The circus must go on.
Reading the news of Cirque du Solei filing bankruptcy due to Coronavirus was a shock, but not unexpected. So many “houses of theater” and “palaces of creativity” have had to go dark. In a performance and patron hiatus till at least 2021. No Broadway, no concerts, and no circuses. Will humankind be around to see a possible reemergence, is anyone’s guess. The devistation to our artists’ community is a cruel one. Will it recover? Time will tell. Further, a reinvention of how art comes to us is on the way, similar to Cirque to the circus world.
When I was a young lad, I was able to take in a Barnum & Bailey circus. It wasn’t special effects, it wasn’t a high dollar ticket, and the concessions were average. Yet the smells of animals, the makeup and costumes of the performers, the choice of carnival-style soundtracks, and the theatrics were a special kind of magic.
I wasn’t some purveyor of carnivals or circuses, and my exposure to these entertainers outside of an occasional clip you would see on TV, or some smaller, sadder version as part of some sort of school field trip was all I would see for a long time. And then as if a light gut punch, the Ringling Brothers and many of the traditional circuses would go out of business.
Part of the reality was the methods needed to make animals go through firey things and do unusual acts were predicated on doing very negative thoughts to the animals and would be an unwinnable battle for the circus. And the other thing would be, after 146+ years of the entertainment, how many times could you see the same trapeze, animals, and concepts. Different performers, but “basically” the same thing.
In 1984, someone figured the same thing, and a new type of circus was born. This one did not rely on animals to do repetitive things; it relied on the human mind to explode in colors and song and dance and all sorts of unbelievable physical acts, to create Cirque du Solei.
The marriage of a newer, more modern, sans animals, the circus was then paired with the theatrical and created a medium that was part circus theater and part magical imaginations. The beauty of this has created numerous shows with residencies all across the world, on seven continents, over 100 million people have experienced a show, and in 2019 Cirque was closing in on $1 billion in revenue.
Now Cirque is known for creating these visually stimulating shows that make you ooh and aah. While these are beautiful scenes, it is how they take musical icons and turn them into presentations that I connect with at a different level. I remember one of the most beautiful shows I ever saw was the Beatles “Love.” Their already iconic music sewn together with a psychedelic story that took me on an experience that the music had only teased. And all the while, as I held my breath during the Beatles score and the beautiful patterns and shapes that the performers created with their bodies and props, it continued to tear me up inside that they were able to drag something else from their music.
The marriage of art, music, theater, plus the added danger of the mysterious, magical circus continues to drive my mind because creativity truly never dies. I look at music in the same way as I feel the startling karmic effect of past music being sampled and reappearing in future iterations is how art passes on.
As we say a gentle, hopefully temporary, goodbye to Cirque, and many other shows like it, we have to hope for rebirth in a post-COVID world. Somehow, it must reappear, reignite, and imagination must be given the keys to our minds and hearts, to allow for the circus to once again, go on.
