circus circus

yes, i'll say it twice if i damn well please.

it was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO pretty!

i am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO tired! (: i tried to sleep longer than 8 hours but my cat insisted on being fed or some such nonsense...tricksy kitty.

cj got here around 445, and we jetted over to tish's house. from there to the macaroni grill, which of course was excellent dining, and we were seated by the fire. i had carmela's chicken rigatoni, which was a parmesan marsala white sauce with carmelized onions and mushrooms in (surprise!) rigatoni pasta. very tasty. for dessert i had this lemon spongecake soaked in lemon something, with lemon frosting and real whipped cream, on a plate drizzled with caramel. YUM.

apparently on fridays and saturdays the grill has a singer--so we were serenaded by this man with an AMAZING tenor voice. he sang something in spanish, but it wouldn't have mattered, because when people are singing i have a hard time focusing on the words when this lovely voice is just flowing all around you. halfway through his song i realized that this pretty elderly lady a few tables away was staring at me. i smiled back.

the only downside was that we also were seated next to about 16 kids who were at a giant table and quite obviously en route to prom or something. must be fall formal? who knows. dresses were sparkly and children were loud. that prompted a chat at our table about what we wore to prom, what we did, etc. it was entertaining to think back on those years, but i'm not sure i'd like to revisit. (;

after that we stopped at tish's parents' house to put leftovers in the fridge and find some cigarettes for cj. on the road again, parked up by the walker art center and watched the tent as we walked in--this huge blue and yellow striped circus tent, surrounded by all these littler ones. walked through the concessions tent, in which they had all kinds of stuff that was amazingly beautiful, but far, far out of my price range. one of my favorite things was these bags they had that were recycled tent. what a good idea!!! what a horrifying price tag: 135.00!!!

found our seats in said tent. the stage was in the round, so a round stage swirled with designs, divided by two curtains. we couldn't see the people on the other side of the stage until people started walking around a little bit with lights over there. the screen was (and i'm going to use this word to death in this post) amazing--sheer, with angels and such painted on it. between the curtains were these three gigantic chandaliers, which appeared to have candles flickering on top of them. stunning.

the story behind "corteo" is that this clown is dying, and guarded by angels (who kept swooping out of the top of the tent wearing beautiful gowns and little wings to attend him and other players) he's making his way to heaven, stopped only by all the well-wishers (characters) who are parading through to say good-bye. this was gleaned from what was going on and the bits in the program--the singing was gibberish (to me) and the speaking parts were a pidgin of english, french and italian. nice to hear but nothing sensical.

on television it's much easier to pay attention, but it's also much more remote. you don't see all the peripheral stuff going on--you hear the music and you see the performer, but you don't know that on the floor below this person, women are whirling in dance, or people are drumming. the stage rotated in different areas--one ring on the outer edge, one plate in the middle, and in the very center of the stage, a drop hole that people could disappear into or appear out of. the screen was used as needed to shield our poor eyes from setups and such, and half the time i was so caught up in what was going on that by the time it was nearing the floor i FINALLY thought, oh, they're putting the screen down... (:

the costuming, as befits cirque productions, painted the stage, but the real show is put on by the performers, who move around in ways that made me think about how legends are started about flying people and so on. i'm trying to remember all the acts but i just cannot--the first was with the three chandeliers, women draped and swinging around on them, contorting their bodies into strange positions, spinning, flying. then there was a scene with two huge beds that were actually trampolines, and people flying from bed to bed and flipping...you've seen it on bravo. well, not this production. (: yet...

there were jugglers and this man who whistled like i've never heard, people leaping and twisting on a long trampoline that spanned the stage and off onto the sides, above which was an act in which women and men were tossed about like toys. there was a tightrope walker and a balancing act with a tall, tall ladder. the second to the last act was a woman who soared through the air on these two looped ropes, with this long, long hair whipping around. she was the closest thing to a bird i have seen. the last act was all these high bars, men hanging on the bars and swinging around on them in unison, flipping and rolling in mid air, only to catch the bar or even land on it standing.

that's the truest beauty of cirque: the people, throwing themselves into the show and making everything look like art, when it's actually the human body at the height of athleticism, carefully masked and glittering with makeup and yards of diaphanous fabric.

the music is created live, right there, on all four corners of the stage, voices and instruments sighing into the area.

i think the tent held 2600, but it didn't seem that large because the stage was not that large. the only downside (in my opinion was that the seats were all manufactured for smaller people, so by act II we were feeling cramped and overly warm. but that just was good because then when we got outside, the cool air was invigorating and felt like the perfect crisp end to an evening of dim smoke and mirror and incense.

the image was haunting and little bits of it keep popping up in my head, here and there, cloudy like a dream.

i cannot wait to go again! (: