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T h e U n o f f i c i a l
C i r q u e d u S o l e i l N e w s l e t t e r
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http://www.CirqueFascination.com
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VOLUME 21, NUMBER 5 Jun/Jul 2021 ISSUE #208
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Welcome to the latest edition of Fascination, the Unofficial
Cirque du Soleil Newsletter.
* * * INTERMISSION IS OVER! * * *
Over the last few weeks, Cirque du Soleil has been very happy and
quite pleased to announce its long-awaited return to the stage through
a number of announcements made about its touring and resident shows.
So much so that it has our heads spinning! So far, and at press time,
Cirque has announced the following shows will be returning with
tickets already on sale for many of the restarting shows:
o) MYSTERE - Performances began on June 28, 2021
o) "O" - Performances began on July 1, 2021
o) MICHAEL JACKSON ONE - to begin on August 19, 2021
o) THE BEATLES LOVE - on August 26, 2021
o) ALEGRIA: IN A NEW LIGHT - on November 18, 2021 in Houston, TX
o) LUZIA - on January 12, 2022 in London, UK
o) KOOZA - on April 28, 2022 in Montreal, QC
And although there are touring dates listed for KURIOS, CRYSTAL, and
CORTEO, official announcements have yet to be made regarding these
shows. Additionally, we as yet do not know the fates of BAZZAR, OVO,
AXEL, MESSI10, KA, or DRAWN TO LIFE. However, we're relatively certain
that KA and DRAWN TO LIFE will have restart announcements soon. (KA is
tentatively on track to return in October, Lamarre said to the Las
Vegas Review-Journal.) Our Itinéraire section has been re-added and
updated to include these new dates and, of course, you can read these
announcements in full within. Stay tuned for more!
* * * THE SUN RISES... DOCUMENTARY? * * *
On July 1st, "O" returned to the stage in grand fashion with a
visually spectacular processional throughout the Bellagio. Led by
a carousel horse, the cast and crew paraded and performed through the
resort fully outfitted in the show's surreal costumes as they readied
themselves to make their first appearance back in the aquatic theater.
Bellagio employees and Cirque du Soleil fans lined the parade route
to officially welcome "O" back to the resort. Following the
processional, the cast and crew were met in the theater by the CEOs of
Cirque du Soleil and MGM Resorts International who delivered remarks on
the significance of the flagship show's return to the stage, having
performed more than 10,000 shows in front of more than 17 million
guests. Perhaps most interestingly is that the "O" return was captured
for a documentary by MGM Studios, which is controlling the production,
editing, distribution and messaging about the project. Lamarre was
featured. Otherwise, he says, "There's very little I can say other than
we are shooting right now, and we are waiting for MGM Studios to come
back to us and tell us who the buyers are going to be." There should be
worldwide interest in such a project, he says. So... Cirque du Soleil
Returns coming to a streamer near you?
* * * 10 YEARS AND 10 SHOWS IN THE OLD PORT? * * *
In the exciting announcement that Cirque du Soleil's KOOZA would
"come home" to Montreal in the Spring of 2022 (the announcement of such
you can read within), did you happen to catch this line? "Cirque du
Soleil is also pleased to count on a strong partnership with the Old Port
of Montreal and to confirm its presence in Montreal with new productions,
as well as the return of some of its classics, every year for the next 10
years." WHOA. While we're not quite sure what this means in terms of
"classic shows". Does this mean the return of Kurios, Totem, and Luzia -
the company's more recent touring shows - now deemed classics? Or, could
we see restagings of Saltimbanco, Quidam, Dralion, or even Varekai - the
company's true classic shows - under the big top once again? At this
point who knows... but we do know that in addition to "classic" shows,
Cirque is also committed to producing and releasing NEW productions in
Montreal. And it all begins in 2022!
* * * AND 10 MORE YEARS IN LAS VEGAS FOR... * * *
Another show is also getting 10 more years... Mystère! Lamarre informed
the "Mystere" cast after Monday's relaunch that the company and Treasure
Island owner Phil Ruffin had extended the show's contract by 10 years.
Specifically, a five-year extension with another five-year option. This
negotiation from June 2020 lasted like 10 seconds. "In the middle of the
crisis, I talked to Phil Ruffin, he called in the middle of that, and
said, 'How can I help?'" Lamarre said. "I said, 'It would be great to
expand our contract.' "How many years do you want?" Ruffin said. "Ten?"
Lamarre said. "Done," Ruffin said. "This is what it's like to do business
with Phil Ruffin," Lamarre said. "When he first bought the hotel, the f
irst thing he said to me was, 'I love 'Mystere' and I want it to run
forever.'"
* * * OTHER MUSINGS * * *
With Cirque du Soleil making its grand return to the stage, we here at
Fascination will be getting back to our regular monthly publication
schedule. Although we were able to continue publishing through the
initial months of the pandemic (thanks to content written to be
published during that time), the last few months have been rather lean.
But with the intermission over at Cirque du Soleil, we're looking forward
to getting back into it! Besides, and as I mentioned, we still have yet
to learn the fates of OVO, BAZZAR, MESSI10, AXEL, and UNDER THE SAME SKY.
We've also not really heard much about the Special Events side of the
company. Cirque was planning to launch more CIRQUE AT SEA shows, had
events planned in Malta, Trois-Rivières, and, much more. But we know
Cirque du Soleil is taking its time -- as it should. So, until next time...
Enjoy!
/----------------------------------------------------\
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| < www.cirquefascination.com > |
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- Ricky "Richasi" Russo
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CONTENTS
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o) Cirque Buzz -- News, Rumours & Sightings
* La Presse -- General News & Highlights
o) Itinéraire -- Tour/Show Information
* BigTop Shows -- Under the Grand Chapiteau
* Arena Shows -- In Stadium-like venues
* Resident Shows -- Performed en Le Théâtre
o) Outreach -- Updates from Cirque's Social Widgets
* Webseries -- Official Online Featurettes
* Videos -- Official Peeks & Noted Fan Finds
o) Fascination! Features
*) SPECIAL REPRINT: "The Show Will Go On"
by: Jason Kirby, The Globe and Mail
*) SPECIAL REPRINT: "40 at 40: Cirque Flips Back Into
Action After Pandemic"
By: Jon Kaplan, Toronto NOW
o) Copyright & Disclaimer
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CIRQUE BUZZ -- NEWS, RUMOURS & SIGHTINGS
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***************************************************************
LA PRESSE -- General News & Highlights
***************************************************************
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Grupo Vidanta Expands Plans for Vallarta Theme Park
{May.19.2021}
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Grupo Vidanta has broadened its plans for its theme park currently
under construction in Vallarta, Mexico.
Now called VidantaWorld, the expanded blueprint will include three
"dream parks," which will feature hotel accommodations set to open at
a later date.
As originally planned, the theme park complex will include a theater
for newly created Cirque du Soleil shows, which will debut during the
first phase within a jungle park with a lake featuring fountain jets,
music and performances; a plaza; shops; and a range of restaurants and
such culinary options as street food carts.
The SkyDream Parks Gondola will provide transportation between the
parks and hotels, which will be set on 2,500 acres.
Other elements of VidantaWorld will include "dream park" and a nature
"dream park," details of which will be announced at a later date,
Grupo Vidanta said.
"Our guests have come to expect only the best from our brands, and
their anticipation is high for the new entertainment parks," said Ivan
Chavez, executive vice president of Grupo Vidanta.
"In preparation of VidantaWorld's upcoming first phase, we've already
unveiled the SkyDream, our state-of-the-art aerial gondola crafted by
the expert engineers at Doppelmayr. And we've purchased top-of-the-
line rides by leading international attraction companies Intamin and
Aerophile, which will introduce vacationers from across the globe to
the beauty and wonder that they can only experience in Mexico."
{ SOURCE: Grupo Vidanta }
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Hot-selling Cirque should have all shows Open by October
{May.19.2021}
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Cirque du Soleil has been dark for so long we've lost sight of how
quickly the company can move.
We are speaking of the company's accelerated ticket sales, at least in
the high-demand, post-pandemic climate. And, also the company's
faster-than-expected return to the stage for "Love," "Michael Jackson
One" and "Ka."
"O" and "Mystere," Cirque's first two shows to comeback after COVID-
19, are selling their at about twice their pre-shutdown rate. And
"Blue Man Group," which Cirque owns, is also selling at that clip.
"What it means is that if a normal day at 'O' or 'Mystere' would sell,
just for the state of discussion, 500 tickets a day, now we're selling
1,000 tickets a day," Cirque CEO Daniel Lamarre said in an interview
last week. "I would include Blue Man Group in that group."
Opening July 1,"O" at Bellagio is selling between 80-100 percent
through most of July, according to Ticketmaster's updated figures.
That show is the best-selling of all Cirque's Vegas productions, and
was consistently in the 90-percent range throughout its run before
COVID-19.
Opening June 28 "Mystere" at Treasure Island, too, is showing strong
sales between 70 and 80 percent, through the first half of July.
Before COVID-19, the longest-running Cirque show on the Strip has
hovered around 60 percent sold per show, and was commonly discounted
to reach that number.
Lamarre also said to expect an accelerated return of "Love" at the
Mirage, and "Michael Jackson One" at Mandalay Bay.
"We are going to reopen shows probably at a faster pace than we
thought originally," Lamarre said. "I think that we'll open MJ and
'Love' sooner than later, and 'Ka' sometime in the fall."
Lamarre said to look for "MJ" and "Love" to "almost at the same time"
in August. Cirque would then have succeeded in bringing four shows
back to the Strip by September. "Ka" is tentatively on track to return
in October.
About 1,370 Cirque employees in Las Vegas lost their jobs when the
company shut down its entire 44-show empire in March 2020. About 120
were let go permanently when "Zumanity" closed after a 17-year run at
New York-New York.
Asked how many of Cirque's remaining available employees would be
coming back, Lamarre said, "I would say most of them
I think that we
should be pretty close to where we were by the end of the year."
PLANS TO REHIRE 95% OF STAFF
Lamarre further says the company is ready to rehire 95 percent of its
3,500 employees cut loose during COVID, including those in the
company's 44 international touring shows. Bringing back the Vegas
community has been comparatively seamless, when you consider the
balance of Cirque's artists were performing around the world.
"The artists are in better shape than we expected, which is great to
bring back the quality of the shows at at the level they were,"
Lamarre said. "We kept an official link with our Las Vegas artists
because we believed, rightly so, Vegas would be the first market to
open, because all the artists live there. But what the surprising
thing is, we discovered that 95 percent of our international employees
were willing to come back."
Lamarre continued, "That helps us take a quicker decision to start
reopening our touring shows as well."
Cirque is back in action in the U.K. in January, when it reopens
"Luzia" at Royal Albert Hall in London.
Lamarre also said MGM Resorts International Chief Operating Officer
Corey Sanders has joined the Cirque Board of Directors, stepping in
for departing MGM Resorts President of Entertainment and Sports George
Kliavkoff. Former MGM Resorts Chairman Jim Murren remains one of
Cirque's two chairmen, along with Gabriel de Alba of the investment
team at The Catalyst Capital Group.
"I have known Corey forever, and I have known Jim forever," Lamarre
said. "You know, in these meetings, board members are asking about the
situation in Vegas, and I could give my version, but I can also turn
to Corey and say, "Corey, what do you think?" because he also has a
very strong point of view about the market."
The "O" return is being captured for a documentary by MGM Studios,
which is controlling the production, editing, distribution and
messaging about the project. Lamarre will be featured. Otherwise, he
says, "There's very little I can say other than we are shooting right
now, and we are waiting for MGM Studios to come back to us and tell us
who the buyers are going to be."
There should be worldwide interest in such a project, given the
company's post-pandemic revival, starting with its water spectacular
on the Strip.
"I think this documentary should have an international attraction,"
Lamarre said. "Streamers and broadcasters around the world should be
interested in this." Lamarre himself is planning to spend two weeks in
Las Vegas, which he has never done in his 25-year tenure with Cirque,
leading to the "Mystere" and "O" reopening.
"I love it," Lamarre said. "You will get tired of me, but I want to
live the story, the rehearsals, the buzz of the city. I cannot wait to
be there."
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
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KOOZA to Return to Old Port in 2022
{May.19.2021}
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Cirque du Soleil is happy to announce its return to the Old Port of
Montreal in 2022 with one of its most acclaimed shows around the
world, the electrifying production KOOZA! Cirque du Soleil is also
pleased to count on a strong partnership with the Old Port of Montreal
and to confirm its presence in Montreal with new productions, as well
as the return of some of its classics, every year for the next 10
years.
Since its creation and world premiere in Montreal in 2007, KOOZA has
travelled the globe and delighted audiences in 65 cities and a total
of 21 countries. It is with great enthusiasm that Cirque du Soleil
confirms its anticipated presence in the Old Port of Montreal with one
of its iconic productions.
"It's with great pleasure that Cirque du Soleil will resume its long-
lasting tradition of presenting shows under the Big Top in the Old
Port of Montreal and we look forward to finally reconnecting with our
Montreal and Quebec audience" said Daniel Lamarre, President and CEO
of Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group. "More than 450 days have
passed since we had to take a temporary hiatus, and we are anxiously
waiting for our return to Montreal. I just can't wait to see the view
of our iconic Big Top in the beautiful landscape of the Old Port of
Montreal."
