Beware the Hazzards of YouTube Big Topping ... When and How Digital Slights the Ageless Delight ...

     In the Kingdom of Kong, at Big Kid Circus

I am coming to terms with a situation I have long alluded to whenever looking at a circus performance on YouTube:  Among many set backs, your view is limited to where you are placed, to the camera's focus, and to the sometimes muddled split-focus imagery resulting from costumes and sets getting in the way.  This post was spurred by Douglas McPherson's  review of the  Big Kid Circus. So here we go ...

ACTION VERSUS PRODUCTION: In the YouTube of a particularly lavish set, such as  what Big Kid Circus offers patrons across the Big Pond, I found myself  straining at times to stay focused on the act. For example, I was hooked  by a single trap artist, who seemed to slither in and out of the proceedings.  

In fact, the production has so much atmosphere -- flashing lights, lavish costuming and scenic effects, it can feel like getting lost in a gigantic birthday cake 

EDITING: You may be watching a partially edited video, which will give you a distorted view of the entire performance.  During a comedy number, the clowns were moving back and forth across the ring to an end point blocked by a scenic element.  

ACTS COMPETING WITH PRODUCTION: Perhaps nothing in my big top You Tubing has come so close to making me feel at times swamped in the colors, lights, props and special effects. They are quite impressive here, but I still prefer clear sight lines to what the performers are doing. 

MULTIPLE VERSIONS:  Sometimes, someone will send me a link to another video of the same show --- "this has more of the story-line" -- "this shows the cris-cross flyers" -- which only begs the question, what else may be missing?

What I think I liked at Kingdom of Kong:  Hard to believe  that a roller skating act so impressed me. Also impressive juggling. The single trapeze guy.  Human pyramids. Clowns bouncing balls against a wall that I could not fully see behind a blocked view.  Five acrobats.  Quick costume changes - terrific. Contortion dancing.  Emphatic Afro  dancing.  The prevailing mood comes with heavy music that can overwhelm.  This is not a wishy washy show.  I can see it maybe being a lot of fun, especially when going with a friend.

Two big acts not so fun: The double wheel opens the show rather weakly  The closing Globe of Death features three motor divas from Iran. With the unfortunate accidents to several globe of death riders recently, this will surely inflate the fear factor in these acts and only lessen the chances of their going away  any time soon. 

In his review Douglas calls it "the best looking big top show in Britain." Well worth reading,  you will find it at circusmania.blogspot.com. Scroll down past a  fascinating report he has just posted, with photos and comments. of  his "whistle stop tour of some of its biggest traveling shows." Very interesting and educational. I can't remember reading anything about circus in India.

Blame it on YouTube. 

Beware the Pitfalls of You Tube Reviewing, -- Big Apple Circus Ill Served? This is NOT a review

Perfect example: I watched a video, in two parts,  of Big Apple Circus, apparently shot by a patron, lasting half as long as the actual show itself, with the Flying Poemas left out. I can see the included acts well enough to know, for example, that how three water exhaling guys turning themselves into Roman fountains --  Jesse Highley, Neal Skoy, and Robert Ryan  --- are as ingeniously brilliant as is a labored slack wire workout borderline amateur.  But as for the themed production casting the acts in hometown settings,  I am left  with a felling that maybe The New York Times got it right in calling what looks to me like a disjointed mishmash  “underwhelming.” But also left wondering, had I actually seen the new Ringling, might I have liked its production values as much as I did the acts?  Nothing beats being there.  

Boob Tube to You Tube ... Lost in a Billion Bytes, the Circus from Astley to Zippos ...

Blame this post on Comcast offering me a better price if I would only upgrade.  New cable box and modem (do they still make those?) and I fell into a dizzy smorgasbord of infinite video footage fit for big screen TV. And am still falling. So Easy (and tempting) to get lost, looking for this but caught by  that over there that shamelessly plays to my non-circus interests (what else do they know about me?).

But out of nowhere, too, can pop surprising delights, like Big Top Circus from 1954, a weekly “kiddie” circus, cheerfully ring-mastered by Jack Sterling. It  looks more like a circus for all ages, free of the pretentious ballet- and narrative-driven drivel that’s draining the life out of our big tops.  Take Mel Hall's three Cycling Wiz Kids, from around 5 to 10 in ages, who score big and breezy on unicycles.  The littleest one, a boy,  falls and gets back up and tries and tries again, four times, and achieves the trick before our astonished eyes. And, are you kidding me, world? – a man dancing with a bear, smooth as two aging adults over a waxy floor? 

