Woke war on Christmas! Review of Big Apple Circus, Hometown Playground

Has Christmas gone out of fashion? In London's Winter Wonderland, Zippos' seasonal show is the distinctly un-Christmassy (but distinctly classy) Candyland - read my review here. Well, I guess the venue is 'Winter' Wonderland, not Christmas Wonderland.

Over the pond, meanwhile, Big Apple Circus has also dodged the Yuletide spirit to present Hometown Playground, themed not around Santa's workshop but around the five boroughs of New York.

I can hear the splutters of outrage from the gammons on the right: "Woke war on Christmas! We're not allowed to celebrate Christmas anymore!"

These would be the same people who leave Trip Advisor comments like, "It's not a circus without animals!" Despite the fact that  - news flash! - Hometown Playground includes a poodle act. Yes, animals in the circus. How un-woke is that?? 

Personally, the canine capers of the Cartoon Poodles left me a little cold. While I've championed circus animals in the past, I feel like we closed that chapter of big top history several years ago and it's time to move on. A slick modern, all-human circus just looks better to me these days - the shows certainly look like they're doing better at the box office without all that 'cruel circus' baggage - and the inclusion of the dogs in the Big Apple tent feels like a relic from a bygone age. Especially after the resounding success of last year's all-human Big Apple show, which was provided in collaboration with Circus Theatre Roncalli - read my review here.

Maybe I'm just too woke.

But hey, the circus was woke before our grandparents were born. The big top was diverse and inclusive before anyone else was. It's always been performed by absolutely everyone for absolutely everyone, and not everyone celebrates Christmas, so why exclude them from a wintertime night out?

Personally, I'm no Scrooge. I actually put up a Christmas decoration this year (just the one, but it's on my front door, so not like I'm hiding it). But I'm not fussed about a lack of tinsel in the circus as long as it's a good show - and Big Apple has served up a (forgive me!) cracker this year.

My favourite act is Alex Petrov who does an upside down walk (pictured above). I guess he's held on by wires rather than magnetic shoes or Spider-Man powers, but he really does look like a human fly as he bounces a ball on his upside down floor, and tries to drink water - which pours down to the real floor.

Speaking of water, America's Got Talent winners the three Human Fountains make a hilarious act out of drinking water and spitting it out.

Another highlight is the slick and acrobatic three-way juggling of the Zsilak Trio Jugglers in their colourful 1960s-style costumes (below).

There are big acts on the bill, too. Antoly Huaman Brazzan is a thriller on the Wheel of Destiny (is that the new woke name for the Wheel of Death?). When he trips on his skipping rope and nearly falls from the top of the huge rotating wheel he draws gasps and screams from an audience on the edge of its seats. He then gets massive cheers when he skips not just successfully but with aplomb, leaping high into the roof of the tent as the wheel revolves.

A hot jazz soundtrack adds to Brazzan's energetic performance. It's the same sort of music they're using at Zippos this year, hot jazz clearly being in fashion if Christmas music ain't.

A Russian swing act, hurling its performers high into a sail-like safety net is similarly impressive, as is the climatic flying trapeze act by the Flying Poemas. Again, an exciting soundtrack adds, well, excitement, with the audience clapping along as the daring young men somersault between the swings.

As the show takes us around New York from Coney Island, where we find ace pick-pocket Michael Halvarson, to Harlem, where Mihret Mekonnen rides a unicycle on the slack wire, a circular gauze curtain is periodically lowered to fully enclose the stage. New York street images of road signs and neon signs are projected onto the gauze in a very pleasing visual effect.

The gauze is also used to surround aerial globe artist Sofia Petrov in the bewitching illusion of falling snow. 

Well, it wouldn't be New York at Christmas without snow - even if the snow falls without a hint of Christmas music.

Hometown Playground is at the Lincoln Centre until 5 January.

 

BIG APPLE CIRCUS REVIEW 'DREAM BIG'

Big Apple star Gena Cristiani

And so we head across the Atlantic - on YouTube Airlines - to the city so good they named it twice for a visit to the Big Apple Circus.

America's most fearlessly honest big top watcher, Showbiz David, was unimpressed with this 45th year production. Read his review, here. But he also hoped to see some other write-ups that might offer a different perspective, so I thought I'd give it a spin.

For a show titled Dream Big that stars one of the biggest names in circus, Grand Canyon-crossing wire-walker Nik Wallenda, this edition of New York's favourite circus has a decidedly 'small' feel - and not in the cosy, intimate sense. A procession of solo acts presented with little window dressing gives the proceedings a low budget look. 

Apart from a nice cylindrical curtain that encloses the ring before the show, there's no production to speak of. No special effects, dancers, glitz, spectacle or razzmatazz. 