KOOZA is a return to the origins of Cirque du Soleil that combines two
circus traditionsacrobatic performance and the art of clowning. The
show highlights the physical demands of human performance in all its
splendor and fragility, presented in a colorful mélange that
emphasizes bold slapstick humor. "KOOZA is about human connection and
the world of duality, good and bad," says the show's writer and
director David Shiner. "The tone is fun and funny, light and open. As
it evolves, we are exploring concepts such as fear, identity,
recognition and power." The show starts with the Trickster bursting
onto the scene like a jack-in-the-box in front of The Innocent, and
that's just the first of many surprises to come. The Innocent's
journey brings him into contact with a panoply of comic characters
such as the King, the Trickster, the Obnoxious Tourist and his Bad
Dog.
Between strength and fragility, laughter and smiles, turmoil and
harmony, KOOZA explores themes of identity, recognition and power. The
show is set in an electrifying and exotic visual world full of
surprises, thrills, chills, audacity and total involvement. The name
KOOZA is inspired by the Sanskrit word "koza," which means "box,"
"chest" or "treasure," and was chosen because one of the underlying
concepts of the production is the idea of a "circus in a box."
The international cast of 50 acrobats, musicians, singers and actors
present heart-stopping feats and laugh-out-loud antics to a live
soundtrack fusion of jazz, funk and Bollywood beats.
Tickets for the Montreal performances of KOOZA are available online,
exclusively to Cirque Club members, starting today. General on sale
starts on June 21, 2021, at cirquedusoleil.com/Kooza
{ SOURCE: Cirque du Soleil }
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Edie overcomes 'complete shock' of 'Zumanity' closing
{Jun.17.2021}
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Somewhere in the seismic shifts of the pandemic we have caught up with
a 12-year Cirque du Soleil star who will not be reopening his show.
Or, her show, in this case.
Edie, as she is known onstage, and Christopher Kenney away from it,
was cut loose with the rest of "Zumanity" at New York-New York in
November. Never to be knocked off the spindles (or 6-inch heels) the
great drag character prospers in "Faaabulous" at Notoriety at
Neonopolis. Shows are at 8 p.m. Fridays.
Kenney and partner Jamie Morris (also co-star of "Puppetry of the
Penis" at Erotic Heritage Museum) have developed a terrifically funny,
and vocally satisfying, drag showcase. The singers all sing the series
of novelty numbers.
The primary cast (stage names, all) is Edie, Vita Summers, Sandra
"SanSan" Santigold, Sunshine, Dusty Muffin and JuneBug (all
recognizable on the drag scene). The backing dancers are, Taylor
Bradley, Curtis Goodman, Joe Rivera and Eric Lehn. Swings are Kitty
Delmar and Jessica Grabbit.
It might not be the multimillion-dollar spectacle that was "Zumanity"
on the Strip, but there is something to be said for absolute talent, a
smart use of resources and manageable overhead. And, not to belabor
the obvious, this plucky production is still onstage.
Some time ago, we fired a few questions at the towering drag
performer, forging a dream in downtown L.V. The highlights:
Q. It's been some time since "Zumanity" closed. What goes through your
mind when someone mentions the show, or Cirque generally?
I don't know. I have to move on. I was so comfortable for so long. The
fighter inside of me says, 'What's the next gig?' That part of my
brain kind of opened back up, being a solo artist but also for a group
of people. It's a little more intense.
Q. What is the biggest challenge in developing the show?
Getting the word out. To be frank, it's not my expertise here. We're
making just enough to pay the cast. I haven't been paid yet, myself,
not once. We need to hire someone to come on and help us get the word
out. I'm used to performing, not wearing every single hat. But I'm up
for the challenge. Bring it on.
Q. It's tough for a small-capacity show to get brokers to sell tickets
when you're only performing once a week.
If you see me standing on I-15 in full drag, with a sign that says,
"Faaabulous Tonight at 8!' don't laugh.
Q. You have any projects outside "Faaabulous?"
I've written a new show, "Las Vegas Showgirl: Unleashed," that's going
to tour the east coast in August. It's how Edie got to Vegas, how she
got to Cirque, and how the show closed eight months into a pandemic.
It's life after Cirque. It's light and fun, but I want audiences to
know the truth. This is what happened, and it really sucked.
Q. How did you learn "Zumanity" would close?
We were on a Zoom meeting and we were told this was just a COVID
update, and we thought there was this tiny light at the end of the
tunnel, and then it was, the show is closing and in two weeks your
health insurance is gone. We were completely shocked, and I'll tell
about how shocked we were.
Q. What is your long-term vision for "Faaabulous" in Las Vegas?
I want it to be a full-fledged, five-or-six-days-a-week show. I want
it to be popular. I want people to feel fabulous when they leave the
building. I want it to be a major show in Las Vegas. I know we have
serious competition, with 'Ru Paul's Drag Race' coming back (to
Flamingo Showroom), but I think there is room for Ru Paul's TV, lip-
syncing show, and the other one with real singing and silliness."
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
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Cirque du Soleil Announces Additional Reopening Plans
{Jun.17.2021}
----------------------------------------------------------
Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group ("Cirque du Soleil" or "the
Company") is pleased to confirm the long-awaited return of additional
touring and resident shows. After announcing the reopening of two of
its most iconic shows in Las Vegas "O" and Mystère, as well as the
touring shows KOOZA in Punta Cana and LUZIA at the Royal Albert Hall,
in London on April 21, 2021, Cirque du Soleil is thrilled to confirm
the addition of five new shows to its on-sale listings.
o) The Beatles LOVE, a Cirque du Soleil creation and co-production
with Apple Corps Ltd., will reopen at The Mirage on Aug. 26, 2021
with tickets going on sale on June 24, 2021
o) Michael Jackson ONE by Cirque du Soleil, in collaboration with the
Estate of Michael Jackson, will reopen its exclusive residency at
Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino on Aug. 19, 2021
o) Alegría, Cirque du Soleil's emblematic production, will be in
Houston, Texas, under the Big Top at Sam Houston Race Park as of
Nov. 18, 2021
o) KOOZA, a Cirque du Soleil production acclaimed by more than eight
million spectators and critics around the world will perform at the
Old Port of Montreal as of April 28, 2022
Additionally, Blue Man Group, Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group's
affiliate show, will return to Chicago and New York in full color
beginning Aug. 18 and Sept. 3, 2021, respectively, with the Las Vegas
show opening June 24.
Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased at
https://www.cirquedusoleil.com and https://www.blueman.com.
Today also marks the beginning of a celebratory movement for Cirque du
Soleil in support of the live entertainment industry and its
professionals with the launch of its global initiative
#intermissionisover. Since the start of the pandemic, the arts
ecosystem has sustained irreparable damages as the live events
industry was one of the first to shut down. With this initiative,
Cirque du Soleil aims to shed light on the resilience of performers
and bring maximum visibility to the challenges creative professionals
are facing and overcoming in this time of revival.
Cirque du Soleil has enlisted circus aficionados and artists from
around the world to help spread the word, inviting them to share on
social media photos and videos of themselves hard at work or in their
everyday life as they are working toward a return to the stages, or
what this moment means to them, using the #intermissionisover hashtag
and proudly wearing the official Intermission is Over t-shirt. The
campaign kicked off today on the company's website and social
platforms.
"Today, we all stand together to celebrate our industry coming back to
life," said Daniel Lamarre, President and CEO Cirque du Soleil
Entertainment Group. "Let's flood social platforms with messages of
hope, strength and perseverance. We encourage you to join us and add
your voice to support your favorite artists, venues, friends and
families working in the live entertainment industry. Intermission is
over. Now, show time!"
Fans are encouraged to join the movement by sharing their favorite
show memories on social media, using #IntermissionIsOver. The campaign
t-shirt will be available, starting tomorrow, for US$35.00 on the
Cirque du Soleil website.
"Cirque du Soleil thanks them wholeheartedly for their support of
fellow performers and professionals," said Lamarre. "Now is a time to
celebrate the resilience of our industry and the return of live
entertainment performances."
{ SOURCE: Cirque du Soleil }
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'Mystere' again launches Cirque on the Strip
{Jun.26.2021}
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In the middle of Mystere Theater on Friday afternoon sat the
undisturbed, inert Korean plank.
And it was beautiful.
The plank act involves the entire "Mystere" cast, either airborne or
ancillary around the piece. It's a team effort, a family affair, and
the way Cirque du Soleil rightfully should return to the Strip. The
show comes back to the stage Monday night, marking Cirque's reopening
on the Strip.
"O" is next in line on July 1. "Michael Jackson One" at Mandalay Bay
follows Aug. 19, and "Love" is next at the Mirage on Aug. 26. "Ka" at
MGM Grand is still to be announced, but the company does plan to have
all four shows open by October.
But as always, "Mystere" is ahead of the field.
"It needs to be the first one back, because it is last of the old-
school Cirque," says RJ Owens, who plays the grown-up Bébé François in
the production. "It is the last show that completely relies on the
human condition, rather than technology and fancy sets."
"Mystere" is indeed the "last" of all those Cirque qualities, but will
always be the first Cirque show to ever open in residency on the
Strip, in December 1993. The cast has finally reunited this month,
ahead of the Monday night re-opening performance. The company has
adopted the #IntermissionIsOver hashtag in marketing the revival
campaign.
Originally, Cirque had geared up for "O" to relaunch first among Strip
productions, but "Mystere" vaulted into that role. The show was
propelled into that position by Treasure Island owner Phil Ruffin,
whom Cirque CEO Daniel Lamarre said was "very, very eager that as soon
as the market recovered that he would open 'Mystere.'"
In a statement, Ruffin said the show "continues to be a very popular
and we're currently booking full houses 1,600 seats and 10 shows a
week!"
"We know that the performers are excited to return to the stage," the
statement continued.
"Mystere" Senior Artistic Director Tim Smith said the cast kept
themselves in near-top condition throughout the shutdown.
"We were very surprised at the amazing shape of our artists, mentally
and physically, when they came back," Smith said. "But that is what
they do. That's how they live. They kept themselves trained to perform
the unique skills that they do. They came back ready to work and were
very excited about it. It was not too much of a task to get them back
up and running."
Smith said the show is usually the entry point for Cirque fans
visiting Vegas.
"We are a lot of people's favorite show, and often the first Cirque
show they have seen," Smith said. "It is iconic here in Las Vegas we
are lucky enough to be synonymous with people's vacation. If you come
to Las Vegas, you've got to see a Cirque du Soleil show, and usually
it's "Mystere.'"
The show has advanced through fully costumed rehearsals over the past
three-plus weeks.
"They have gone perfectly. Perfectly," Owens said. "It's beautiful,
it's heart-touching and warming as it has always been."
During the COVID pause, the show has undergone inevitable shifts in
cast, and even in the size and shape of one cast member.
Guitarist Bruce Rickerd retired during the shutdown. He was a cast
member in "Mystere" in its opening, and played some 12,465 shows.
Rickerd holds the Guinness Book of World Records mark for most
theatrical performances by a male musician.
And Owens is not nearly as much man-baby as he was prior to the
pandemic. He has lost some 200 pounds, down to 279. He's had 12 inches
taken out of his pajama costume and big diaper.
"I am where I was when I was 16," Owens said. "I have new aches and
pains in my joints because I am able to move differently. I can run a
little with the cast."
Owens has notched more than 4,500 shows dating to February 2013. His
reunion with the cast has proven emotionally powerful.
"The fact that we have been able to take our masks off and actually
see each's others' faces is so moving to me," Owens said. "I've been
weeping all day today. Just weeping. It's been ridiculous. It's the
cast out here, working their asses off to do above and beyond the best
show you have seen."
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
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The Beatles LOVE Returns to The Mirage, Aug. 26
{Jun.29.2021}
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The Beatles LOVE by Cirque du Soleil will make its grand return to The
Mirage Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas on Aug. 26, 2021. The iconic show
is also celebrating its 15th anniversary. Tickets are on sale now and
can be purchased at cirquedusoleil.com/love.
A Cirque du Soleil creation and co-production with Apple Corps Ltd.
and MGM Resorts International, LOVE celebrates the musical legacy of
The Beatles. The world-renowned show brings a burst of color to the
Las Vegas Strip as a cast of 70 artists showcase aerial acrobatics,
vibrant visuals and high energy choreography on a 360-degree stage.
Since opening to rave reviews on June 30, 2006, LOVE has performed to
more than 10 million audience members and has been honored with three
GRAMMY Awards.
The Beatles LOVE by Cirque du Soleil performs Thursday Monday at 7
p.m. and 9:30 p.m. through October 2, and Tuesday Saturday at 7 p.m.
and 9:30 p.m. beginning October 5. On sale now, tickets start at $79.