Sunday School Barnum?   In You Tube land you learn the damndest things, such as this whopper: Not only did Barnum & Bailey invent the three ring circus, which they kind of did, but they cleaned out all grifting on their midway, thus earning themselves she honorable put down among competitors of  “Sunday school boys.” Are you laughing?  Ringling brothers: SUE.  Historical fictions leak through even on loftier PBS-certified documentaries, such as The Circus, in which it is claimed that TV killed it in the 1950s.  So, have I been been hallucinating for the last fifty years?

A sharper image through fewer pixels: Looking back at the bear and  man dancing together, and the little ones riding their one wheelers,  you can feel what it was like to be fully and perfectly pleased by a circus act plain and simple, before the invasion of Cirque du Precious.

Countdown to Ringling Redo, beginning TODAY. And how might production embellishments  be used —  or abused —  by the Felds when they launch their sanitized version of the new Greatest Show on Earth?.  This is finally happening within hours, down in Boissier City, LA. Juliet Feld in a promo, chirps up how the audience will be more intimately involved by being seated closer to the action and connected digitally to closeups of performers.  Yawn. Didn’t they already try this in their last edition, the one that went out of this world and ended up in the graveyard? The year 2017.   Have they learned nothing?  Like really,  who wants to see a Broadway show from premium seating in the wings?   I am reminded of Al Ringling’s definition of ringmaster decorum, which might as well count for circus itself -- “elusive yet vital.”  In my book, a million less pixels will do.

So, back to earth and across the big pond, let us go zip zip zipping up and over to Zippos Circus.

Revered ringmaster and incomparable bird trainer, Norman Barrett

Hilariously original from diminutive dynamo Paulo Dos Santos of Brazia : How a balloon can be contorted into so many amusing sizes and connections to the human body.this one nearly brought down the tent. ZIPPOTASTIC.

There’s a clean effervescent flow and glow to this straight ahead big top. For my taste, the three most memorable moments are: (1) a most engagingly clever juggler who keeps tennis rackets and luggage in motion (2) that HUGE  balloon you see being ingeniously worked by Paulo Dos Santos, and   (3) The Temujin Troupe from the Mongolian Steppes.  At their best, these eight agile acrobats execute voltige and casting in a continuous stream, lending the feel of a novelized flying return act, which I could have watched  over and over again, But NO, Wait, Hold on —  STOP, correction!  Blame it on You Tubery!  Why did I say so little about them on my notes and yet now give them the center ring status here? Why? Here’s the reason why.

How you Tube scrambles reality into billions of bits, some getting mixed up with others, leaving us with fractured impressions of what really happened . Turns out, the Zippos performance I watched on You Tube contained a version of their act very different from another one I subsequently watched, from off the show's website.  Apparently, on their way to Zippos the multi-gifted Tumujins were re-programed down to a more static series of human pyramids, each followed by a drawn out reach for more applause. Gone were the streaming acrobatics.

Something I haven’t seen before: These five words usually come to mind when discovering that rare novelty at the circus that I live for, and I think of the man who first spoke them to me when I asked him what he looked for in scouting acts: John Ringling North.   Another discovery I made was scrambled my way by You Tube, ever ready to sustain my primary focus at the moment  —  a clip of ringmaster Norman Barrett, who has previously blown the whistle for Zippos,  performing the most astonishing bird act. Now, I am in awe of the man’s talents. In his youth, I am told by Douglas McPherson, he rode horses roman style.  “He stood on two galloping horses while a third ran in the opposite direction between his legs!”

"When you’re smiling, when you’re smiling ... the whole world smiles with you,” sings Sir Norman while gingerly coaching a dozen or so trained birds who fly back and forth between two little turning carousels.  How did he ever get them to .. How?. These are the moments when circus proves its true genius.        

You Tube excels when rolling out footage unmolested by expert voices telling us what we should think.  You don’t go to a circus to think as much as to feel — to gasp and awe and laugh and thrill and scream with joy.  Or to smile over  the simple yet wondrous charm of a bear dancing with a man.
 

