Cirque
Theatre Severn
June 24th -June 25th 2024
Circus skills on stage? With backing music? Singers and dancers performing during tricks? Surely this cannot be so? Expecting something far less than I got: Cirque, thrilled and thoroughly entertained. This is a stellar show and full of stars and tricks and fun and everything all in one.
The backdrop was a red curtained big top entrance rather like one would find in a circus tent. Also stage left there was a movable set representing a little dressing room for the compere, he was a silent compere and could only mime but he was great, getting chance later in the show to prove he too has circus skills. But in this role he was predominately a distraction whilst the next trick was set up. He was naturally funny, he could talk to the audience without saying a word and his skills were both clever and funny. A great distraction. There is something almost pitiful about Marcel Marceau’s mime character Bip, men wanted to help him, women just wanted to hug him. There was no pitiful aspect to this white-faced compere’s antics but there was a lot of devilment and fun. He came across as a naturally funny man and whilst his magic with the bottle in the tube creaked a little and surprised nobody, it was still massively entertaining.
It is hard to determine just how many members of the cast there are as they all double up and have other skills, I’m sure there are a set of triplets in the cast: But I wouldn’t dare put money on it. Together these guys make up a huge body of ability and have the skills and professionality to make it work anywhere in the world.
Since the decline of the music hall and the sophistication of television programming good old variety has taken a knock. There is a lot to be said for bringing it back, this show is living testament to the popularity and instant feel-good factor, that variety has to offer and its nice to be reminded. There is nothing more enthralling than watching a human perform a trick that solely relies on the performer’s strength and technique, there is an earthy honesty that is lost in other mediums. This show has that and that is what endears it to you.
Daring Cross Bow Shooters, Courageous high acts, tipping and tumbling, jivy juggling, funny respite moments, and top singing and dancing! This show has it all going on. What a great antidote for the world’s troubles and election fever which seems to be gripping and blocking our other form of entertainment. Like a fresh mint this show blows cool and clever and most definitely pleases.
The lighting and sound are superb. It is a complex lighting plot with hundreds of changes, sound too had to be just so and it was. The audience members that were dragged up, one man and one woman, had quite a lot to do when they were up there, but they looked so incredibly good and polished? One suspected stooges planted but no, it seemed not, as both “volunteers” returned to there respective partners and friends. How one can keep a straight face when the one who invited you up has a ridiculously large balloon for a head. Oh, you got to see it, to just get that one gem. Hilarious.
In summary this reviewer would say: It’s a great show, well planned, directed and executed, this lively bunch of circus professionals will continue on their journey trying to lighten up what is momentarily a pretty serious time for our country.
This is a Five Star Review
Sofia Lewis
Sofia is a successful playwright living in Shrewsbury. After graduating from Wolverhampton University in theatre. Sofia went on to become an actor and film maker. Her first play was published in 2015 and her plays have been seen all around the world. She is also the instigator of the popular concerts, The Sound Of Shrewsbury Folk. She has been writing with loveshrewsbury for 13 years and loves Theatre Severn and all she sees there.
Recent Post