Strangely, the show does open with a pleasing vignette that features all the performers in a kind of storybook or childhood dream setting. I say strangely, because the scene suggests we might be in for a story or a show with a theme. The strange thing, however, is that after that single scene, the director seems to have stopped directing the show. The artists simply come on, do their bit and go off, with nothing to connect them.

The short video messages with which the performers introduce themselves is a pleasant touch, but even that looks a little homely and amateur talent show-like. And given that this show runs over the Christmas period, where is the falling snow, balloons, Xmas decorations or even Christmas songs? Surely Christmas in New York is supposed to be a big deal, isn't it?

The acts themselves are fine. I enjoyed the juggling routine of Gena Cristiani (pictured above), a local girl from Queens, and especially her diabolo tricks with a couple of hats. I was also thoroughly entertained by a razor-blade-swallowing performer from Japan (whose name is sadly absent from the Big Apple's website). He also swallows and regurgitates a very long inflated balloon. Pulling out the razor blades on a long string is an old trick, but one with such a wince-inducing quality that it's always hard not to be engrossed.

There is also a cute act with small dogs, although in the current climate it may not be to everyone's taste. Speaking as someone who has often championed tigers and elephants in the big top, I'm surprised to find myself typing this, but I didn't find the sight of the little mutts walking on their back legs very endearing and in fact ever so slightly... distasteful? Blimey. Next, I'll be joining Peta. Just kidding, but maybe my tastes in circus are changing. Either that, or something about this particular act in this particular show didn't do the trick for me.

Perhaps I'd like to see a show that's full on with sawdust, horses, snarling beasts and polar bears sliding down chutes, or one that's all glossy and all-human. All or nothing, in other words. One thing or the other. This one seemed to fall between two stools with the little dog act - a relic from a glorious animal-heavy past - just making the programme look small, tawdry and old fashioned. 

Circus is all about tradition, but also eternal renewal. It shouldn't look like a tired shadow of its past, but a bold, bright, startling thing of today and tomorrow.

Headline clown Johnny Rockett (pictured left) gets a lot of ring time throughout the show, playing off of a diminutive ringmaster. Not everything he does made me laugh, but the kids in the tent absolutely lapped him up, and that's probably the main thing.

My favourite part of the show found Rockett swaying about on top of a rubber lamppost right in the middle of the audience. That's the sort of funny-scary up-close antics that circus excels in.

It's a rare circus that doesn't deliver at least one knockout blow and Rockett on the lamppost was the golden moment for me.

Nik Wallenda's high-wire troupe provide a solid finale, if not a particularly exciting one. To be fair, it's not the sort of act that translates well to watching on a screen. You have to be there, to see the height and feel the peril. The same is true of a lofty hand-balancing act elsewhere on the bill. But, that said, I have seen more entertaining work on the wire this year, namely by Henry the Clown at Circus Extreme. Read my review of that show here.

Over all, I have to agree with Showbiz David that this is a mediocre show. There's nothing wrong with the individual acts. But it looks nothing like a must-see attraction for visitors to New York this Christmas. And as one of America's most famous circuses, it really should do, shouldn't it?

Nik Wallenda and cast

For a behind-the-scenes journey through the contemporary circus scene, with reviews of circuses of all types, both traditional and modern, plus interviews with big top owners and performers from clowns and sword-swallowers to trapeze artists and tiger trainers, read Circus Mania - The Ultimate Book for Anyone Who Dreamed of Running Away with the Circus!

Click here to read the 5-star reviews on Amazon.

 

Cirque du Soleil Kooza preview - Royal Albert Hall, January 7 to February 8

There often seem to be battle lines drawn between contemporary and traditional circus, but as Zippo's Martin Burton put it, the choice shouldn't be between old circus and new circus, just good circus and bad circus.

Cirque du Soleil was largely responsible for the rise of the term cirque and its adoption by a proliferation of companies hoping to grab a little of Soleil’s thunder - and thus was at the forefront of the division between contemporary theatre-based cirque and traditional big top-set circus styles - and audiences, which are often as different as the shows. So I’m pleased to report that Cirque du Soleil's show Kooza, which comes to London's Royal Albert Hall from January 7 to February 8 not only asserts Soleil’s supremacy atop the tree of cirque but is a very accessible and circusy show.

It’s a pity Soleil won’t be pitching the big top - or Grand Chapiteau - of its American travels in Hyde Park, although the in-the-round setting of the Royal Albert Hall is perfect for circus, and circus buildings actually pre-date tents, recalling the atmosphere of Astley’s Amphitheatre in the early 19th century.

A pity, too, that (as far as I know) they won’t be bringing superstar juggler Anthony Gatto who seems to have done that most un-superstar-like thing and retired at the peak of his powers.

But Kooza has many thrills still to offer, including a three-person human pyramid on bicycles on a high-wire; a wheel of death and some charismatic solo trapeze from Darya Vintilova (in the States at least; I guess the cast may change).