SHOW SCHEDULE
Thursday to Monday at 7:00pm and 9:30pm through 10/2
Tuesday to Saturday at 7:00pm and 9:30pm from 10/5
7:00PM SHOWS ONLY
8/26, 8/29, 8/30, 9/2, 9/5, 9/6, 9/9, 9/13, 9/16, 9/20
DARK DAYS
Tuesdays and Wednesdays through 9/29
Sunday and Monday from 10/3 to 12/26
ADDITIONAL DARK DAYS
11/2 and 11/30 to 12/4
ADDITIONAL PERFORMANCES
12/27 at 7:00pm and 9:30pm
12/31 TBD
TICKET PRICES
Start at $79.00 USD
TO BOOK TICKETS
Call 888-488-7111 or 702-693-8866
Or go to www.cirquedusoleil.com
*Please note that show schedules are subject to change.
{ SOURCE: PR Newswire }
----------------------------------------------------------
Mystère Caps Spirited Reopening with 10-year Extension!
{Jun.30.2021}
----------------------------------------------------------
There are times when a show will "goose" a standing ovation. The cast
will hang for a few extra counts, as if to allow audience members to
gather their thoughts and gauge the room before rising.
But Monday night, the full house at "Mystere" at Treasure Island gave
the host show a full-hearted, full-throated standing ovation. That
wasn't the only gesture of gratification, either.
During the night's reopening speech, Cirque CEO Daniel Lamarre
announced the show had extended its contract at TI for another 10
years. Should the show finish that term, "Mystere" will have run in
residency in Las Vegas for 38 years.
The Cirque's new ownership-power roster was also in Vegas, seeing one
of the company's productions for the first time. Joining Lamarre and
Cirque's President Eric Grilly were company COO Stéphane Lefebvre, and
co-Chairman of the Board Gabriel de Alba from primary ownership entity
Capital Catalyst Group.
Cirque also got a visit from one of its original creative visionaries,
Franco Dragone, the original artistic director of "Mystere" in 1993.
Dragone also conceived "O" at Bellagio, then split with Cirque and
developed "A New Day
" at the Colosseum and "Le Reve" at Wynn Las
Vegas.
Dragone sent a bouquet of flowers to the cast, along with a note
reading, "Wishing you all a beautiful performance tonight!"
"Mystere" obliged. The granddaddy of Cirque du Soleil residency
productions on the Strip ended the company's pause with an especially
spirited performance. The lengthy pause brought new life to such
familiar, classic acts as RJ Owens' Bebe Francois' (RJ Owens) game-of-
catch with the Red Ball, and Jimmy Slonina's clown usher Brian Le
Petit's dumping of popcorn on fans as they filed into the theater.
The Korean plank (planche, French translation of plank, is the
company's inside term, we have been reminded) felt especially death
defying, as the Spearmato characters were sent skyward onto their
castmates' shoulders. Was the trapeze act higher, in the return? It
seemed like it. The entire night carried a inherent anxiousness, at
least from my seat, at the heightened risk level (and high reward) of
Cirque acrobatics.
This was not a flawless performance. Perfect precision could not be
expected after a 15-month layoff. There were breaks here and there, a
loose landing, at least one "miss" in the trapeze act. Owens managed
to veer into the plank in his arrival in his golf cart, sending the
signature piece about three feet off its mark (nearby Spermato pushed
it back into place).
But that audience roar, at the end, was everything.
Some fans in attendance had actually never seen a Cirque performance.
Angie Dominguez was one. The tourist from Durango, Colorado, brought
her young daughter and a friend to the show.
"It was amazing, absolutely amazing," Dominguez said. "Fantastic, 100-
percent. I have never seen anything like this in my life."
Britney Corbin of Durango joined Dominguez on the trip to Vegas.
"This is actually the second time I've seen it, but it's been 14 years
since I saw it last," Corbin said. "It's great. It's the show I
remember. Even some of the characters, I think, are still here from
the last time I saw it."
Tiffany McCaloa was another ticket-holder seeing "Mystere" for the
first time. She moved to Las Vegas two years ago from Salt Lake City.
"I felt like there was more excitement from the people performing,
because it was the first opening night" McCaloa said. "I felt that,
and I loved it."
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
----------------------------------------------------------
Dawn Porter, MGM TV team for Cirque du Soleil Documentary
{Jun.30.2021}
----------------------------------------------------------
MGM and Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group have partnered on a
feature documentary that promises to go behind the curtain of the
iconic circus, with Dawn Porter (The Way I See It, John Lewis: Good
Trouble) attached to direct and executive produce.
Porter's Trilogy Films, a production company specializing in creating
feature-length documentaries and non-fiction series, and her new
partners at Industrial Media are providing production services.
Currently in production, filming on the project began in April and
will continue through opening night July 1, when Cirque du Soleil's O
show makes its return to the stage at the Bellagio Resort & Casino in
Las Vegas.
For the first time in its 37-year history, Cirque du Soleil granted
exclusive access to MGM and Porter as performers prepared for the
upcoming show after the COVID-19 pandemic put the circus on pause.
The personal stories of those artists from ringmasters to acrobats
and divers are at the "heart" of the film.
Mark Burnett, MGM's chairman of worldwide television, said in a
statement: "Chronicling the re-opening of the aquatic O show brings
MGM back to its roots, as it was 75 years ago that the studio produced
the first Aqua Musicals with Esther Williams."
Porter added: "Like so many people, I have always been enthralled with
the beauty and mystery of Cirque du Soleil and fascinated with the
extraordinarily talented people who make the seemingly impossible come
to life. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to document Cirque's
biggest challenge, a return to the stage after one of the world's
greatest crises. The performers, cast, company, and crew are giving
their all to make this the biggest premiere of their careers. This is
a magnificent story and I'm so grateful to be able to tell it."
{ SOURCE: Real Screen }
----------------------------------------------------------
Doc to go behind the scenes of Cirque's 'O'
{Jul.01.2021}
----------------------------------------------------------
When Cirque du Soleil CEO Daniel Lamarre met with MGM Resorts
International CEO Bill Hornbuckle at the Bellagio on Tuesday, the two
execs played to a small audience.
A camera crew.
The back-and-forth was banked for an upcoming MGM Studios documentary
chronicling the return of "O." Lamarre emphasizes this meeting was not
staged and was a very real update on MGM Resorts' hotel occupancy
expectations over the next several months to gauge ticket-buying
demand.
As Cirque says, intermission is over.
Cirque's best-selling show and strongest brand relaunches on Thursday
night. As reported in April, MGM Studios (which is not formally
related to MGM Resorts) has partnered with Cirque du Soleil develop an
under-the-carriage account of the company's recovery from COVID.
Documentary filmmaker Dawn Porter ("Trapped," "The Way I See It,"
"John Lewis: Good Trouble") heads up the creative team. The dramatic
tension is clear, as Cirque du Soleil had performed 52,000 shows for
more than 70 million on the Strip before COVID forced all 44 of its
shows worldwide to close. "Zumanity" at New York-New York was shut
down forever.
"O" has been Cirque's most successful production ever in Las Vegas,
selling about 748,000 tickets per year. The aquatic spectacular is the
biggest box-office hit performing in a single venue anywhere in the
world.
For Cirque, the benefits of allowing a documentary crew into its
revival are multifold. Primarily, the company will generate revenue
through the sale and distribution of the finished project. MGM
Chairman of Worldwide Television Mark Burnett, a big Cirque fan who
has visited the company's Montreal headquarters, is in Las Vegas for
the show's relaunch.
Filming is to be completed after Thursday's performance, and MGM
Studios will shop the project for global distribution, aiming for a
fall release. Several potential buyers will be at Thursday's "O"
premiere.
The project will also serve as an effective marketing tool. Cirque has
become the international leader in the return of theater-scale
entertainment worldwide, a process MGM Studios is sure to capture.
"We thought this would happen, and now I am living it," Lamarre said
during a chat at Bellagio on Wednesday morning. "Las Vegas, and Cirque
du Soleil, are becoming the symbol of the resurrection of live
entertainment. The opening of 'Mystere' and 'O' shows everyone around
the world that, yes, the industry is coming back."
Lamarre estimates it will take a year, maybe a year and a half, for
Cirque to return full revenue to its 2019 numbers.
"All of the other markets, including Broadway, are opening later than
Las Vegas," Lamarre said. "I hope I am not exaggerating, but Las Vegas
is the first market in the world that is really opening to
entertainment."
Lamarre says the upcoming documentary is also pulling the company's
human element to the fore. A common quibble about the circus troupe is
its frequently flawless precision can override human artists who make
it all possible. This is a chance to evoke some backstage, real-life,
personal accounts of Cirque performers.
"Absolutely, 100 percent, we want to show the emotion of our artists,
how much they have overcome," Lamarre said. "Everything is linked to
human performance."
This project might lead to an ongoing series of Cirque reality based
shows.
"This could open up the door for more TV content" Lamarre said. "With
Mark being a big, big fan of Cirque, he convinced MGM to do the
documentary. We can move forward from there."
Lamarre informed the "Mystere" cast after Monday's relaunch that the
company and Treasure Island owner Phil Ruffin had extended the show's
contract by 10 years. Specifically, a five-year extension with another
five-year option.
This negotiation from June 2020 lasted like 10 seconds.
"In the middle of the crisis, I talked to Phil Ruffin, he called in
the middle of that, and said, 'How can I help?'" Lamarre said. "I
said, 'It would be great to expand our contract.'
"How many years do you want?" Ruffin said.
"Ten?" Lamarre said.
"Done," Ruffin said.
"This is what it's like to do business with Phil Ruffin," Lamarre
said. "When he first bought the hotel, the first thing he said to me
was, 'I love 'Mystere' and I want it to run forever.'"
Too bad the MGM Studios crew wasn't around for that chat.
Lamarre also said that MGM Resorts has signed on for a five-year
extension of "O," and two years apiece for "Michael Jackson One" at
Mandalay Bay and "Love" at the Mirage. Nine years, total, in
contracted commitment coming out of COVID.
And "Ka" at MGM Grand is already signed through 2024. That show is
targeted for an October reopening.
Lamarre has been on an emotional Tilt-A-Whirl for the past 16 months,
first shutting down the company, navigating through its sale and
helping assemble the pieces for reopening.
In November, when the sale of Cirque to a group led by Capital
Catalyst Group was announced, Lamarre spent 14 straight hours on the
phone for interviews with international media.
"I had two PR people with me, fielding the calls and giving me
sandwiches," Lamarre said. "But I had to be accessible, and speak
about what was our company's survival."
The result was 5 billion impressions worldwide about Cirque's return.
"I thought maybe 1 billion, or even 700 million, impressions about
Cirque," Lamarre said. "This shows me the Cirque brand is as strong as
ever."
But it's not just a business. Cirque's leading executive is still
wowed by the acrobatics, the comedy and artistry emanating from his
company's stages.
"It's not only numbers. I want to see the artists, the magic, what
will impress you at the show tonight," Lamarre said. "I get so
emotional, still. I was emotional watching 'O' in rehearsals Saturday
night. After the opening of 'Mystere,' I so happy, I wanted to hug
everybody.
"The day I'm not impressed by our artists, is the day I stay home."
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
----------------------------------------------------------
After 15 years, Franco Dragone revisits his creation 'O'
{Jul.02.2021}
----------------------------------------------------------
It's not so easy to put the warm fuzzies into words. But you felt that
rush of exhilaration the moment the welcome was shouted from the O
Theater stage Thursday night. "Ladies and gentlemen!" was the call-out
from the familiar audience member pulled onstage to start the
proceedings.
That's all the crowd needed to hear. The 1,800 or so in attendance
roared. "O" then dove into a flawless performance, marking the show's
revival after 16 months away. It was too long between performances for
the show's passionate cast and crew. It was also an astonishingly long
break for the man who made it all happen 25 years ago, the show's
creative founder Franco Dragone.
Dragone moved almost totally unrecognized and unimpeded with the crowd
filing out of the theater. He said it had been 2006 or 2007 since he'd
seen "O," just as he had developed the Strip's other aquatic
masterpiece, "Le Reve" at Wynn Las Vegas.
Dragone does not like to revisit his former shows. He's more
superstitious than sentimental. Even behind his face cover (which he
still wears in public places, to play it safe), you could tell he was
smiling.
"What I will tell you is banal and all cliches, but what they do is
so, so, so, impressive," Dragone said during a walk from the O Theatre
seating area to the lobby. "They respect every little detail. What
they do is so very difficult, and maybe when people are watching, they
don't realize this. But here, we see the precision, every movement,
every position of the body can send a different message."
Dragone sent flowers to the "Mystere" cast on Monday, and again to the
"O" team on Thursday. Cirque CEO Daniel Lamarre arranged for Dragone
to have tickets to both shows, ending Dragone's long break from
stepping into a Cirque theater.
Though he had originally planned to be at "Mystere," which he also
conceived, Dragone held off to make "O" his first Cirque show in the
pandemic.
Dragone is going to be more prevalent in Las Vegas this year and into
2022. His pre-show nightclub project with Criss Angel, originally
titled Mr. Smiles & Molly but certain to be renamed, set to launch by
the end of the year. That concept will be paired with Angel's
"Mindfreak" show at his Planet Hollywood theater (that show relaunches
Wednesday).
Dragone also still has "Rise," the outdoor acrobatic show, on the
table for next year. Other concepts abound from his production
company, and a refreshed version of "The House of Dancing Water"
production is due to return to City of Dreams resort in Macau in 2022,
too.
But Thursday was all Cirque nostalgia, as Dragone spoke immediately
after "O."