 

Circus Vargas Lands Prime Time NFL Coverage --- Almost ... Get Ready to Be Blown Off the Field

In what has got to be one of the biggest fiascos in big top product placement history,  one of our finest circuses apparently allowed the NFL to feature snippets of its action in an NFL season-kickoff promo —  without even a trace of the show's name appearing anywhere in the  promo. How many old time press agents are there screaming their guts out six feet under over this Name-Game wipe-out:  NFL: 100.  Circus Vargas: 0

Yes, ZERO.   You see those big brawny brain-busters hustling the ball and themselves against each other, and you see some terrific circus action between the body blows that the public can’t get enough of. OK, though I never watch a single game, but I do enjoy the human interest stories on sports talk radio, and I’m rooting for Jimmy G. to make it back into the starring role.

News of this heist arrived in my e-mail on 9.11 at 2:46 AM, from Alex Smith in So Cal, whom I am starting to think of as a symbolic blood brother to myself and Don Marcks, since we both, though generations apart,  enjoyed rich friendships with the very sharing Don.

“Vargas enjoyed a great media PLUG on Fox sports”

Awesome!  I opened the link to be dazzled by first-line football action interspersed with some clean and compelling circus acts – the sort that make you want to go to a circus. Where was the name Circus Vargas in any of this?  Say, a view of its logo over the performers entrance?  Alex?

I e-mailed him my puzzlement.  Had I missed something?    

In return, a corrective from Alex, holder of a giant popped balloon. 

“Circus Vargas got a great plug on NFL ?? SPORTS PRE GAME—— (well maybe it’s not a plug if they don’t mention them by name and use the new dirty word “circus” ) anyway it’s cool, check out after the :30 mark on link below.”

And on a subliminal level, consider this, Alex:  Circus performers were equated with the most athletic and skilled football stars.

Down the Convington chute,  on 7.13, came a more accurate headline:  Circus Vargas Adds Excitement to NFL Football"  

Alex sent in-the-field details on 7.15:

 "As far as I know, FOX SPORTS showed up Saturday, shot footage, and then over night infused it with their PRE-GAME Promo for the Saturday Fox football intro”

Which amounts,  I’d add, to their walking off the lot like a pack of old-time bill-posting bandits, stealing away captivating Vargas posters and tacking their names over them.

Directing your attention to the sign over the banner. top of the performer's entrance:  I see garble. Might it have replaced the words Circus Vargas?

Further  from Alex,

“I hope they were at least paid well because CLIFF VARGAS is turning over in his grave with no mention of them or the VARGAS name or brand.  Still, these days in the Mecca of
“Circus hate” which is Los Angeles, it’s probably as good as it gets.”

Looking good, people!  And what was the name of your show???

And how sadly symbolic of the  American circus, getting both smeared on the front lines of circus day, but used in a more populist ballyhoo to snare a crowd.

 “I only hope that Nelson and Katya made a ton of money out of this, which I doubt.”  

In this day and age, the prominent placement of Circus Vargas in the same context as NFL (what, the nation’s most popular sport?) would have been infinitely more valuable than a cowardly payoff.  Don’t drop the word “circus.”  Just tease the suckers with those amazing performers they can’t stay away from. 

Was that all there was?  Yes, Peggy, that's all there was.  Things have changed a lot  since you last walked a midway.

Simon Cowell -- Closet Circus Fan? -- Pumps Circus Acts to Lure in the Crowds, Dumps 'Em at Finals for His Favorite Singers. America's Got Gall!

Okay, Simon, why are you so afraid of the circus in your own show? Is that why you haven't the guts to give its best moment the honor they deserve?

I am starting to look deeper into the win history of America's Got Talent.  And I am finding what should not be a surprise.  Most of the winners are the singers.  A few are magicians and ventriloquists

Top dog?  Only once did a real circus act bark off with top honors -- an act introduced to Americans in 1989 by Cliff Vargas --- surprise! -- Olate dogs.  You did know about Simon and the dogs?

Runner up? Only once, to an acrobat

Just Another Rigged Reality Show?

To be clear, I only watch parts of these drawn-out episodes.  I have seen so-so circus acts, now and then the occasional star turn.  There were three men this season doing, from a bit I caught, a fantastic balancing act. They brought the judges to their feet, as the judges sometimes do for circus acts.   You might get from Simon rare verbal acclaim -- "The best act of your type we have ever seen here!"  Maybe even "the best I has ever seen  anywhere!"  And how exciting to hear, Simon.  And where from there?  Onto no where.  Pumped and dumped.

Here's my best guess: Simon does not want to risk giving circus the prime attention he gives to the singers, lest he produce the image closer to a vaudeville show than a singing contest, right?