On the ground, meanwhile, there’s a charming double act on a single unicycle that works both as ballet - the depiction of a romance between the characters - and gymnastics: the girl standing on the male unicyclist’s head.

Kooza - check your pockets before you leave.

The highlight is a clown pickpocket routine originated by Michael Halvarson. While Soleil is great at doing ‘big,’ it’s compelling to watch a ‘close-up’ act where we can see how the volunteer’s tie is removed with out him realising.

The routine is slickly scripted, with sly lines like “You’re a waste bin, my friend,” as some scrap paper is returned to the victim, and the punch-line: “Don’t forget your Viagra!”

The sketch ends with an exploding police wagon and disappearing trick that would fit perfectly into any big top show.

So yes, cirque can be as accessible as circus.

The only trouble is, having watched all the best bits on YouTube, would I drive 100 miles each way to spend an evening in the Albert Hall?

(And you thought I'd seen it America, didn't you...?)

Big Apple on the Big Screen

Which brings me to New York’s Big Apple Circus. On November 8, the Apple streamed its show live to cinemas across America. US blogger Showbiz David found himself watching it in a near deserted cinema in California, as did his brother in Utah.

In a country as big as America the broadcast offered circus fans a fantastic opportunity to see a show that would normally cost them a tremendous amount in airfares and hotel accommodation - so it's hard to know why so few turned up at the movie houses. Maybe it just wasn't promoted enough and nobody knew about it.

It would be wonderful if the Big Apple extended the favour to the rest of the world. Perhaps the organisers of UK circus festivals should consider augmenting their programmes of visiting acts with live cinema shows of circuses from around the world, letting us watch the gold acts of Monte Carlo, the elephants of Ringling or, indeed, Soleil in Las Vegas.

But can watching a circus in a cinema, or at home on a DVD or YouTube, be as good as sitting ringside? Or could it even be better?

The atmosphere of a big top, with grass under foot and popcorn in the air, has to be experienced first hand. But multiple camera angles and close-ups can offer a better view than the best seat in the house.

The Kooza pickpocket, for example, was enthralling for me because on screen in close-up I could see everything so clearly. Would I have been able to follow the routine as closely from a side seat ten rows back?

Darya Vintilova’s trapeze act was enhanced by the sudden close-ups of her face that let us see the exhilaration in her eyes.

Trapeze
Click here forreview

Circus acts are by their nature often too fast for the eye to fully catch, so might there be a place for the slow-motion action replay? I’ve seen many flying trapeze acts, for example, but watching from the ground has never matched the drama of the trapeze scenes in the (fictional) movie Trapeze, where we’re given a real sense of vertigo.

Finally, while experiencing a show in person may be more atmospheric, not all atmosphere is good atmosphere. Take the ‘atmosphere’ of a tall person sat directly in front of you, a noisy eater to your side and a coughing kid behind you, and the distraction of people fiddling about with their brightly lit phones. How about the queue for the loos and scramble for over-priced refreshments? Or the traffic jam at the car park?

Douglas McPherson
Frankly, he'd rather be at home...

One advantage of traditional circus is that the big top comes to your local town or village. You may not see the biggest or best acts, but you can park easily or go on foot and prices tend to be on the low side, whereas most cirque shows necessitate a trip to a bigger town or city with its attendant cost and bother.

At home, though, you get the best acts in the world without the crowds or hassle and, dare I say it, a volume control and fast forward button - things I often sorely wish for when I’m reviewing shows in person.

Cirque or circus, live or on screen. Ultimately, it’s not a matter of one being better than the other, more that they all have advantages and disadvantages, and they all have a role to play in making all our days circus days.

To read about my visits to some of the wide variety of circus and cirque shows in Britain today - and to hear the stories of the performers and showmen I met backstage, read Circus Mania - The Ultimate Book For Anyone Who Dreamed of Running Away With The Circus. Click here to read the reviews on Amazon.

Review: Big Apple Circus meets Circus Theatre Roncalli in New York City, 2023

2023 was the year that Ringling returned with The Greatest Show on Earth, its new animal-free spectacular (you can read my review here). Opening a new era for American circus, it was certainly the biggest show on Earth. 

In New York City, meanwhile, the Big Apple Circus has completely revamped its traditional Christmas stand by bringing to the Lincoln Centre one of the greatest shows in Europe, Circus Theatre Roncalli.

When I reviewed the Big Apple's offering last year (read it here) the procession of solo acts had a decidedly threadbare feel. While the acts themselves were good, there was no sense of a production, no razzmatazz. It certainly didn't look like the jewel in the world's jazziest city. Nor did it look like a show celebrating its 45th birthday, surely an occasion that deserved a bit of glitz. It looked more like a forgotten attraction barely hanging in after a decade of decline and bankruptcy - which, alas, it was.