"I was fine at first, but strangely enough, during the show, I started
to go, 'Ooh! Ooh!' when I saw something that affected me," Dragone
said. "I am happy for Daniel and all of the people in Cirque.
Congratulations to them."
SEE PICS HERE: http://www.cirquefascination.com/?p=14109
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
----------------------------------------------------------
"The Illusionists" in Las Vegas?
{Jul.02.2021}
----------------------------------------------------------
John Katsilometes of the Las Vegas Review-Journal asked Lamarre at the
"O" Premiere if "The Illusionists" might be moved into a Vegas
theater, specifically the former "Zumanity" room at New York-New York.
He also asked MGM Resorts CEO Bill Hornbuckle about plans at New York-
New York
the response? "He's only said there would be a brand-
friendly show able to perform 10 times a week coming to the hotel."
"The Illusionists" is the magic production owned by Cirque that
has succeeded on Broadway and on tour. The show was to be
presented as the cornerstone of "One Night For One Drop" at
Luxor last March, sliding in as "R.U.N" was closing at the
theater. That show was spiked because of COVID, but "The
Illusionists" remains a Cirque holding.
"The truth is, I haven't found a place for that show yet," said
Lamarre, who did not rule out a new, original Cirque theater in
that venue. "We have many options. Right now we are looking at
various alternatives. What we do normally is develop five or six
different concepts, very different, and do our research locally
to see what will work best."
Hmm...
{ SOURCE: John Katsilometes, Las Vegas Review-Journal }
=======================================================================
ITINÉRAIRE -- TOUR/SHOW INFORMATION
=======================================================================
o) BIGTOP - Under the Grand Chapiteau
{Alegria INAL, Koozå, Kurios, Luzia}
o) ARENA - In Stadium-like venues
{Crystal, Corteo}
o) RESIDENT - Performed en Le Théâtre
{Mystère, "O", LOVE, MJ ONE, JOYA, X: The Land of Fantasy}
NOTE:
.) While we make every effort to provide complete and accurate
touring dates and locations available, the information in
this section is subject to change without notice. As such,
the Fascination! Newsletter does not accept responsibility
for the accuracy of these listings.
For current, up-to-the-moment information on Cirque's whereabouts,
please visit Cirque's website: < http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/ >,
or for a more comprehensive tour listing, visit our Itinéraire
section online at: < http://www.cirquefascination.com/?page_id=6898 >.
------------------------------------
BIGTOP - Under the Grand Chapiteau
------------------------------------
Alegría-In a New Light:
Houston, TX -- Nov 13, 2021 to Dec 12, 2021 [RESTART]
Seattle, WA -- Jan 18, 2022 to Feb 13, 2022
Koozå:
Montreal, QC -- Apr 28, 2022 to Jun 19, 2022 [RESTART]
Punta Cana, DR -- Nov 25, 2022 to TBA
Kurios:
Rome, IT -- Mar 16, 2022 to Apr 24, 2022
Milan, IT -- May 4, 2022 to Jun 19, 2022
Luzia:
London, UK -- Jan 12, 2022 to Feb 12, 2022 [RESTART]
------------------------------------
ARENA - In Stadium-Like Venues
------------------------------------
CRYSTAL - A BREAKTHROUGH ICE EXPERIENCE:
Frankfurt, DE -- Nov 10, 2021 to Nov 14, 2021
Leipzig, DE -- Oct 7, 2022 to Oct 9, 2022
Nuremberg, DE -- Oct 12, 2021 to Oct 16, 2022
Cologne, DE -- Oct 19, 2021 to Oct 23, 2022
Hanover, DE -- Oct 26, 2022 - Oct 30, 2022
Munich, DE -- Nov 3, 2022 to Nov 6, 2022
Oberhausen, DE -- Nov 16, 2020 to Nov 20, 2022
Stuttgart, DE -- Dec 1, 2021 to Dec 5, 2021
CORTEO:
Nice, FR -- Aug 19, 2021 to Aug 22, 2021
Aix-en-Provence, FR -- Oct 27, 2021 to Oct 31, 2021
Monpellier, FR -- Nov 4, 2021 to Nov 7, 2021
Copenhagen, DE -- Jan 13, 2022 to Jan 16, 2022
Helsinki, FI -- Jan 27, 2022 to Jan 30, 2022
Stockholm, SE -- Feb 3, 2022 to Feb 6, 2022
Vilnius, LT -- Mar 17, 2022 to Mar 20, 2022
Moscow, RU -- Apr 8, 2022 to May 16, 2022
Saint Petersburg, RU -- May 20, 2022 to May 29, 2022
Antwerp, BE -- Jun 23 2022 to Jul 2, 2022
Dublin, IR -- Jun 30, 2022 to Jul 10, 2022
London, UK -- Jul 13, 2022 to Jul 17, 2022
Palma de Mallorca, ES -- Aug 5, 2022 to Aug 14, 2022
Vienna, AT -- Sep 21, 2022 to Sep 25, 2022
Leeds, UK -- Oct 27, 2022 to Oct 30, 2022
Trondheim, NO -- Nov 11, 2022 to Nov 13, 2022
Oslo, NO -- Nov 17, 2022 to Nov 20, 2022
Lille, FR -- TBA
---------------------------------
RESIDENT - en Le Théâtre
---------------------------------
Mystère:
Location: Treasure Island, Las Vegas (USA)
Performs: Friday through Tuesday, Dark: Wednesday/Thursday
Variable Nightly - 7:00pm and/or 9:30pm
** SHOWS RETURNED JUNE 28, 2021!! **
"O":
Location: Bellagio, Las Vegas (USA)
Performs: Wednesday through Friday, Dark Monday/Tuesday
Varable Nightly - 7:30pm and/or 9:30pm
** SHOWS RETURNED JULY 1, 2021!! **
LOVE:
Location: Mirage, Las Vegas (USA)
Performs: Thursday to Monday, Dark: Tuesday/Wednesday (throgh 10/2)
Tuesday to Saturday, Dark: Sunday/Monday (from 10/5)
Two Shows Nightly - 7:00pm and 9:30pm
** SHOWS RETURN AUGUST 26, 2021!! **
7:00pm Shows Only On:
8/26, 8/29, 8/30, 9/2, 9/5, 9/6, 9/9, 9/13, 9/16, 9/20
Additional 2021 Dark Days:
o) 11/2
o) 11/30 to 12/4
Additional 2021 Performances:
o) 12/27 at 7:00pm and 9:30pm
o) 12/31 TBD
MICHAEL JACKSON ONE:
Location: Mandalay Bay, Las Vegas (USA)
Performs: Thursday through Monday - Dark: Tuesday/Wednesday
Two Shows Nightly - 7:00pm and 9:30pm
** SHOWS RETURN AUGUST 19, 2021!! **
JOYÀ:
Location: Riviera Maya, Mexico
Performs: Tuesday through Saturday, Dark: Sunday/Monday
X: THE LAND OF FANTASY
Location: Hangzhou, China
=======================================================================
OUTREACH - UPDATES FROM CIRQUE's SOCIAL WIDGETS
=======================================================================
o) CIRQUECONNECT SPECIALS
Enjoy a front-row seat to awe-inspiring moments of the larger-
than-life shows, with never-before seen angles that can only be
experienced on your screen.
- SPECIAL #47: BEST OF WHEELS {May.14}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RkUYVDFOyE
- SPECIAL #48: BEST OF TEETERBOARD {May.28}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPEYDfIj9Kg
- SPECIAL #49: BEST OF STRAPS {Jun.11}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRYjltItPM0
o) A, B, CIRCUS!
In this series, Cirque du Soleil uncovers the basics of the modern
circus by taking us through its history.
- Episode 1: "History of the Circus" {Jun.02}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3uXVuXk8s4
- Episode 2: "The History of Juggling" {Jun.09}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HlpM7zRtbY
- Episode 3: "The History of Clowns" {Jul.06}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWtFoYTs-tk
o) I AM CIRQUE
Get ready to experience our story through our eyes.
01: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0tRzxtt7OU {Jun.10}
02: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_rDizX5eqM {Jul.08}
o) NOMADS
In this four-part series, meet Andrew and Kevin Atherton as they
let us in on their life-changing decisions and set off to travel
across continents to join the cast and crew of JOYA, Cirque du
Soleil's dinner show in Riviera Maya, Mexico.
01: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ4INQFvVCk {May.05}
02: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfmyoxXHOX4 {May.12}
03: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eb0k8Bv3-bE {May.19}
04: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9FU03wkzE4 {May.26}
o) OTHER VIDEOS
- INTERMISSION IS OVER {Jun.23}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPNqua1tg3E
Together, we are rising up to celebrate the return to life of
the performing arts. Strong, united and more conscious than
ever of our mission.
=======================================================================
FASCINATION! FEATURES
=======================================================================
------------------------------------------------------------
SPECIAL REPRINT: "The Show Will Go On"
By: Jason Kirby, The Globe and Mail
-----------------------------------------------------------
On a sunny afternoon in March 2020, a small crowd shuffled into Cirque
du Soleil's sprawling tent-shaped theatre at the Disney Springs resort
in Orlando for a mini-preview of its new show, Drawn to Life. Once
inside, everyone's sense of perspective was immediately put to the
test. A towering lamp loomed over the stage, its bulb the size of a
baby elephant. Twenty-foot-tall pencils stood in a jar near an old-
timey pencil sharpener that would take a team of six to operate.
Dozens of bedsheet-size sketchpad pages hung overhead. This was what
it must be like to be shrunk down to size and perched on an animator's
table. The effect was Lilliputian. Or, since this was a Cirque-Disney
co-production, Jiminy Cricketian.
Drawn to Life tells the story of Julie, a young girl whose animator
father has died (in keeping with Disney's tradition of doing away with
parents). When she discovers some of his unfinished animations, she
sets out to complete them. The audience that day was made up of
reporters, theme-park-industry watchers and Disney employees, and as
they took their seatsstrangers sitting elbow to elbow, their faces
just inches aparta team of acrobats dressed to look like pencil
sketches performed in tandem with animated drawings projected behind
them. Then a muscular aerialist twirled a giant pencil dangling from a
rope like he was drawing onto a sketchpad on the stage. When an old
wooden desk sprang to life and galloped away, delight at the spectacle
was apparent on the onlookers' unmasked faces.
No one there knew it yet, but this was Cirque's last gasp in the
Before Times. In less than two weeks, panicked governments would close
borders, people around the world would start to don masks, and the
global economy would be put into a coma to fight the spreading virus.
By the day of the show's preview, the mysterious virus had already
begun to leave its mark on the company. The city of Wuhan, where the
disease originated, sits 800 kilometres west of Hangzhou, home to
Cirque's first permanent show in China, which launched in the summer
of 2019. Authorities had ordered live performances in the country shut
down, while Cirque's touring shows in Hong Kong and Italy had also
been put on hold.
Even without everything that was about to happen, this was already a
critical moment for the company. The jewel of Quebec Inc. had only
just announced it was pulling the plug on R.U.N., its newest big-
budgetresident show in the crucial Las Vegas market, after just five
months of dismal reviews. ("An ugly, inconsistent, poorly planned and
sloppily executed mess that lies there like a dead body in a ditch,"
scathed one critic.) It wasn't the first Cirque show to get panned and
end its run early, but R.U.N. was its most high-profile failure to
date and the shortest lifespan of any outing in its history.
For Cirque, then, Drawn to Life was a timely opportunity to reassert
its bona fides as a dynamic creative force. It's a hugely ambitious
production, the result of more than two years of collaboration with
Disney's animation team and its Imagineering R&D division, which saw
Cirque gain access to the studio's archive of pencil sketches. It
features seven sprawling tracks that loop backstage carrying 250-foot-
long drawings that crisscross each other to create a parallax effect
an ode to the seven-layer multiplane camera system Disney perfected to
make animated scenery in movies like Snow White and Bambi more
realistic. No wonder CEO and 20-year Cirque veteran Daniel Lamarre was
so eager to talk up the company's long game when he stepped on stage,
onto a literal blank canvas on the floor. "We are preparing an amazing
show that I hope will stay here forever," he beamed.
Later, after the acrobats and anthropomorphic furniture had wandered
into the wings, Lamarre joined me in the front row, where he reflected
on everything Cirque was up against. Yes, R.U.N. was a costly flop, he
admitted. The financial hit to Cirque was around $20 million and even
more to its partner, MGM Resorts International. And yes, the virus was
deeply worrying. A crisis unit had been formed just the day before at
Cirque's Montreal headquarters to monitor the risks to its employees
and operations.
Yet, Lamarre remained true to his reputation for unshakable optimism,
a quality he attributed to having "a very selective memory" that stops
him from dwelling on those instances when Cirque's big creative bets
don't pay off. This moment in the company's nearly 40-year history is
no different, he insisted. "As a robust entertainment organization, we
mitigate our risk with a portfolio that is broad enough that if you
have bad luck or a bad situation somewhere, you can absorb that
without getting the company into trouble," he said, wearing his
trademark tinted glasses. "Look, this is not good, obviously. But it's
not the end of the world."
Within days, however, Cirque's world would completely collapse.