Other night I tuned in and saw three acts standing on the stage -- only one would be named to go to the finals. One of them were a terrific group of ladies on unicycles who turned in a dazzling display.   Would they get through?  Of course, not.  Another singer was plucked to stay the course. Singers ... singers ... singers ... BOOOOORING.

Rigged? Who really knows but Simon and his cronies.  I've read the audience may be mostly what are known in Hollywood as "audience extras," meaning paid shills to fill up the seats. Better yet, to take their reaction cues from scripted signals.  There are plenty of complaints out there alluding to rigged judging, and I have to believe them, simply because I believe Simon will not dare turn his precious little let-me-hear-you-sing showcase into something closer to a Barnum concoction.  Thus, they use 'em for come in, shun 'em at finals.   

I have noted here how lucky we are to at least have America's Got Talent, if only for the continued national exposure it gives to circus arts. Which means that it will continue to infuriate me.

Finding Circus on TV, In Small Towns, at Auctions ... Bow Wow, Big Top Simon! You Are the Spirit of Circus Past

     "'MORE THRILLING ACTS to come!” Yes, bring them on!  This from America’s Got Vaudeville (excuse me, Talent). This sly manipulator knows how to exploit thrilling aspects of authentic circus to its scheming advantage. If only they would axe that idiotically annoying on-stage host who mugs it up while acts are on, what, telling us how to react? Snippet watching, I caught a fellow juggling what looked like pancakes!  Three strong men in an incredible  balancing act worthy of high Monte Carlo recognition.  A rabbit that failed to do most of its tricks, and still fooled three foolish judges, but not the critically correct Simon Cowell.  I’m watching and wanting this unpredictable jamboree more.  But  it you ask me, most of the singers are all the same ... Booooring!  Bring on more Barnum & Bailey! ...

Simon loves dogs ... Simon, wait! -- A full fledged Brit, might he be the spirit of circus past helping to keep it alive in a form over here that plays to the millions?

   ON THE DARK SIDE of AGT, they dared to present a vulgar spectacle that should be outlawed: young woman against a target on wall, her mother shooting arrows at the edges of her face. The judges cringed, and so did I.  The judges swooned, and so did I not.  But, but ... Yes, you could argue the roots of gutsy circus in that too.  Okay, Simon, yeah, show us the beef. AGT hasn’t a second to waste on Cirque su Soleil tripe.  Bravo! 
  

     UK, YOU'RE ON:   From Simon to Boris the Great (the government), who is leaving things open to circuses and their patrons to more or less, between themselves decide on the proper protocol for masking and distancing. And I say that’s the right way to keep on living   But not so easy to bring off. This from my London source, Douglas McPherson, reporting in general that the same shows are still on the road as of this posting. But with customers polled by the big tops and split down the center on the issues of mask and distance, wonders Douglas “Which half of their audience will they please?”   It does not suggest an easy road when customers are at odds with each other.  “Time will tell, but it looks to me that the government's mixed message is handing all the problems and potential confrontations to businesses and the public.”    

   LITTLE TOPS on precarious parade.  I hold my breath when I try goggling up on their current status.  The shows are pitching to smaller population pools.  VENARDOS -- "the little circus that could" -- and ZOPPE planning dates in Colorado hamlets.  VARGAS on the west coast playing to mid-sized places like Santa Barbara and Downey, with Temecula on through August 23 .... UNIVERSOUL into National Harbor, MD, CULPPER &MERRIWEATER onto Princeton, same state.   HANNEFORD slates an August run in Cobleskill NY.  We’re not seeing big cities at the moment, and might not for a spell ...  CIRCO CABALERRO'S  last date shown in June 28 in Vegas, with no futures in sight.... The past haunts BIG APPLE CIRCUS.  Last item I can find about them alludes to an auction of assets ... Surprised Gotham is not covering this ... Well, that's right, it's only circus, hardly able to compete with hysterical media exploitation of Covid, Racism, and DC politics. 

 

 

At Zoppe & Zippos Circus!  Okay, NO, it's a Zoppe kid above, but I could not help merging these two zippy names into one. I am absolutely gaga over the name ZIPPOS.  Zip! Zip! Zip! Hip, hip, zip zip, and ain't that a pip!