The arrival of Circus Theatre Roncalli has changed that, and turned New York's resident big top into a must-see attraction once more. Ringling's arena show may be the biggest show on Earth, but Roncalli's one-ring show is undoubtedly the brightest, filling the tent with a non-stop swirl of colour and making a trip to the circus a truly theatrical event.

The immersive experience begins outside the main tent, with an adjacent circus museum full of pictures and costumes from Roncalli's and Big Apple's history. This is something that British circuses should really invest in. The Great Yarmouth Hippodrome has had a backstage museum for the past decade, and each of the travelling shows must have a wealth of old posters, props and costumes in storage. If they were presented in a separate tent beside the big top, the circuses could earn extra revenue with a token charge to walk through circus history in the way that they used to charge visitors to see the animals in the 'zoo' after the show.

In New York you can also buy a ticket to a VIP area where you can sip wine and have your picture taken with the performers while being serenaded by Roncalli's 8-piece jazz band.

Yes, Roncalli has a band! While most circuses these days rely on recorded music with a contemporary pop feel, Roncalli has a live band, seated on a balcony above the plush red ring doors. The music is distinctly old style - including a bit of the traditional circus music Entrance of the Gladiators - and helps to transport us into a dream-like circus world.

The music goes perfectly with the costumes worn by the artists, including traditional red circus tailcoats, and a team of half a dozen Broadway-style dancers whose dresses evoke a variety of eras, from Victorian vaudeville to the royal ballrooms of 17th century France.

The show is performed on a raised circular stage with no ring curb to create a barrier between the action and the audience. It begins with Angelo, an exquisitely costumed traditional white-face clown playing a saxophone while solemnly circling the stage.

The quiet opening captures our attention before the show suddenly bursts into life.

Two more clowns descend from the ceiling in a hot air balloon and basket. While the balloon is removed from the stage, a circus train comprising a small lorry and two huge circus wagons circle the perimeter.

The opening sequence sets up the loose theme of travel, reflected in the show's title, Journey to the Rainbow.

In keeping with the theme, a contortionist performs atop what looks like a tall but narrow ship's funnel. He then folds himself in two and slides down the inside of the tube and emerges from a door in the base.

Also on the travel theme, a cyclist pedals around the inside of a basket made from wooden slats that is hoisted into the air, swinging and swaying about like a lampshade, while he rides around the basket's sloping walls with nothing but an open hole beneath him.

It's not an act I've seen before, but America's No1 ring-watcher Showbiz David reported on one in his review of the Zoppe Italian Family Circus in sunny California a couple of months back (read his review here), so maybe it's a new trick coming into fashion (or perhaps it was the same performer). David wasn't impressed by what he called a "refreshing prop in search of a payoff." And it's true that it is a one-trick act. But in Roncalli's fast-moving programme it doesn't last long. It would definitely make a change to see such an act in a UK circus instead of the ubiquitous motorcycle Globe of Death (which isn't featured in the Roncalli ring).

While Ringling fields big acts, like a crisscrossing flying trapeze and a human cannonball in its big arena spaces, Roncalli goes for more intimate music hall-style acts. Emma Philips is one of the most entertaining foot-jugglers I have seen. Dressed as a vintage showgirl with a feather in her hat (she made her own costume, too) she spins a table atop her feet while spinning a parasol in each hand.

A juggler wows with a one-handed juggling of three clubs. A tightrope walker bounces back and forth between two crossed ropes. A clown performs a comedy springboard act, flipping a teddy bear into a chair atop his head. 

Elsewhere in the show, a male and female aerial routine is romantically dressed with candelabras flickering around the ring and a female vocalist singing a romantic ballad while a pianist plays a baby grand beside the ring doors, conjuring the feel of a cabaret supper club.

Just as Ringling has ditched its animals - and with them a whiff of controversy that has dogged the circus industry for decades - this is the first year that the Big Apple Circus has featured only human performers. Last year's show featured just one act with small dogs, and it looked like a token reminder of a bygone era of entertainment.

And yet, the ghost of circus past haunts the Lincoln Centre's tent this Christmas. The strangest act in the show features three performers dressed as polar bears. These aren't the big, jolly cartoon-like costume characters that lumber around the ring at Zippos Christmas Circus in London, however.

The Roncalli bears move on all-fours like real bears. Guided by a female trainer with a whip, they recreate a traditional polar bear act, standing on their hind legs on podiums and walking across a see-saw.

It looks like a dream sequence, a memory of circus as it was... and anyone who finds circuses creepy may well find it disturbing! I can't see anyone who disliked the idea of animals being 'forced to perform'  enjoying this reminder of what they came to an all-human circus to avoid. But then, maybe circus directors can't help giving us a little shiver now and then. As much as the industry decries the image of cruel lion tamers and scary clowns, perhaps there is a little dark corner of the circus' heart that enjoys being sinister.