Over the past year, Cirque du Soleil granted Report on Business
magazine access to its top leaders as they fought to keep the company
alive. Along with interviews with Cirque's former owners, performers,
lawyers, past executives and others, they provide a front-row seat to
not only the crushing decision to cancel the company's shows worldwide
and lay off 95% of its staff, including acrobats, clowns, musicians
and other creative types, but also the complex logistical scramble to
unwind Cirque's vast international operations.
And they reveal the financial contortions Cirque had to perform to
survive. It's a company with no real assets beyond its brand and its
expertise at creating live extravaganzas. But carrying a staggering
amount of debt, Cirque was arguably more exposed to a once-in-a-
century pandemic than any other major company in the world. The crisis
triggered a desperate scramble for emergency financing that saw Cirque
plunged into one of the most complex bankruptcy filings in Canadian
corporate history. And it set off a high-stakes, hard-knuckled battle
between the powerful private equity firms that controlled the company
and its creditorsa clash that ultimately left Cirque in the hands of
Toronto-based Catalyst Capital, whose business model includes
targeting and seizing control of distressed assets.
Now, with the pandemic's end in sight, Cirque is opening the door on
its plan to revive itself and bring back at least some of its
performers, beginning with two of its oldest and most popular shows in
Las Vegas this summer. The challenges will be manyfrom the
unpredictability of COVID-19 variants and lingering border
restrictions to more fundamental questions about how Cirque will
repair its famously close-knit workplace culture and preserve the
risk-taking ethos on which it was built.
What Cirque is attempting is the corporate equivalent of the seemingly
impossible acrobatics its performers are known foronly it's doing so
after suffering a near-fatal injury. Vast fortunes, personal
reputations and the livelihoods of thousands of former employees, not
to mention Quebec provincial pride, now ride on Cirque sticking the
landing.
To understand Cirque's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad year, it
helps to know where the company stood going into the crisis and the
circumstances that made it so vulnerable when the pandemic hit.
In mid-February 2020, around the time the World Health Organization
assigned COVID-19 its official name, but before Quebec had confirmed a
single case, Cirque's headquarters buzzed with activity. Located in
the Montreal borough of Saint-Michel, on the site of a former
limestone quarry that later served as the province's largest landfill,
the steel and glass structure could be home to just about any
multinational corporation, save for the gigantic bronze sculpture of
an old leather clown shoe near the entrance. Inside, it's the kind of
place where turning a corner puts you face to face with a life-size
animatronic polar bear. Young men and women in fantastical costumes
dart in and out of doorways, and a multistorey atrium overflows with
employees watching Cirque's resident clown, Madame Zazou, dressed in a
bright red wig and a gown of red and gold felt, lead a raucous
lunchtime quiz show. (Guy Laliberté, Cirque's founder, hired her years
ago when he worried the place was becoming too corporate, and Madame
Zazou is known for regularly crashing high-level executive meetings to
poke fun at Lamarre.)
I'd travelled there from Toronto as part of a story on the business of
creativity. Cirque was seemingly the perfect case study. Over 36
years, it had become one of Canada's most successful exports by
turning decades of North American circus tradition on its head,
replacing the elephants, lions and clown cars with a fusion of
daredevil acrobatics, opera, dance and whimsy. It achieved pop culture
status along the wayin Madagascar 3, Alex the Lion riffs on how
French Canadians, "drunk off their maple syrup and cheap
pharmaceuticals," completely flipped the paradigm of traditional
circuses. It has also spawned a cottage industry of business
consultants who teach other companies how to replicate Cirque's
innovation magic.
At full strengthas it was not long before the pandemic struckthe
company would put on daily performances of its 13 big-top and arena
touring shows in places ranging from Miami, Punta Cana and Seville to
London, Brisbane and Paris. It also hosted 10 resident shows, seven of
them in Las Vegas, packing in audiences up and down the strip. By some
estimates, 40% of all show tickets sold in the entertainment capital
of the world in 2019 were to see Cirque. And that didn't include
performances by other Cirque-owned subsidiaries, including Blue Man
Group and the Illusionist magic franchise. At the end of that year,
Cirque boasted annual sales of US$1.04 billion and posted earnings
before income, taxes, depreciation and amortization of around US$120
million. "At their peak, they really did resemble the British Empire,"
says Patrick Leroux, a circus scholar and associate dean of research
at Concordia University's faculty of arts and science. "The sun never
set on a Cirque du Soleil show."
In many ways, Cirque is a child of globalization. Starting from its
roots as a troupe of stilt-walkers and fire-eaters in the 1980s, it
exploded in popularity during the 1990s and 2000s as technology and
trade made the world feel smaller. It wasn't just the diverse makeup
of its international workforce. By design, Cirque's style and music
was at once culturally non-specific and immediately identifiable. The
lyrics to its songs are generally a familiar gibberish that allows for
cross-cultural appeal. The modern world's free flow of ideas and
people made Cirque possible.
Even before countries closed and global trade routes seized up, the
company's small world was growing harder to navigate. Tightening
border restrictions under the Trump administration made processing as
many as 7,000 visas and other permits a year more complicated. Rising
diplomatic tensions with China hurt too: In December 2018, Cirque
pulled out of talks to feature its performers in China's highly
watched Spring Festival Gala on the same day that country seized
Canadians Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig in retaliation for
Canada's arrest of a Chinese telecom executive on a U.S. warrant
(though the company said the two weren't related).
But if the rise of nationalist populism and identity politics were
making it more difficult to find a shared language that would
transcend borders, those same borders would prove dangerously
vulnerable to the invisible enemy of COVID-19.
Cirque's pre-pandemic success was grounded in its ability to juggle
the competing demands of creativity and commerce. As Lamarre put it
that February in Montreal, "If I were to listen to our creators, they
never have enough money, and if I were to listen to our business
people, we're always spending too much." He knew all too well what
could happen when both balls were dropped. In the wake of the 2008
financial crisis, Cirque suffered a string of disappointments as the
recession sapped demand for its pricey tickets and the company turned
out several creative duds that left it exposed. With profits falling,
Cirque laid off hundreds of executives and performers, and embarked on
a plan to diversify its business, with bold talk of theme parks,
cabaret shows, movies and expansion into Asia. By 2015, however,
Laliberté, then 55, put Cirque up for sale, saying he wanted to spend
more time with his five children but also to explore ventures in real
estate, multimedia and technology. (Laliberté declined to be
interviewed for this story.) Despite interest from 52 suitors, the
winning bid was a consortium led by U.S. private equity firm TPG
Capital, which bought a 55% stake. Shanghai-based Fosun Capital
acquired 25%, and provincial pension fund manager Caisse de dépôt et
placement du Québec bought 10%. The group reportedly paid US$1.5
billion for the company, with Laliberté holding on to 10%.
Aside from the predictable hand-wringing by Quebec nationalists over
Cirque being owned by des capitalistes américains, the deal also
caught attention for the financial acrobatics that enabled it. Like
all leveraged buyout transactions, the TPG-led consortium paid for the
takeover using debt, which it then put onto Cirque's balance sheet and
let grow further over the next four years. By the end of 2019, Cirque
owed US$970 million in long-term debt, and Moody's, the credit-rating
agency, had warned the company's "largely debt-funded expansion
strategy could be unsustainable." If trouble ever arose, Moody's added
prophetically, Cirque would have little room to maneuver.
Cirque's debt load didn't appear to concern its owners. As an LBO
giant, TPG had already deployed US$50 billion in nearly 200
transactions over the previous two decades, including many media and
entertainment investments. Right till the end, Cirque was generating
nearly US$100 million a month in revenue and meeting its interest
payments. Even today, those with knowledge of TPG's Cirque strategy
call the focus on its debt a red herring. "Our debt was basically
trading at par in advance of COVID, so the markets were saying Cirque
was appropriately capitalized," says a source familiar with TPG's
thinking.
The initial focus for the new owners was on improving efficiency.
"Cirque had an abundance of culture and cult-like commitment to the
brand, and at the same time it had an abundant lack of controls,
accountability and responsibility for [profits and losses]," says
Mitch Garber, the Montreal businessman who joined the TPG-led purchase
of Cirque as its chair (he was replaced last September). "It's hard to
be critical, because it worked for Guy. He's not an org chart guy.
He's not a quarter-over-quarter growth guy, and he doesn't necessarily
hold people accountable for missing their numbers, which is something
that's necessary when running a large organization." To that end, more
rigorous corporate reporting systems were put in place, as was a more
disciplined process for greenlighting new projects. As part of an
efficiency drive, Cirque also quietly cut more than 50 jobs in
December 2019. "We did all those things, and we were really in a great
position going into 2020," says Garber.
But the new ownership group also saw Cirque as a one-of-a-kind global
live entertainment platform. "Cirque's capability set included
recruiting unique talent around the world, dealing with a tonne of
visa issues, moving performers around the world, paying people in
multiple currencies, and being able to take any [intellectual
property] and distribute it around the world," says the source close
to TPG. "There's a long tail of mom-and-pop shows that have made it in
one-off locations. Cirque could leverage its platform to distribute
more shows and more show types globally." Pursuing that strategy
between 2017 and 2019, Cirque bought Blue Man Group (the one with the
blue-painted bald artists and musicians), the Works (a troupe of
touring magicians) and VStar Entertainment (which produces touring
shows based on kids' programs like Paw Patrol). In total during the
TPG era, Cirque invested US$300 million in acquisitions and new shows.
(Not everything was a successin addition to R.U.N.'s failure, a
40,000-square-foot football-themed interactive attraction in Times
Square, launched in partnership with the National Football League in
2017, closed after only 10 months.) "We had a multiyear plan that was
just about to hit its inflection point in 2020, where we were going to
experience a lot of growth, on both the top line and bottom line,
because of all the shows we were set to launch by the end of the
year," says the person close to TPG. "It was just horrific timing to
have this kind of black swan event happen."
By the time I met Lamarre again in Orlando in early March for the
Drawn to Life preview, it was clear from the closure of Cirque's shows
in China, Hong Kong and Italy that the virus would affect the
company's plans for the year. Yet he maintained the new show at Disney
Springs would open as planned for full previews two weeks later. In
fact, for many of those attending the event, hope remained high that
North America would be spared the worst. The optimists included me.
I'd flown my family down for a side trip to Disney World, reassured by
the fact the entire state of Florida had only seen a couple of cases
so far.
The reality of my own naiveté was driven home 10 days after we got
back to Toronto, when news broke that a 34-year-old man from
California had fallen ill after visiting Disney World at the same time
we were there. He tested positive for COVID-19 and was put on a
ventilator. He died five days later, on March 19, a day before Drawn
to Life was supposed to open its doors.
That never happened, of course. By then, Cirque was in freefall.
When Emily McCarthy stepped onto the ice at the arena in Sheffield,
England, as part of Cirque's touring show Crystal in early March 2020,
it wasn't just for any regular performance. Born in nearby Leeds,
McCarthy had been part of Great Britain's acrobatic gymnastics team
from a young age. While competing in Florida, she was spotted by
Cirque's talent scouts. At 16, she ran away to join the circus, a
journey that took her to more than three dozen countries. As an
aerialist in the finale of Crystal, it was her first chance to perform
the act in front of her home crowd. "It was mega-exciting to have all
my family, friends, schoolteachers and gym coaches come to see me,"
says McCarthy.
It was also in Sheffield that she first started paying attention to
the spreading virus. By the time the tour moved to Glasgow the
following week, it was no longer a distant concern. The tour director
called a full meeting to say Cirque was keeping an eye on the
situation. The next day, another meeting was called, and performers
were told that after the final show three days hence, everyone would
be sent home. "The plan was to rekindle the show in Paris in
September, and we all just thought, Wow, five months away is such a
big deal," says McCarthy.
Back at Cirque's head office, the response to the mounting crisis had
already started to scale up. The first show to close had been Cirque's
sole residency in China, X: The Land of Fantasy in Hangzhou, which
shut down on Jan. 23, the same day the Chinese government imposed a
dramatic lockdown of Wuhan. The move stung, given Cirque's long-stated
aspiration to grow in China, but the idea that the whole world would
grind to a halt was still inconceivable.
On Feb. 21, Duncan Fisher, who'd joined Cirque two years earlier as
vice-president of touring operations, got a message from a tour
director with Blue Man Group, which was scheduled to travel to South
Korea, where an outbreak had just occurred. Fisher spent the last week
of February in Munich with the touring show Totem, which was set to
visit Italy, Europe's hardest-hit country, the next month. There, too,
questions were being asked about how to proceed.
Fisher rushed back to Montreal, where he was charged with setting up
Cirque's crisis task force, which began meeting daily. Their
discussions still largely focused on how Cirque could keep shows
running in the face of widening government restrictions and what types
of safety protocols were needed for employees and audiences. "There
wasn't any talk of us shutting down," says Fisher. "It was, 'How do we
operate in this new reality we're seeing?'"
As the situation worsened, the daily meetings grew to include more
than 70 people. Despite their size, the gatherings were kept to around
45 minutes, with a strict time limit imposed on questions. "If we
couldn't solve your problem in 60 seconds, we'd take it to a sidebar
meeting," Fisher says. "Everybody in the company then knew exactly
what was happening with every tour around the world."
