the Olympics - went largely unreported in the UK.
On the continent, Lacey says his sons are “treated like film stars.” For his own part, however, he says fame and fortune are no longer his motivation for twice daily getting into the tigers’ cage.

“I just go in and play with my animals, which I enjoy doing. As opposed to wowing the audience, the act is really for me to play with my pets.”

Big cats back in Britain
at Jolly's Circus

2013 update
In 2012 the British government announced a ban on wild animals in circus in 2015 with a new licensing regime in the interim. Rather than "wait till the bitter end," Lacey closed his Great British Circus at the end of last year. His tigers went on to perform in Courtney Brothers Circus in Ireland.

But the issue of animals in the circus never goes away. In late 2013, lions and tigers returned to a British circus ring when big cat presenter Thomas Chipperfield joined Jolly's Circus. Click here for more.

Thomas Chipperfield
presents Britain's last
big cat act

2014 update
Next year's ban seems to have receded, with the government failing to introduce its Wild Animals in the Circus bill in the next Parliamentary session. It won't now be debated before next year's general election, and if the government changes... who knows what will happen? In the meantime, Peter Jolly's Circus and Circus Mondao are the only two British circuses licensed to use wild animals, and Jolly's is the last with a big cat act.

2016 update
With the government having taken no action on a ban, the Welsh Assembly has promised a ban in Wales and has appointed Professor Stephen Harris to complete a study on the subject. 2015, meanwhile, saw Britain's last lion tamer, Thomas Chipperfield, set out on a tour of Wales with his own show, An Evening of Lions and Tigers.

Click here to read my review of possibly the last such act the UK will ever see.

The above article first appeared in The Stage. For the full story of Martin Lacey and many other circus stars, from trapeze artists and sword swallowers to tight-wire walkers and clowns, buy my new book Circus Mania! - The Ultimate Book For Anyone Who Dreamed Of Running Away With The Circus.

Click here to buy Circus Mania from Amazon.

Click here to read an interview with Zippos owner Martin Burton.

ROLL UP, ROLL UP!

For a sneak peak behind the scenes of the BBC's new circus sitcom.
..............................................

Zippos 2nd tent rebranded as Circus Maestro
for the BBC sitcom Big Top
- filmed in deep winter

As I exclusively revealled in The Stage, the circus in BBC1’s new sitcom, Big Top, was very nearly called Zippos, after the real-life circus where it was filmed.

According to Zippos owner, Martin Burton, “I sent a memorable email saying that might be possible unless there were drunken chorus girls and badly behaved clowns. An equally memorable email came back saying, ‘There’s all of that and much more...’ So I said in that case we’d better not call it Zippos, and we re-branded everything as Circus Maestro.”

Starring sitcom royalty Tony Robinson and Ruth Madoc alongside Britain’s Got Talent host Amanda Holden, who stars as ring-mistress Lizzie, Big Top promises to do for circuses what Hi-De-Hi did for holiday camps.

Producer and director Marcus Mortimer, of Big Bear Films, recalls the origins of the show, which will be the flagship of BBC1‘s autumn schedule.

“We’d just had a lot of success with My Hero, about a superhero living near Greenford, and the broadcasters said they’d really like an ensemble piece for a mainstream audience,” says Mortimer, who‘s other successes include Jonathan Creek.

“Our head of development, Susie McIntosh, came to a meeting and said, ‘How about a circus?’ And we all went, ‘Do you know? That’s never been done before.’ Nobody has done a comedy, or even a drama, in this country about a circus. Which is absolutely extraordinary.”

To script the series, Big Bear turned to My Hero writer Daniel Peak.

“Daniel is one of the best of the best of the new, young writers,” says Mortimer. “And, amazingly, he turned out to be a big circus fan.

“The BBC asked us to do a read and at that read we had Amanda Holden, Tony Robinson, John Thomson, who plays the clown... everybody turned up. All the actors loved the parts we wanted them to play and about six days later the controller said, ‘I’ll have a series, please.’