Playing to that other-worldly image of mysterious circus people, the show concludes with a bewitching bubble-blowing act by Paulo Carillon, a steampunk clown who drives into the ring in a bizarre vehicle apparently made from scrap metal that, being a former engineer, he made himself.

His moodily lit act shows the artful beauty that can be created by a clown in a tent. And then, after that spell-binding moment, everything is suddenly all light and colour again for the full-cast finale.

It's a show that truly takes us on a journey, through a multitude of moods and, alongside the completely different but in its own way just as impressive Ringling show, suggests that the American circus industry is on the upswing into a bright new era.

New Yorkers certainly seem to be lapping it up, with Roncalli's run extended by two weeks until 15 January.

 

Cirque du Soleil's Kooza Preview - Royal Albert Hall Jan 7 - Feb 8

My previous post on Mr Fips Wonder Circus highlighted the division between circus and cirque, the former term being associated with traditional, family-friendly big top shows and the latter with contemporary or progressive theatre-based productions.

It’s a fluid division, of course, and not a battle line. Showman Martin Burton presents Cirque Berserk alongside his traditional Zippos circus and argues that the important question isn’t whether circus is old or new but good or bad.

Katherine Kavanagh, who reviews a tremendous quantity and variety of circus shows on her blog The Circus Diaries rightly commented that shows with cirque in the title can be as accessible as those with circus, and vice versa.

Katherine also mentioned Cirque du Soleil’s Kooza, which comes to London's Royal Albert Hall from January 7 to February 8. Soleil was largely responsible for the rise of the term cirque and its adoption by a proliferation of companies hoping to grab a little of Soleil’s thunder. So I’m pleased to report that Kooza not only asserts Soleil’s supremacy atop the tree of cirque but is a very accessible and circusy show.

It’s a pity Soleil won’t be pitching the big top - or Grand Chapiteau - of its American travels in Hyde Park, although the in-the-round setting of the Royal Albert Hall is perfect for circus, and circus buildings actually pre-date tents, recalling the atmosphere of Astley’s Amphitheatre in the early 19th century.

A pity, too, that (as far as I know) they won’t be bringing superstar juggler Anthony Gatto who seems to have done that most un-superstar-like thing and retired at the peak of his powers.

But Kooza has many thrills still to offer, including a three-person human pyramid on bicycles on a high-wire; a wheel of death and some charismatic solo trapeze from Darya Vintilova (in the States at least; I guess the cast may change).

On the ground, meanwhile, there’s a charming double act on a single unicycle that works both as ballet - the depiction of a romance between the characters - and gymnastics: the girl standing on the male unicyclist’s head.

Kooza - check your pockets before you leave.

The highlight is a clown pickpocket routine originated by Michael Halvarson. While Soleil is great at doing ‘big,’ it’s compelling to watch a ‘close-up’ act where we can see how the volunteer’s tie is removed with out him realising.

The routine is slickly scripted, with sly lines like “You’re a waste bin, my friend,” as some scrap paper is returned to the victim, and the punch-line: “Don’t forget your Viagra!”

The sketch ends with an exploding police wagon and disappearing trick that would fit perfectly into Mr Fips Wonder Circus.

So yes, cirque can be as accessible as circus.

The only trouble is, having watched all the best bits on YouTube, would I drive 100 miles each way to spend an evening in the Albert Hall?

(And you thought I'd seen it America, didn't you...?)

Big Apple on the Big Screen

Which brings me to New York’s Big Apple Circus. On November 8, the Apple streamed its show live to cinemas across America. US blogger Showbiz David found himself watching it in a near deserted cinema in California, as did his brother in Utah.

In a country as big as America the broadcast offered circus fans a fantastic opportunity to see a show that would normally cost them a tremendous amount in airfares and hotel accommodation - so it's hard to know why so few turned up. Maybe it just wasn't promoted enough and nobody knew about it.

It would be wonderful if the Big Apple extended the favour to the rest of the world. Perhaps the organisers of UK circus festivals should consider augmenting their programmes of visiting acts with live cinema shows of circuses from around the world, letting us watch the gold acts of Monte Carlo, the elephants of Ringling or, indeed, Soleil in Las Vegas.

But can watching a circus in a cinema, or at home on a DVD or YouTube, be as good as sitting ringside? Or could it even be better?

The atmosphere of a big top, with grass under foot and popcorn in the air, has to be experienced first hand. But multiple camera angles and close-ups can offer a better view than the best seat in the house.

The Kooza pickpocket, for example, was enthralling for me because on screen in close-up I could see everything so clearly. Would I have been able to follow the routine as closely from a side seat ten rows back?