That was the first week of March. By the second, "everybody knew what
was coming our way," says Jean-François Girard-Berberi, then Cirque's
head of talent operations. "Everything was moving so fast, you had
very little time to react." (He left the company this past April.) One
by one, its touring shows were shut down, and by Friday, March 13, all
13 of themaccounting for an estimated 65% of Cirque's revenuehad
closed, save for Crystal in the U.K., where the government was slower
to implement lockdowns.
For Lamarre, the halt was crushing. The only consolation, if it could
be called that, was that the six remaining Cirque shows in Las Vegas
were still operating, though he knew the clock was ticking. On March
14, the day after the Trump administration declared a national
emergency, Lamarre sat in a chair at his hairstylist's as his phone
pinged every few minutes with updates on the spreading crisis. Then
came the call from MGM Resorts: All the Vegas hotels were closing, and
with them the Cirque showsO at the Bellagio, Love at the Mirage, Kà
at MGM Grand, Mystère at Treasure Island, Michael Jackson One at
Mandalay Bay and Zumanity at New York-New York. Lamarre excused
himself and walked to his car in a daze. "I just collapsed in my car
as I came to the understanding that Vegas was shutting down," he says.
"It meant we had no more shows. It meant we had no more revenue."
As it turned out, the 1 p.m. performance of Crystal in Glasgow that
Sunday would be Cirque's last show before locking down, making
McCarthy's act one of the final performances before the company's
collapse.
Crystal follows the subconscious journey of a young woman after she
falls through a frozen pond, and as McCarthy stepped onto the ice, a
narrator's voice echoed out: "It's easy to fall, harder to get back
up." After she's flung through the air repeatedly, McCarthy's act
culminates with her heart-stopping plunge, headfirst, toward the ice
from about 20 feet in the air, where she is caught at the last moment
by another performer. "I wanted it to be perfect and to take in every
moment," she says. "Once that final trick ended and I got in the
finale position at the end of my act, I just started crying."
Cirque du Soleil is the United Nations of live entertainment. At its
height, the company's 4,900 employees hailed from almost 90 different
countries, and it maintained a small army of translators so they could
all talk to one another. On its touring shows alone, there were 1,500
performers, artists and technicians from 50 nations. Nearly all of
them would soon be out of a job. And with borders rapidly closing,
they all had to get home.
While many employees had heard from their local managers that shows
were being put on hold indefinitely, official word came from Lamarre
via a short video posted on the company's internal communications hub
at noon on March 19. Cirque would be laying off 4,679 employees, he
said, retaining a bare-bones staff of 259 in Montreal. "This is a
temporary situation," he tried to assure them.
Behind the scenes, the massive logistical dance of repatriating
everyone was already underway. "All the barriers at the company
dropped, and everybody wanted to work together to help employees and
save the company," says Girard-Berberi. Members of the tour services
team in Montreal, along with local tour managers, began frantically
booking flights through Expedia for all 1,500 touring employees. With
employees hailing from countries as diverse as Kazakhstan,
Switzerland, Belarus, Moldova, Denmark, Taiwan, Australia, Russia,
Colombia, Japan, Finland, Italy and Brazil, the flights crisscrossed
the globe. All told, the bill for airfare was close to $1 million. Yet
within a matter of days, the mass mobilization was complete. "From
when we started shutting down, it took us 10 days to get everybody
home," says Fisher.
Well, almost everybody. Eight Mongolians who'd worked on various
Cirque shows found themselves trapped when their country closed its
borders, even to its own citizens. Ninjin Altankhuyag, a 25-year-old
contortionist with the show Kooza, was one of them. From the age of
seven, when Cirque came to Mongolia for a casting call, she'd wanted
to join the company, and she got her chance in 2014. Kooza was in
Lyons, France, when it was shut down. "Cirque found us an apartment to
stay in until we could get back home," she says, "We really
appreciated it." As the weeks turned to months, she mostly watched TV
and cooked. "I learned a lot of new recipes," she says. Finally, in
August, they were able to snag a spot on a special charter flight to
Ulaanbaatar.
Before employees left their tour sites that March, they'd helped tear
down most of the tents and pack up the arena shows. Tents at three
tour sites, in Melbourne, Houston and Montreal, were left up in the
hope that shows might resume in the coming months, but eventually
those too were dismantled. That left Fisher with the question of where
to put them all, along with costumes, booths, sound and lighting
equipment. Gear from Europe went to the warehouses of a trucking
company in Amsterdam, while the rest was loaded into trucks and stored
in Las Vegas or Montreal. In all, nearly 700 tractor-trailers were
packed away.
Many of them still sit in the parking lot beside Cirque's
headquarters. "When I see them, truck after truck after truck, it just
hits me in the gut," says Leroux, the professor at Concordia, who also
teaches at the National Circus School across from Cirque's offices.
"The first time I saw them, I thought, Oh my God, so this is what a
multinational touring force looks like at a standstill. It's
heartbreaking to see so much creativity, so much potential, so much
investment and so many dreams just sitting there in a parking lot."
In the world of theatre, it's tradition to leave a single lit lamp,
known as a ghost light, onstage after everyone has left for the day.
In Melbourne, after packing away the equipment for Kurios, that's what
employees did, where Cirque's big top once stood at the Flemington
Racecourse. The light stayed lit until this past April, when Cirque
had to clear out for good.
* * *
The crisis facing Cirque wasn't entirely unprecedented. The 1918
Spanish flu triggered government lockdowns that forced circuses across
America to end their touring seasons early. In October of that year,
Charles Ringling notified the 1,200 employees of the Ringling Bros.
World's Greatest Shows the circus was shutting down. The next day, it
staged its final standalone performance. By the next spring, it had
merged with Barnum & Bailey, and the combined company was back on the
road at full force.
At Cirque, as with the rest of the world, no one knew how long COVID-
19 would keep its grip on the global economy, but early on there was
hope the crisis wouldn't last. "We went from almost US$100 million a
month to zero in a week, and I think we all naively thought we'd be
able to recapitalize the business and by the end of the summer or
beginning of fall this thing would be over," says then chief financial
officer Stéphane Lefebvre, who joined Cirque in 2016 and was recently
named chief operating officer.
The financial nightmare would last much longer than that.
In theory, Cirque had three options. It could tap the government for a
bailout. It could get its existing investors, TPG, Fosun and Caisse,
to inject more cash to keep the company afloat. Or it could file for
protection from its creditors.
Lamarre preferred the first two options, and he turned to the Caisse
for support. The pension fund had extra motivation to see Cirque
survive intact. Less than two months earlier, in February 2020, in
what might go down as the most perfectly timed asset sale ever,
Laliberté unloaded his remaining 10% stake on the Caisse for US$75
million, thereby doubling the pension fund's exposure to the company.
By early May, Cirque had secured a loan of US$50 million in "emergency
funds" from its ownership group, and the Quebec government pledged up
to $200 million to help Cirque get back on its feet, providing control
was anchored in Quebec and the existing owners maintained control.
Cirque's immediate future seemed safe.
But there was a problem. Cirque had already failed to make roughly
US$20 million in interest and principal payments to its creditors in
March 2020. And just before doing so, Cirque's ownership group had
transferred intellectual property assets, including the Cirque du
Soleil trademark, to a separate holding company they controlled. If
Cirque filed for bankruptcy protection, lenders might no longer have a
claim on the Cirque brandarguably its most valuable assetin many
parts of the world. And bankruptcy was looking increasingly likely.
Moody's slashed Cirque's credit rating deep into junk territory and
warned the pandemic shutdown had "significantly heighten[ed] the
company's risk of default."
When the asset shuffle eventually came to light, it put Cirque and its
existing ownership group on a collision course with debtholders. "To
the extent they were taking security away from the lending group and
the lending group doesn't have the ability to call on that security
anymore, that reduces your pool of collateral, whether or not the
company is insolvent," says Joe Pasquariello, a partner and head of
the corporate restructuring group at Goodmans, which represented a
committee of secured creditors.
Enter Catalyst Capital. Controlled by secretive Toronto financier
Newton Glassman, the private equity firm specializes in acquiring
distressed assets, like the secured debt of struggling companies, on
the cheap. It then restructures the businesses with the goal of
spinning them off at a profit. Through March and April 2020, Catalyst,
led by managing director Gabriel de Alba, began quietly buying up
Cirque's first-lien debt (the first in line to be paid when a borrower
defaults) at around 50 cents on the dollar.
With US$4.3 billion in capital commitments, Catalyst's strategy has
put it at the centre of some of Canada's largest restructurings,
including those of broadcaster Canwest Global, steelmaker Stelco and
theatre giant Imax. But it has also been stuck with holdings it failed
to unload profitably, such as Advantage Rent A Car, which filed for
bankruptcy protection for the third time in May 2020, and Gateway
Casinos, which saw a US$1.1-billion sale collapse last year. The firm
has also pushed limits in its battles with adversaries. A recent
Ontario court ruling revealed Catalyst had indirectly paid up to US$11
million to Black Cube, an Israeli private investigation outfit, which
carried out a sting on a former Ontario Superior Court judge who had
previously ruled against Catalyst, in an attempt to discredit him.
Catalyst has said it was unaware of Black Cube's actions. (De Alba
declined requests for an interview.)
In the wake of the transfer of Cirque's trademark, Catalyst assembled
an ad hoc group of other lenders and negotiated with Cirque to replace
the $50-million loan from its owners with one from the creditors.
By then, though, the struggle for Cirque du Soleil's soul had become
an all-out brawl. Pierre Karl Péladeau, CEO of media giant Québecor,
vowed to "rescue" Cirque with a vague pledge of "several hundred
millions of dollars." Péladeau also took a shot at Lamarre and Garber,
then Cirque's chair, on social media: "The accounting truth
demonstrates beyond any doubt that the management of [Lamarre and
Garber] has been more than deficient
Cirque and its talents must be
saved." (Garber fired back on Twitter: "My life would have been so
much easier with much less risk if my daddy gave me my company and a
few billion dollars. Unfortunately, I had to build and learn from
scratch. You'll always be the guy born at third base but convinced you
hit a triple.")
Even Laliberté wanted back in. "As Cirque faces the biggest challenge
of its existence, we're about to see a wrestling match involving a
number of players," he wrote in an open letter last May. "From my
point of view, we're in for a battle royale."
* * *
While all this was going on, Cirque's former employees were struggling
to adjust to life off the stage. The company had allowed everyone to
keep their work computers and phones so they could stay connected. Yet
as billions around the world were learning, lockdowns can be
gruelling, especially for people accustomed to performing daring feats
of athleticism in front of cheering audiences 350 times a year.
For Crystal's McCarthy, her very identity came into question. "From
when I was 16 until 25, Cirque was all I'd known," she says. "It's
been my one and only job, and so coming off the tour, I really was
unsure about who I was." Absent the pressures of the show, she lost
her motivation to train. "I was rubbish. I was drinking wine every
night, just watching Netflix and not knowing what to do with myself,"
she says.
Some of the many performers back in Montreal moved in together to form
bubbles around specific acts. "If you had five people who do a Korean
plank act, you'd find the largest apartment you could and all move in
to train together," says Concordia's Leroux. Others sought out
specialized gear that was sitting unused in empty gyms. Brittany Gee-
Moore, an aerialist rope performer with Messi10a show inspired by
Argentinian soccer star Lionel Messi that had been on tour in Qatar
returned to her parents' home in Burnaby, B.C., and tracked down a 24-
foot-tall aerial rig that she set up in their backyard. "I'm not
really sure if it was legal, but I was able to train six days a week
on it, sometimes with the neighbours watching," she says.
Aside from the physical and psychological challenges brought on by
Cirque's collapse, there was also the financial burden. Cirque often
describes itself as a family, and in many cases that's the literal
truth. Workplace romances are common, so when the company shut down,
many employees also had a partner who was suddenly out of work. That
was the case for Caroline Lauzon, who performs in the Las Vegas show O
and whose husband is a rollerblader in Love. "When we closed, I think
everyone was a bit relieved they could go in their cocoon and stay
safe," she says. "But after a few weeks, it dawned on us that we're
not going back for a while."
Lauzon was fortunate to have obtained her real estate licence a few
years earlier"I'm going to be 40 in two years, so I had to plan ahead
because the body can't do Cirque forever"so she began working in Las
Vegas's surging real estate market. She knew others who weren't so
lucky. The previous winter, Cirque had hired 40 more artists for O in
order to perform the show seven days a week, but they hadn't worked
long enough to qualify for unemployment benefits. "Some of them spent
all their money moving here and had no money coming in," Lauzon says.
"They were standing in lines for free food." Lauzon set up a GoFundMe
campaign that raised enough to give US$1,000 each to 21 performers.
While Cirque's full-time employees had all been paid in full for the
work they'd done before the layoff, that wasn't the case for the many
contractors and freelancers. Gabriel Dubé-Dupuis grew up around
Cirquehis father played the Baby in Mystère when the show debuted in
Vegas in 1993and he joined the company 25 years ago. He was a
creative director for shows being developed for cruise ships when
Cirque terminated his contract. Dubé-Dupuis was still owed $70,000 and
was told that as a supplier, he was at the bottom of the list of
creditors. "I was shocked," he says. "If we provided basically the
soul of the company over the last 35 years, how can you consider us
the same way you would consider Hydro-Québec providing electricity to
the building?" In May and June 2020, he organized protests in Montreal
with other Cirque contractors who were owed a combined $1 million. But
as the summer wore on, he didn't know when or if he would be paid.
