"...angels in the architecture..."

[magid]

Last night my parents took me to Cirque du Soleil's Corteo, which was, unsurprisingly, beautiful and astonishing. And while it's got impressive acrobatics and beautiful theater, it's very different from Varekai. Most excellent, in a different way, one with a more obvious story, which I appreciate (summarized at the first link).

The staging was impressive. It was theater in the round, the circular stage (with a labyrinth pattern on it) having a major axis from one side to the other for acrobatic (and parade) purposes. An outer ring of the stage revolved as well. Even the rigging was beautful and shapely, with an organ high above the stage (other music was made either onstage or in the corners where the major axis met the circle, none of it canned). Their use of lights is impressive, not only to highlight things, but to distract when the set was being changed.

There were angels flying; bikes ridden in the air; ladder dancing; funeral processions; spinning chandelier aerials; trampolining on beds; rolling in hoops; juggling; glowing singing bowls and water-filled glasses; synchronized high bar and see saw aerobics; fantastical costumes; a path of flipping people on netting; women flung (and caught) from platform to platform; little people, one floating from balloons above the crowd, bouncing off people's hands as she floated, the contraption allowing movement in a couple of planes (I want to wear balloons a float like that!). The only thing I'd wished for and didn't get were people on silks, though there were people doing impressive things suspended on straps (sometimes by the teeth! I kept wondering about dental bills...).

I am so awed by what people can do.

Comments

[rhysara.livejournal.com]

I thought I was the only one who stopped to think about dental bills in the middle of an amazing performance.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Nope. My parents were talking about it too.

When did you see the show?

[rhysara.livejournal.com]

I haven't, it's just always the first thing that jumps into my head when I see things of that nature.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Worth seeing, if you're flush the next time they come to town.

PS

[magid.livejournal.com]

I'd forgotten: the scene where the angels appear in colored dresses, more stiff and wired to conical shapes than the others, I had the sudden mental image of flying Daleks...