Darya Vintilova’s trapeze act was enhanced by the sudden close-ups of her face that let us see the exhilaration in her eyes.

Trapeze
Click here forreview

Circus acts are by their nature often too fast for the eye to fully catch, so might there be a place for the slow-motion action replay? I’ve seen many flying trapeze acts, for example, but watching from the ground has never matched the drama of the trapeze scenes in the (fictional) movie Trapeze, where we’re given a real sense of vertigo.

Finally, while experiencing a show in person may be more atmospheric, not all atmosphere is good atmosphere. Take the ‘atmosphere’ of a tall person sat directly in front of you, a noisy eater to your side and a coughing kid behind you, and the distraction of people fiddling about with their brightly lit phones. How about the queue for the loos and scramble for over-priced refreshments? Or the traffic jam at the car park?

Douglas McPherson
Frankly, he'd rather be at home...

One advantage of traditional circus is that the big top comes to your local town or village. You may not see the biggest or best acts, but you can park easily or go on foot and prices tend to be on the low side, whereas most cirque shows necessitate a trip to a bigger town or city with its attendant cost and bother.

At home, though, you get the best acts in the world without the crowds or hassle and, dare I say it, a volume control and fast forward button - things I often sorely wish for when I’m reviewing shows in person.

Cirque or circus, live or on screen. Ultimately, it’s not a matter of one being better than the other, more that they all have advantages and disadvantages, and they all have a role to play in making all our days circus days.

Read Circus Mania - The Ultimate Book For Anyone Who Dreamed of Running Away With The Circus. Click here to read the reviews on Amazon.

Dick Whittington screened live from Bristol Hippodrome to your local cinema

Ashleigh and Pudsey
Panto stars coming to cinema screens
December 7

Earlier this month, America's Big Apple Circus made history - or rather, missed its chance to make history - by broadcasting its show live from New York to cinemas across America.

Sadly, as reported on the Showbiz David blog, hardly anyone showed up in the movie houses to see the show. In the cinemas attended by Showbiz, his family and friends, ticket-buyers were outnumbered by the usherettes. And there were plenty of empty seats up on the big screen. The BAC couldn't even fill its tent before putting it on display for the world.

Presumably, it will be a while before another circus repeats the experiment, although it's not entirely without precedent.

As chronicled in my book Circus Mania, Gerry Cottle's fame in the 1980s rests in no small part on the fact that the BBC televised a Saturday night variety show from his big top every week, mixing circus acts with the singing stars of the era. Other more established circuses had apparently been offered the gig but turned it down. They didn't want to surrender their tent on the most profitable night of the week in exchange for the fee the Beeb offered.

What the old circus families couldn't see, but the young and hungry Cottle could, is that the fee was immaterial compared with the publicity. The TV exposure helped Cottle become the most famous and successful showman of his era - and what was to stop him taking a second tent out on the road on Saturdays?

Jump back to the present and, although not a circus, it's interesting to learn that the Bristol Hippodrome is following in the Big Apple's clown shoes by broadcasting it's pantomime, Dick Whittington, to cinemas across Britain on December 7. The cast includes Ashleigh and Pudsey, the dancing dog act that came to fame on Britain's Got Talent and Mr Bloom from children's TV programme CBeebies.

Clive and Danny
Clowns and panto
stars

One thing's for sure: I doubt there will be any empty seats on screen. While I've often been in a circus tent more empty than full I've never attended press night at a pantomime and found it anything but sold out. And they don't fill the theatres with comped seats, either. In many regional theatres panto is so popular the annual show pays for the venue to stay open the rest of the year.

Could the circus learn something there, such as casting bankable names famous from TV? Maybe, maybe not. At the Theatre Royal in Newcastle they stopped casting minor celebs when they realised that for the past ten years the big draw was father and son clowns Clive Webb and Danny Adams - perhaps the only true stars on the British circus scene.

If you've never seen them, take a look at this YouTube clip to see just how funny they are.

But, given that panto relies even more than circus on audience participation and the experience of "being there" in an excitable crowd, will Dick Whittington be able to break through a cinema screen and work up a multiplex crowd into shouting "He's behind you!"

Did you know clowns are nicknamed Joeys after Victorian funny-man Joseph Grimaldi? And that although joeys are synonymous with the circus, Grimaldi never performed in a circus - he was a pantomime star.
For a full chapter on Britain's funniest clowns, Clive Webb and Danny Adams, plus much on the history and dynamics of clowning, read Circus Mania - The Ultimate Book For Anyone Who Dreamed of Running Away with the Circus.

Gerry Cottle's 50 years of Circus

Back in the Big Top!