As for McCarthy, she recalls the day she woke up and realized only one
person could determine how long she'd feel unmotivated. She started
training again that morning. Her brother had started his own company
selling calisthenics and bodyweight training equipment, so she bought
a stake in the business. She also set up her own YouTube channel,
which amassed 70,000 subscribers, and began offering flexibility
classes on Zoom.
"I feel very fortunate to have had such a good experience over this,"
McCarthy says, "even though it took me a little while to get there."
Cirque du Soleil itself saw a bit of good news last summer.
Immediately after its live shows shut down, the company launched a
digital portal, CirqueConnect, and began airing weekly specials
featuring acts from its shows. The videos quickly racked up more than
65 million views. Meanwhile, Cirque's corporate partners were stepping
upSun Life, a longtime sponsor and Cirque's group insurance provider,
kept its rates at the level of a company with nearly 5,000 employees,
even though the insured group had shrunk dramatically. What's more, by
early June China had brought the virus under control, paving the way
for Cirque's show in Hangzhou to relaunch. Performances of another
show, Joyà, at the Riviera Maya resort in Mexico, resumed shortly
after.
Reality soon came crashing back. With its emergency funding running
out, Cirque buckled under the weight of its debt and the ongoing
shutdown, and filed for protection from its creditors late in June
2020. At the same time, it announced a so-called stalking-horse bid
(which sets a floor for other bids to follow) from existing
shareholders, through a new company called Trapeze Holdings, that
would see them reduce the company's debt and inject US$300 million to
restart its shows. The proposal would leave Cirque's creditors holding
just 45% of the equity.
In an internal video to employees, Lamarre called the filing a
"necessary step for Cirque's survival and a springboard for the
organization's revival," but he also let them know Cirque "can no
longer afford to keep our employees on temporary layoff." The layoffs
were now permanent, save for about 600 workers in Las Vegas and
Orlando who would be kept on to help shows in those cities eventually
relaunch.
The bankruptcy filing blindsided the creditor group, which had
signalled interest about launching its own stalking horse bid, says
Pasquariello, the lawyer representing Cirque creditors. The group of
lenders quickly signalled it wouldn't support the transaction. "The
lender group wasn't interested in dilly-dallying when a bid wasn't
going to be serious and competitive with the lending group's own
offer," says Pasquariello. Days later, the creditors put forward their
own offer, through their own circusy-named holding company, Spectacle
BidCo., to buy, among other assets, "the storyline, plot, themes,
characters, concept developments, ideas, costumes, sets, props,
choreographies, performances, makeup design, lighting concepts, sound
designs, musical compositions and staging of any live entertainment
program" of Cirque for US$1.2 billion, including US$375 million in new
money. The deal would cut Cirque's debt by more than 30%. The creditor
group also committed to keeping Cirque's headquarters in Quebec for at
least five years.
Other bidders had until Aug. 18 to come up with better offers, but
they all had to meet one somewhat unusual demand. Embedded in the
first Trapeze bid was a non-negotiable Cirque requirement that whoever
ended up owning the company would establish a US$15-million fund to
help terminated employees, and another fund for freelancers and
contractors. "It was odd," says then CFO Lefebvre, "but when you know
what the DNA of this company is, it's not a surprise that we would
think about these things."
In every way, the pandemic made the already complex proceedings even
more strained. Lefebvre and Lamarre had to do half a dozen five-hour
presentations to potential bidders virtually. Hundreds of
teleconference calls were made between creditors, lawyers, existing
shareholders and financial advisers, all while juggling stay-at-home
orders, family demands and pandemic stress. "I think every financial
and legal professional who has played in this field over a long time
would say this was one of the most challenging restructuring files
they'd ever seen," says Pasquariello.
While a wide array of potential bidders reportedly examined Cirque's
books, including Quebecor, Rogers Communications, Goldman Sachs and
Feld Entertainment (which once owned Ringling Bros. and Barnum &
Bailey Circus and now operates Disney on Ice), no bid could top that
of the creditors. As lenders, only they could include the face value
of the company's US$1 billion in debt as part of their bid, an
insurmountable hurdle for other contenders.
With that, Cirque became a holding of its lenders, led by Catalyst and
including Sound Point Capital and CBAM Partners of New York. It struck
many as an odd fit. A company that embodies hope and joy was now
controlled by one of Bay Street's most ruthless dealmakers in
Glassman, who once told a reporter, "You have to be unaffected by
conflict to be decent at distressed [debt investing] because it's a
highly adversarial process
You are dealing with desperate people, and
desperate people try desperate things."
The deal received court approval and closed in November 2020. Most of
Cirque's existing management team stayed in place, and Jim Murren, the
former CEO of MGM Resorts InternationalCirque's biggest partner in
Vegaswas named co-chair with de Alba.
As for TPG, Fosun and Caisse, their equity holdings were wiped out.
For the Caisse, that meant not just the US$71 million it invested in
2015, but also the US$75 million it paid Laliberté only four months
before the bankruptcy filing. When Caisse CEO Charles Emond was later
grilled by the Quebec National Assembly's public finance committee, he
defended both the February purchase, which he claimed would have given
the fund more sway to address Cirque's swelling debt, and the decision
to write off its stake. "The Cirque went from $100 million per month
to zero, with employees to pay and suppliers to pay, in 48 hours," he
said. "It was probably the first business to close. It will most
likely be the last to reopen."
* * *
One year after Cirque du Soleil's nightmare began, in March, Lefebvre
and Lamarre held a video call with employees. The message was simple,
says Lefebvre: "We might not be out of the worldwide health crisis at
this time, but the company is definitely out of its financial crisis
created by the public health crisis."
Normalcy has begun to return, slowly. In March, Dubé-Dupuis, who was
among the contractors still waiting to be paid for work completed
before the pandemic, got a call from his bank asking why $70,000 had
just been deposited into his account. He'd reached out to Catalyst
after it won control of Cirque and told the new owners of the
contractors' situation, and de Alba assured him Cirque was working on
it. In all, US$3.6 million was paid out to Cirque's former contractors
and freelancers that month. "This is a step in the right direction,"
Dubé-Dupuis said the day after getting paid. "Good things can happen."
Payments from the special US$15-million employee fund are also close
to being issued, Cirque officials say. The fund got bogged down last
fall in a dispute between Canada Revenue Agency and Cirque's new
owners over the tax treatment of the payments, which would amount to
US$3,000 per employee. At one point, an exasperated Quebec Superior
Court judge, Louis Gouin, who oversaw the bankruptcy filing, urged the
two sides to work out their differences on compassionate grounds.
"This is my human side talking," he told the lawyers. "These are
really exceptional times. Those acrobats can't find a job tomorrow. I
very much, very much would prefer that you find a way to do this."
The clearest signal that Cirque's revival is underway came this April,
when it officially announced its long-awaited return plan. After
Nevada's governor set a goal of reopening the state at full capacity
by June 1, Cirque picked two shows to lead its relaunchMystère at
Treasure Island in late June and O at the Bellagio on July 1. It was a
symbolic choice: The two shows were Cirque's first resident
performances in Vegas in the 1990s and helped rewrite the idea of the
city as an entertainment destination while also catapulting Cirque to
new heights as an international brand.
Cirque's remaining Vegas shows, Love, Michael Jackson One and Kà, will
follow this fall. (Missing from the list: Zumanity, the Cirque's R-
rated venture into erotic cabaret. After 17 years, it was closed for
good last November.) In Florida, the company is hoping to launch Drawn
to Life sometime in the fall. Two of Cirque's touring shows also got
start datesKooza will begin performances in the Dominican Republic in
November, followed by Luzia at London's Royal Albert Hall next
January. "The intermission is over," says Lamarre.
Cirque's revival is a moment Diane Quinn has been preparing for. When
the COVID-19 crisis began, Cirque's chief creative officer threw
herself into the world of pandemic research. As her understanding
grew, her questions for the experts became more specific. What effect
does virus shedding have on the distance particles travel when
Cirque's singers are performing live? How far apart should clowns be
when speaking to each other or to audiences? What types of HVAC
facilities are in place in different venues? "I don't pretend to be an
expert, but I feel like I've had quite an education in COVID," says
Quinn.
Last December, she got an opportunity to put some of what she'd
learned into practice. In Kissimmee, Fla., a small circus show Cirque
had acquired was gearing up to perform over the holidays. Quinn
recorded the square footage of all the rooms, traced the paths
everyone would walk backstage to ensure they didn't get too close and
established an isolation booth in case someone showed symptoms. It was
also a chance to test the company Cirque has hired to conduct daily
testingto gain access to the theatres, employees will have to display
a QR code on their smartphones proving they've tested negative. "I was
filled with anxiety, wondering, How can I keep all of these artists
and staff safe?" she says. The work paid off. "There were no issues,
no cases, no sickness, and we provided a socially distanced show for
the audience."
That show had nine performers. Replicating that for a complex 90-
minute spectacle like O with a cast of 85 is next. "Regardless of
whether we have one show up and running or 20 shows, these are the
policies and procedures everyone is going to abide by," Quinn says.
Even so, relaunching just one Cirque show will be a huge undertaking.
Each will require roughly two months of intense training and
rehearsals, and cost between US$2 million and US$4 million to restart.
The decision to proceed in Vegas is also a wager that another wave
driven by COVID variants doesn't force another shutdown. So far the
news is good. At the end of April, Nevada's seven-day average for new
cases was 372, roughly in line with where it had been two months
earlier, while 43% of adults in the county had received at least one
vaccine dose.
A quick scan of ticket-booking sites for O and Mystère revealed both
had sold roughly half the seats to their first few performances in a
matter of days. For the following weeks, however, most seats were
still up for grabs. Lamarre is betting that will change as the vaccine
rollout accelerates and stir-crazy Cirque fans from other parts of the
country desperately flee their lockdown digs. "If you're an American
and you are vaccinated, then you're going to want to travel," he says.
"But guess what? There's almost nowhere in the world for them to go,
so they'll probably decide to go to Vegas or Orlando."
* * *
Early in April, a TV crew from Mark Burnett's L.A. production company
arrived in Las Vegas. Burnett, the creative mind behind Survivor and
The Apprentice, had already been working with Cirque pre-pandemic to
develop a reality show centred on the casting process. Now the cameras
are following the on- and off-stage lives of Cirque performers as they
prepare to bring its famous water show, O, back to life. "We really
want to shine the spotlight on the artists, technicians and
individuals throughout the company moving forward, not just for this
project but for our global content slate," says Sébastien Ouimet,
director of global content and strategic partnerships at Cirque.
"We'll continue filming until O is back performing, and we can feel
the excitement of mission accomplished."
No one at Cirque is under any illusion that mounting a handful of
shows means the company has reclaimed its former glory. Putting the
massive machinery of Cirque's touring division back together is
expected to stretch well into 2022. Cirque will eventually have to
find a way to move its people and gear back into place in a world
where vaccine passports and COVID flare-ups may be the norm. Tour
schedules are also typically mapped out up to 18 months in advance to
line up promoters, secure locations and ensure shows can move from
city to city with minimal downtime. "The reboot of Cirque is not like
just putting Lady Gaga back on tour. This is going to take months to
years of investment," says the source familiar with TPG's original
Cirque plans, now watching from the sidelines. Moody's, a more
impartial observer, likewise noted in December that Cirque's relaunch
will burn through much of its cash by the end of 2022, "leav[ing]
Cirque du Soleil with limited flexibility to absorb any material
underperformance against their business plan during the extended ramp-
up phase." However, Moody's also believes Cirque "will be able to
rebuild scale with limited investment by leveraging a portfolio of
shows with longstanding popularity."
Fisher, the man in charge of remounting Cirque's touring division, is
philosophical about the challenge. "How do you eat an elephant? You do
it one bite at a time," Fisher says. When the world has sufficiently
reopened, touring shows will be launched gradually, likely two at
once, he says. Meanwhile, Lefebvre says the US$375-million capital
infusion Cirque received from its new owners means he doesn't
anticipate needing to raise capital to finance the revival.
One question facing Cirque is how many of its former employees will
come back. "I don't think people understand how difficult it is to let
go of 4,000 acrobats and then just will them back one day," says
former chair Mitch Garber.
In one troubling sign, En Piste, the National Circus Arts Alliance of
Canada, surveyed nearly 400 circus artists late last year and found
94% were considering a career change. Cirque, however, has contacted
many of its former employees and found more than 90% are eager to
return.
Perhaps a bigger questionafter the layoffs, the bankruptcy and the
ownership changeis whether Cirque can recapture the edge that once
defined it. Quinn, Cirque's chief creative officer, predicts the
crisis will give birth to a "creative renaissance
We've all gone
through a lot of hardship over the last year, but the ideas people are
already having are hopeful and joyous and full of positivity."
Ultimately, though, Cirque's creative future depends entirely on the
new owners, says Yasmine Khalil, Cirque's former chief executive
producer, who left the company last fall. Is their goal to stabilize
their investment or take on new risks? "A brand that is loved and
known for innovation, creativity and joy at a time when that's what we
need the most is a tremendous opportunity for Cirque to leap into new
opportunities," she says. "But ultimately, if you don't continuously
reinvent yourself, I think you run the risk of ending up like
Polaroid, a company that was very strong in one field but failed to
pivot."
