Cirque du Soleil bring dramatic acrobatics of arena circus to Liverpool

Nov 14 2008 by Laura Davis, Liverpool Daily Post

Cirque du Soleil are heading back to the city. Laura Davis learns more

IMAGINE a rainbow of thin coloured plastic stretching for half a kilometre like some enchanted river and you start to get an idea of what an enormous production Quidam is.

This is the total amount of acetate used on the 250-plus lights above a stage that will play host to 250 costumes and 200 pairs of shoes worn by more than 50 performers.

Shows on this ambitious scale are what has distinguished Cirque du Soleil from the traditional circus since its inception in 1984.

When the company made its first visit to Liverpool earlier this year it brought Delirium, a multimedia extravaganza of a production featuring the equivalent of four Imax screens.

Quidam, premiered in 1996, focuses more heavily on acrobatic skills and human performance but still promises the grandeur of the typical Cirque du Soleil experience.

“It has flavour of Cirque in the transition from one act to another, which is very seamless and makes it look like it’s one huge story from beginning to end, rather than a series of acts like you would find in the traditional circus setting,” explains Richard Dagenais, Quidam’s senior artistic director.

“But it’s much more traditional than some of the shows we do, for example the one in Vegas with Criss Angel (the illusionist) and Love, the show with the Beatles, which is wonderful but it was a new era for us.”

A challenge with a show nearing its teens is keeping it fresh, but Quidam comes with another all of its own. Having always been performed under a big top, how difficult has it been to transform it for an arena tour?

“We have to make sure that we’re efficient because we only have a few days to go from one city to the other. Normally with the big top we have up to 10 days to set up everything,” explains Richard, who joined Cirque in 2001 after a 10-year career in classical ballet. “The other thing is when you’re under the big top there is a proximity to the public, an intimacy we are able to get just because of the environment and we need to be able to recreate that in the arenas.

“That’s an interesting challenge and it’s very exciting for the artistic staff to be able to rework it a little bit, even though the staging and the show will not change much. It will be in the way we play to the public – we need to adapt a little bit.”

To ensure the show does not get stale, Richard arranged acting workshops for its cast to help them develop their characters.

He has found his background in professional ballet to be a useful tool. “There are definitely some similarities between that and Cirque because dance is a very physical art form and you express emotions through your body – you don’t talk. With Cirque, even though sometimes we use invented language to communicate, it is still through our bodies that we express ourselves to the audience

“The great thing about our show is that even though you do so many performances there is always something that you can work on. We also have changes to the cast which brings new energy to a tour.”

Quidam follows the story of a little girl through a mysterious world (the word “Quidam” is Latin for “anonymous passer-by).

During her journey, she meets a cast of outlandish characters who perform a series of acrobatic acts including aerial contortion, rope-jumping, cloud swinging and hand balancing. And of course there also is the obligatory clown – this time a contemporary version which asks for audience participation.

“Quidam celebrates that anonymous person that you pass in the street without paying attention. It’s explored through this little girl who becomes an anonymous person to her parents because they are busy doing their own thing and they ignore her,” explains Richard, who is visiting the UK for the first time with this tour. “She gets angry and that shatters her little world, and she finds herself transported into her own universe.

“It’s definitely a family show. I’ve seen kids there and they love it but there are also different dimensions so adults will find different things in it than a kid would.”

So far more than eight million people have seen Quidam, albeit the big top version.

The show is received differently depending on which country it is being played in, says Richard.

“If you compare a European audience with an Asian audience they laugh and applaud at different things in the show,” he says.

“Audience participation is the best way to feel the pulse of an audience and in some places they are more shy, in some places they are much more gregarious.”

Cirque du Soleil’s Quidam is at Echo Arena Liverpool from February 26 to March 1, 2009.

lauradavis@dailypost.co.uk