Half a century ago, a stockbroker’s son from Cheam ran away with the circus. He went on to become the most famous showman of his time. During the 70s and 80s, Gerry Cottle became as synonymous with circus as Billy Smart had in the 50s and 60s - not least because of the Seaside Special prime time variety show broadcast each Saturday evening from Cottle’s big top. In later years, Cottle was the guiding force behind the enormous UK success of the Chinese State Circus, Moscow State Circus and Circus of Horrors. A decade ago, he retired from the road to revive the Wookey Hole Caves as one of the south west’s most colourful tourist attractions.

But, to steal a line from Cecil B. DeMille’s film The Greatest Show on Earth, you can shake the sawdust off of your shoes but you can’t shake it out of your heart. Before long, Gerry had established a thriving circus school at Wookey Hole. And this year he’s returned to the road with his first travelling circus in ten years: Gerry Cottle’s 50 Years of Circus - 50 Amazing Acts in 100 Minutes!

A selection of Gerry Cottle's Circus
posters in the programme of his
50th anniversary show

Presented in a huge big top with a cast of 35 performers and a live band, the show boasts an outstanding line up including one of Britain’s funniest clowns, Bippo, and big tricks such as Mad Max Newton using a crossbow to shoot an apple off his assistant’s head; a blindfolded high wire act and a heart-stopping Wheel of Death.

There’s also roller-skating, bicycle gymnastics, magic and large scale song and dance routines. According to a review in fairground newspaper World’s Fair, “By the finale the atmosphere inside the big top was electric, with deafening applause the like of which I have never seen at a circus.”

If you're in striking distance of Wookey Hole, why not book into Gerry’s Wookey Hole Hotel (01749 672243)?

!!!CIRCUS MANIA SPECIAL OFFER!!!

For the full story of Gerry Cottle’s life in the circus, not to mention the story of Bippo the clown, the Circus of Horrors, the Chinese State Circus and a whole host of circus performers from trapeze flyers to tiger trainers, read Circus Mania by Douglas McPherson, a book which Gerry Cottle himself called “A passionate and up-to-date look at the circus and its people,” and which the Mail on Sunday described as “A brilliant account of a vanishing art form.”

Circus Mania retails at £14.99, but you can save £5 by ordering direct from Peter Owen Publishers at the Special Offer price of just £10 postage-free in the UK.

Send cheques to:

Peter Owen Publishers

81 Ridge Road

London N8 9NP

Tel. 020 8350 1775


Or click here to buy Circus Mania from Amazon.

Are circuses cruel to animals?

How the Daily Mail reported the
return of elephants to the
Great British Circus

The issue of animals in circuses will always be a thorny one, writes Douglas McPherson in an article that originally appeared in The Stage.

Beneath the star speckled canvas sky of the big top, poor old Neli is being exploited terribly. One minute she’s being suspended by her ankle, without harness or safety net, above a head first drop to certain death.

Ten minutes later, she’s got a fleece over her costume and is selling teas from the refreshment wagon.

But Neli can‘t complain. The Bulgarian former nurse chose this life when she married acrobat Stefan and formed the Duo Stafaneli (Stefan and Neli, geddit?).

It’s Neli’s four-legged co-stars that have put the Great British Circus in the national news, specifically Sonja, Delhi and Vana Mana, the first elephants to perform in a UK circus ring for a decade - alongside director Martin Lacey’s existing menagerie of Bengal tigers, camels and horses.

When the pachyderms made their debut earlier this year, Dr Rob Atkinson, head of the RSPCA’s wildlife department, called it, “A body blow for animal welfare in this country.”

Me and the elephant
Circus Mania author Douglas McPherson
meets Great British Circus star Sonja

David Davies, chairman of the Circus Friends Association welcomed the return, commenting, “From my point of view, a circus without animals is not a true circus.”

But was stirring up headlines such as the Daily Mail’s ‘Police On Standby In War Over The Elephants,’ the direction circus should be heading in?

Human shows such as Cirque du Soleil have taken two decades to make circus as fashionable and successful as it has ever been. So wasn’t the return of elephants a step back to the bad old days when the widely held belief that circuses were cruel came close to killing off the art form?

As both circus fan and animal lover, it was with very mixed feelings that I attended the Great British Circus on its first stop of the season, in March.

The show I witnessed assuaged many of my fears and prejudices. True, I winced at the horse trainer’s party piece of making the animals take an awkward one legged ’bow.’

I could also have done without the ‘elephant pyramid,’ in which two pachyderms stand on tubs with their front legs resting on the back of the third. Such majestic creatures don’t need to be oversold with gimmicks.

On the whole, though, the animals appeared in excellent condition. The presentation was relaxed and gentle, and I could see the value of a show that allowed us to get so close to so many exotic beasts. The children in the audience were especially enthralled.

Great British Circus
2009 programme

Talking to Lacey and his fellow tiger trainer Helyne Edmonds afterwards, it was impossible to doubt that they were primarily motivated by their love for their animals, and that their training methods were based on patience and reward, as they claimed.