Big Top was filmed in mid-winter... and was sadly
to get a frosty reception from TV critics

“I think people were genuinely fired up by the sense of colour and fun and that element of family entertainment that perhaps hasn’t been around that much lately. A lot of comedies are post-nine o‘clock. They wanted something at 8.30 and we said, ‘Let‘s give ‘em a circus.’”
Inevitably, there are those who wonder if Big Top will portray the circus industry in a bad light.

According to veteran showman Gerry Cottle, “The trouble is that whenever you see a circus on television, the boss is always a crook, with a silver waistcoat and an earring, like David Essex in All The Fun Of The Fair.”

The premise of Big Top is that ring-mistress Lizzie has taken over running the circus because her father, the owner, is in jail for fraud.

The interior of the Zippos tent
redressed as Circus Maestro

But, according to Mortimer, “We’re not having a pop at circuses, in the same way that Hi-De-Hi was not having a pop at holiday camps. Maplin’s Holiday Camp was a great, fun place to be. Big Top is about a circus that is struggling to exist in the current climate, but they always manage to pull something out of the hat because they’re actually a good circus.”
Most of the action in Big Top takes place backstage and was filmed in front of a studio audience.

“It’s a bit like Hi-De-Hi,” says Mortimer. “You didn’t see that much of the knobbly knees competitions. Mostly you were in the offices and chalets. But, of course, you do have to show what goes on in the tent, so we went to Zippos and said, ‘Can we borrow your big top?’”
Burton set up a number of circus stunts for the programme, including a scene in which Amanda Holden is strapped to a revolving knife-thrower’s board.

“She needed a bit of hand-holding before she got involved with that, and I can’t say I blame her,” chuckles Burton, who adopted the name Zippo, from the lighter, as a fire-eating clown and street entertainer, in the 1970s.

Although Burton supplied a knife thrower, he didn’t throw the knives at Amanda for real.
“It’s television,” says Burton. “But we did strap her on and spin her around for real.”
Another action sequence involved a dog chasing John Thompson’s clown onto the flying trapeze, where his feet catch fire.

Amanda Holden and the
cast of Big Top

“It was totally implausible, but we had great fun rigging it,” says Burton. “And before you ask, they booked the dog and no, it couldn’t climb the bloody ladder! If I’d booked the dog, they’d have got a dog that could climb the ladder.”

Bruce Mackinnon had a stunt double for his onscreen tumbling as the Eastern European acrobat Boyco. But he prepared for the role by spending an afternoon walking the tightrope at London’s circus school, Circus Space.

“Once, with my arms flailing like mad, I got from one end to the other. You read stories of old tightrope walkers or trapeze artists, and it’s such a poetic thing to them. So it was nice to get a taste of that - although it’s one thing to be just a couple of feet above the ground and another to know there’s nothing beneath you but death. I think that would be a lot harder... or maybe easier!” the actor chuckles.

Did Zippo share Cottle’s reservations about they way circus would be portrayed in the series?

“I’ve had a very long career working with television companies and I’m very aware that television does what it does in order to get ratings,” says Burton, who also recently lent his tent to a forthcoming episode of the ITV series Married, Single, Other.

“I suspected not everything would be as positive towards circus as I might like and I’m sure there will be a few die-hard circus fans who will be outraged and say it mis-represents circus.

“But I ignore all that. Because the truth of the matter is that if you ask the average six, seven or eight-year-old today what a circus is, they probably don’t know. But I’m sure after this programme they will know. I just think it’s great that circus is back on telly.”

See also: Big Flop?
................................................
For the complete inside story on the making of Big Top, read Circus Mania.

...............................................
In the meantime, does anyone know why it’s Zippos rather than Zippo’s?
................................................

Click here to read an interview with Zippos owner Martin Burton as he looks back at 2013.