So far Cirque's new owners have said little about their long-term
vision. In the only public comments Catalyst's de Alba has made since
the takeover, he said Cirque's future lies in the digital realm.
"You've seen that Disney is bringing some theatrical shows to Disney+,
like Hamilton, with great success," he told The Globe and Mail last
August. "I foresee that Cirque shows can also be part of these types
of streaming platforms." It's a strategy Cirque had been inching
toward prior to the pandemic, and its success with its CirqueConnect
digital hub and ongoing projects to bring a Cirque-related animated
children's show to life prove the strategy has potential.
As for Lamarre, he's optimistic (as usual) about Cirque's new owners.
"People fall in love with Cirque du Soleil, and that's what I'm
observing again right now," he says. "We've spent a lot of time
together, which is as important to me as it is to them, because I want
them to understand our business inside and out."
Above all, Lamarre is aching to experience a live Cirque performance
once again. "I cannot wait to do what I love in life, which is go to
all these shows, go backstage, and chat with our artists and be fed by
their passion," he says. "For the last year I've tried to visualize
Cirque's revival. Now I don't have to force myself to visualize it,
because it's happening."
------------------------------------------------------------
SPECIAL REPRINT: "40 at 40: Cirque Flips Back Into
Action After Pandemic"
By: Jon Kaplan, Toronto NOW
-----------------------------------------------------------
It wouldn't be summer without the circus specifically Cirque du
Soleil, who are back on stages after an absence of 15 months. Because
of the pandemic, the internationally-acclaimed company was forced to
close over 40 productions including several resident shows in Las
Vegas and let go more than 95 per cent of its staff. They even filed
for bankruptcy protection last year, selling the company to some of
its creditors (Catalyst Capital Group) last November.
Now, Cirque is flipping back into action, complete with a savvy
marketing campaign that includes a tear-inducing video called
Intermission Is Over, featuring Cirque performers finishing up their
temporary jobs (in variety stores, empty offices, cafés) and going
back to the big top.
The company, still based in Montreal, has reopened or is about to
reopen several of its resident Las Vegas shows. The family-friendly
Mystère is back in action at Treasure Island, while the water-based
show O is currently making a splash at the Bellagio. Michael Jackson
ONE at Mandalay Bay is set to reopen August 19, and The Beatles LOVE
at the Mirage on August 26.
The company's show Kooza will return to Montreal's Old Port in April
2022.
Here in Toronto we're not quite ready for indoor theatre yet we're
gradually getting used to outdoor performances.
But with the return of Cirque on the international stage, I thought it
would be fascinating to revisit NOW's cover story from July 1988, back
when the company was on its first North American tour. Cool fact:
Cirque began as a street theatre company called Club des Talons Hauts
or the High-Heels Club, a reference to stilt-walking.
Senior theatre writer Jon Kaplan went down to see the unnamed show
(the first named show would come in 1992 with Saltimbanco) at the foot
of New York City before its Toronto run. The World Trade Center was
just north of the venue. He talked to clowns Benny Legrand and Denis
Lacombe (who adorned the cover, in a shot by photographer Algis
Kemezys) and tour manager Yves Neveu.
They discussed the company's humble roots in street theatre, the
funding model for the company in 1984, its first year, 97 per cent
of its operating budget came from government funding, while in 1998,
only 5 per cent did and the importance of the National Circus
School.
One of the things that distinguished Cirque from other circus
companies was the fact that it didn't use animal acts something that
made financial sense at the start. It was cheaper to tour some 85
people without also worrying about caring for and feeding lions and
elephants.
Clown Lacombe also said if they were ever to use animal acts the only
ones of high enough quality were based in Las Vegas, and they wouldn't
be able to pay them what they were making there.
Little did he realize that, five stratospheric years later, Cirque
would take up residency in Vegas itself with Mystère, the first of
many custom built shows to come.
Fittingly, it was the first Cirque show back on the strip.
Below is Jon Kaplan's cover story, Cirque du Soleil's street-wise
charm, republished from the July 21, 1988 issue of NOW.
* * * * *
BALANCING BIG TOP, THEATRICAL SPIRIT
By Jon Kaplan
NEW YORK CITY The circus is coming to town. But there won't be any
lions or tigers or bears, or even any sawdust. Just some of the most
talented young performers in North America.
The circus is the Cirque du Soleil (the Sun Circus), the amazingly
successful troupe that has, in a mere four years, grown to be one of
the most respected companies of its type on the continent. It opens in
Toronto in its eye-catching blue-and-yellow tent on Saturday (July
23), in a parking lot right next to Lake Ontario.
This is the third time that the Cirque has played in Toronto; its
previous visits were in 1985 and 1986. The magic that infused those
visits is still there, even after nine months of touring in Los
Angeles, San Francisco and New York City. Hollywood has also jumped on
the Cirque bandwagon; Columbia Pictures has an option to film the
company.
In New York the circus spread its tent at the foot of Manhattan, with
the Statue of Liberty to the south and the glass towers of Wall Street
and the World Trade Centre just to the north. In a city full of
theatre both onstage and off the Cirque du Soleil charmed New York
audiences of all ages with its blend of traditional big-top skills and
a state-of-the-art show that integrates performance, music and design.
Though its administrative and financial aspects are now large-scale,
the Cirque grew out of street theatre. In 1981, Quebec performer Guy
Laliberté (now the Cirque's president) helped form a group called the
Club des Talons Hauts, with the intention of reviving the generally
neglected tradition of street performers clowns, acrobats, jugglers
and stilt-walkers. That latter skill gave the group its name, which
means the High-Heels Club. For three seasons, the performers offered a
yearly festival in Baie St-Paul, a small town on the St. Lawrence
River.
NATIONAL TOUR
The following year, 1984, was the 450th anniversary of the first
voyage of Jacques Cartier to Canada. To mark the occasion, government
officials gave the club starting money to create a circus a
colourful way to celebrate the Cartier anniversary. The newly named
Cirque du Soleil went on to play 11 Quebec towns that first year.
In 1985, the Cirque toured Quebec again and also played various
Ontario cities; in 1986, the tour was a national one that took in
Expo. The following year the group attended a world circus festival
(and won a bronze medal). The current season is devoted to a North
American tour.
With the growth of the circus has come a corresponding growth in its
financial base. For the 1988 season, the company anticipates a hefty
budget that will surpass $10 million. But interestingly, the source of
the Cirque's funds has changed significantly since it began
performances in 1984. That first year, 97 per cent of the operations
were subsidized by government departments. This year the circus plans
for only 5 per cent government funding, withthe rest of its financial
resources coming from private sponsors and box-office revenues.
Despite its financial growth, the Cirque has never forgotten that its
mandate is to offer an evening of entertainment to its audiences. It
is as fresh now as when it first played Toronto three years ago due
in large part to the spirit of the performers and the artistic team
that has created the show.
The Cirque is different from large circuses like Ringling Brothers in
a number of ways. It works in a single ring, for instance, and relies
on the skills of the performers rather than death-defying acts. The
tightrope performers, Agathe Olivier and Antoine Rigot, work on a rope
only about six feet off the ground. But every effort, every bead of
sweat, is visible to the audience in the 1,700-seat tent.
The Cirque du Soleil takes these sorts of talents and blends them with
the arts of theatre. Director Franco Dragone has staged the evening;
Rene Dupere has created a two-hour score which is sensitive to the
various acts and their individual rhythms. Choreographer Debra Brown,
who worked with the Canadian gymnastics team in the 1984 Olympics, has
given the acrobats a new and dramatic focus. Add lights and costumes
and the result is a circus that doesn't have to rely on animals to
attract audiences.
The circus hasn't forgotten its street origins. "We never get far away
from the fact that the sky was our first tent," says one of the
company's clowns, Benny Legrand, who has been with the circus since
1984, when he was part of a clown troupe called La Ratatouille. Now
he's doing a solo act, verbal and aggressively funny, in which he
often interacts with the ringmaster, Michel Barette.
"The company began as unpretentious street performers who simply found
a place to play when it rained. Over the past five years, we've become
a success; it's like trading in a Volkswagen for an Oldsmobile. But
though we now have corporate offices, the spirit of the circus is
still one-on-one and human. That's what keeps the show alive for
audience after audience."
STREET ORIGINS
The Cirque's street origins help keep that freshness. As tour manager
Yves Neveu notes, most of the company have worked as street performers
at some time.
"We try to find the thin line between street performance and stage
performance," he says. "In the first, there's the spontaneous feel of
never knowing what the performing situation will be. In the second,
there's the feel of being in a fixed space, where people have paid for
their seats and watch the stage expecting something refined and
precise to occur. We want to keep the good part of each; there's a
fragile equilibrium in every show."
That balance is maintained, in part, by the fact that the company
members are young the average age is 24 and fresh. One of the
eldest (at 31) is another clown, Denis Lacombe, who has been with the
company for several years. He has two hilarious numbers one as a
robot clown who discovers the joys of throwing pies and another as a
demented orchestra conductor who gets carried away leading a
performance of the 1812 Overture.
"The spirit of the circus," he says, "comes from the youth of the
troupe. These people are just starting their careers; they don't have
large egos about their skills. They have fun every time they go out in
front of an audience; it's obvious that they love to entertain."
Many of the performers, in fact, have trained at the National Circus
School, which has close blood ties to the Cirque. Guy Caron, who was
first a clown with the circus and later (until last year) its artistic
director, founded the school in 1983. Most of the Quebec artists who
make up the majority of the company have been at the school either
as students or teachers.
"The school is important for us," says Neveu, "because it trains
people not only in the traditional circus arts but also in our
specific style. The spirit we want in the Cirque begins in the school.
It's easier to start with it at the beginning than to find good acts
and teach that spirit to them."
For Neveu, that spirit exists because "we work as a company, like a
theatre or ballet troupe, rather than an independent circus which has
simply brought a number of acts together. In that sort of circus, an
act is hired to do their one number and nothing else. At the Cirque,
everyone is asked to do everything. The ringmaster is also part of the
teeter-board act and drives the bicycle for the 11-person tower-on-
wheels number.
EMPHASIZE ACTING
"Artistically we're different because we emphasize theatre and acting;
those sorts of things complete the performance for us. We think that
learning to dance or act is part of circus training; the school has
the same philosophy. While traditional circus work encourages strong
technicians, we do that as well as making the audience feel something
during a performance; we're closer to theatre than to traditional
circus."
Lacombe was one of those who attended the circus school. "I never
thought of myself as a clown, because I didn't think of the typical
circus clown as being funny. Now I've realized that a clown is someone
who can make people of any age and any culture laugh, without saying a
word. It's a truly international discipline."
Lacombe attributes the success of the Cirque to the technically strong
performers as well as the charisma of each company member. "Technique
alone isn't enough," he says. "What we're doing is show biz you
reveal yourself, not just your act."
Because the Cirque relies so much on its performers' skills and
personalities, animals have never been a part of the show. For
logistical and financial reasons, of course, it's cheaper to tour the
85-member company without having to worry about the care and feeding
of lions, horses and elephants.
Lacombe also thinks that the company sets the standards for any animal
acts that might be considered for the Cirque. "There are only three
such acts good enough to work with us, and they're all playing in Las
Vegas. We couldn't pay them what they're making there."
But the show is magical enough as it is. That magic is evident from
the very beginning, when a group of ordinary people is transformed
into performers for the night. An old uncle becomes the ringmaster;
others become the tightrope walkers, jugglers, acrobats and trapeze
artists.
Giving the show firm support is Dupere's music, which is performed by
five musicians and relies heavily on synthesizers. It ranges from
classical to new-age, jazz to rock. Dupere composed a special piece
for each act, working with each artist so that physical and musical
beats and breaks would coincide.
In each act the audience can see not only the sweat but also the
concentration of the entertainers, from the youngest six-year-old to
those in their 30s. At the show's finale, when all the performers
appear in their colourful outfits, there is nothing artificial about
the smiles of pleasure on their faces. And the audience responds in
kind the company is greeted by spontaneous cheers.
{ SOURCE: Now Magazine, Toronto }
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COPYRIGHT AND DISCLAIMER
=======================================================================
Fascination! Newsletter
Volume 21, Number 5 (Issue #208) Jun/Jul 2021
"Fascination! Newsletter" is a concept by Ricky Russo. Copyright (C)
2001-2021 Ricky Russo, published by Vortex/RGR Productions, a
subsidiary of Communicore Enterprises. No portion of this newsletter
can be reproduced, published in any form or forum, quoted or
translated without the consent of the "Fascination! Newsletter." By
sending us correspondence, you give us permission (unless otherwise
noted) to use the submission as we see fit, without remuneration. All
submissions become the property of the "Fascination! Newsletter."
"Fascination! Newsletter" is not affiliated in any way with Cirque du
Soleil. Cirque du Soleil and all its creations are Copyright (C) and
are registered trademarks (TM) of Cirque du Soleil, Inc., All Rights
Reserved. No copyright infringement intended.
{ Jul.08.2021 }
=======================================================================