“It’s organised play,” said Lacey. “If they didn’t enjoy it, they wouldn’t do it. That’s why any suggestion of cruelty is spurious. You have to be rather nice to them.”

I have to say he convinced me.

Then, just when I had begun telling everyone I knew that it was safe to go back to the circus, the Great British Circus burst back into the news amid a rash of even worse headlines.

“Beaten and hit with hooks, the cruel fate of our circus elephants,” screamed the Daily Express, as television news broadcast undercover film made by welfare group Animal Defenders International (ADI) that showed chained elephants being beaten in their stable.

The Great British Circus responded with a statement that the groom seen “behaving inappropriately” in the footage was dismissed as soon as his actions came to the attention of the management (which was three months before ADI released the film).

The Circus added that it was considering installing its own surveillance cameras to prevent future lapses of animal care.

But the damage had already been done.

Lacey and other animal trainers would argue that the malpractice of one groom should not be used to judge an entire profession.

But when it comes to the public perception of circus, one bad apple really does taint the taste of the entire barrel.

Great British Circus
director Martin Lacey

For fans like me, who want to believe that animals are safe in the circus, the expose feels like a betrayal of trust that will not quickly be forgotten. However well kept the animals appear to be, and however nice the trainers, will we ever again be able to watch an animal show completely assured that everything is as it should be behind the curtain?

For the opponents of circus, meanwhile, there is now forever on YouTube irrefutable justification for their picket lines outside the circus gates and evidence to back their on-going calls for a government ban.

It’s hard not to feel some sympathy for Lacey. While other circuses gave up animals in the face of opposition from the welfare groups, Lacey has campaigned for decades to prove that circuses are capable of looking after their beasts.

It’s interesting that the GBC’s press statement repeatedly stresses that the elephants are appearing under contract and not actually owned or trained by the circus.

Perhaps by hiring a German troupe of elephants, complete with its own trainers and grooms, Lacey inadvertently imported lower standards of animal care than his own.

If so, he is presumably kicking himself for scoring a massive own goal for both the Great British Circus and animal circuses as a whole.

Bolivia recently became the first country to ban all animals, domestic and wild, from the circus ring.

It would be a shame if Britain followed suit and lost its last few remaining examples of circuses keeping alive an animal-based tradition established by the British equestrian Philip Astley in 1768.

The elephant in the room
How this article originally appeared in
The Stage

But if animal circuses are ever to be rehabilitated as a guilt-free form of mainstream entertainment, they will have to work a lot harder than they have to clean up their act in the eyes of the public.

They will have to learn to act, both in the ring and backstage, as if the cameras of a hostile animal rights lobby are on them at all times - as indeed they may be.

The lessons from Mary Chipperfield’s conviction for cruelty ten years ago (on the evidence of undercover film) have clearly not been learned.

But will even the most stringent codes of practise, designed to protect both the animals from abuse and their keepers from the suspicion of abuse, ever repair the damage caused by the occasional highly publicised instance of mistreatment, such as this latest?

Sadly, it seems that for as long as circuses have animals, the spectre of cruelty, real or suspected, will always be the elephant in the room.

Big cats back in Britain
at Jolly's Circus

Update 2014
At the end of 2012, Martin Lacey retired from the big cat cage and closed his Great British Circus. His tigers are now in Ireland, leaving only two or three UK circuses with horses, camels and dogs. A ban on wild animals in British circuses has been proposed for 2015. But around the world, the issue of animals in circus refuses to go away. In Las Vegas, the previously all-human Cirque du Soleil recently augmented its magic show with its first live elephant... and in autumn 2013, big cats returned to the British circus ring when Thomas Chipperfield brought his lions and tigers to Jolly's Circus.

See also my interview with Martin Lacey.








It was a visit to the Great British Circus that prompted me to write Circus Mania. Up to that point, I'd become fascinated by the skills of human circus stars and the dangers they diced with in their acts on the flying trapeze of wheel or death. But when I saw a news report on the return of the elephants to the Great British Circus I glimpsed a sight of an earlier, more raw circus tradition, because it was in sawdust rings full of tigers, horses and elephants that the history of circus lay. I went along with mixed feelings, because I'd been brought up with the belief that the idea of performing animals was wrong. But in my ringside seat at the Great British Circus, and in my subsequent interviews with tiger trainer Martin Lacey and other animals trainers, I realised there was a much richer, deeper and more complex story to be told about the circus than I had originally realised.

Read more on the subject of animals in the circus in Circus Mania - The Ultimate Book For Anyone Who Dreamed of Running Away with the Circus - the book the Mail on Sunday called "A brilliant account of a vanishing art form."

Click here to buy Circus Mania from Amazon in paperback or ebook.