   MEDIA, SHUT UP! And I watch you less!   It shamefully distorts numbers to lend catastrophic impressions.  New covid infections, yes but 99.5% of those infected have NOT been vaccinated.  99.5%. Source: Fauci and the Surgeon General. The un-vaccinated  will continue to prolong the economic hardships for everybody, and I fear tops big  will disproportionately suffer with their profit margins are so thin.

      AND THAT'S  not a cheery wrap.  No, it isn’t.  So, did I unmake your day?   Paging Kenneth Feld! ... Kenneth Feld to the rescue! ... 

Remembering:

Yes, cry clown, cry ...

The Morning Midway: Let the New Organic Circus Organicate ... TV Reality is Taking Us to World Circus Without Pretense ... Audiences Thrill to What Always Thrills ... .

  With the South Korean flying board splitters

Last night on the first episode of CBS's The World's Greatest, we got glimpses of how little we may know about what is going on around the globe, a la ground-breaking circus or circus-type action.

Maybe I am galloping ahead of my expectations on this one,  but first act -- South Koreans who fly up and split boards in half in midair,  evoked memories of going to a circus in my youth and watching something novel sweep me away.

While organic circuses in the land of PC are brushing away smelly sawdust, purging clowns and animals, and adding "narrative " to tenderize out all traces of undue vulgarity, elsewhere, on other shores,  acrobatic performers and ensembles are proving the grit, glory and exhilaration of how inventive tricks performed with both gusto and perfection can bring down the house.   Special effects and dreary theatrical interludes (big top broccoli) not needed.

Brit TV personality James Cordon is the perfect host. Up there, he is about to try equaling the feat of the South Koreans.  It's a comic gag.

There is so much out there that may never get here.  Where is the John Ringling North of our time who will go into North Korea and sign its quintuple flyers for a First Time in America?  Where is the next bold impresario?  Maybe, okay, he is working for Cirque du Soleil, although I am not so sure anymore. 

All I know is that, here is yet another example how reality TV may be helping to revitalize public interest in circus. And a lot of it has to do with producers and judges obviously not pushing the "new circus" angle. 

The Morning Midway: Looking to TV for the Next Greatest Show on Earth?

Not sure when the Super Duper Bowl comes on TV, since I do not follow the sport, might be tonight?

I know that after it is over, CBS has been teasing interest in a global, reality show kind of competition that follows, with dazzling advance clips of acts, mostly circus acts,  and claims that this program will bring viewers the very best to be found round the world.

Might be. Might not be. Does look awesomely promising.  Gradually, television is filling up a void vacated by the dreary and depressing demise of mainstream U.S. big tops.

That rather ignorant recent PBS Circus Doc claimed that television in the '50s killed the circus. No, it did not.

But now, the same medium may be helping to bring it back, long as they keep the action raw and real -- as opposed to precious and pretentious.  

I will be waiting to see.

And you?

Why So Few Reviews for PBS The Circus? ... Fans and Pros Sounding Off in Circus Report Supply Some Possible Answers

I’m pretty surprised that the show was ignored or watched and then ignored by most main stream media.   At the top of the list, The New York Times. Defaulting to the ever-reliable Rotten Tomatoes, there are a grand total of 3 reviews, all colored in red, though two of them bear serious discoloring smudges.  Compare this to 45 reviews for Ken Burns The Vietnam war.

The write ups come from  The Los Angeles Times, Newsday, and The Wall Street Journal.  I could not access the Journal, because you must subscribe to read. I can only trust it was a real notice, not the kind of bogus con job put over by Big Apple Circus last year, quoting back its own quotes from a feature story the Journal did on the show prior to its opening — and framing those quotes in the form of an excerpt from an actual Wall Street Journal review!  Yes, we/they live in desperate times.

One of many circuses snubbed by American Experience.

Well, of course, Barnum's name does not appear

Tellingly, perhaps, here are some acute reservations that leak through the generally positive write ups:

From Robert Lloyd in The Los Angeles Times:    “The Circus” is at times difficult to watch, because the circus, though in most respects a wonderful enterprise, has also been an awful one, particularly in its use or misuse of wild animals – many of which, more than once in this history, will perish in fires -- but sometimes in its treatment of people as well. (People, too, will perish in fires.)”   

That word “awful”... feels awful.

From Verne Gay in Newsday (3 out of 4 stars, really?): "MY SAY Just to hazard a wild guess here, 'The Circus' must be the most exhaustive documentary on the circus that the TV medium has ever known, and — just to hazard another one — that's about five times too exhaustive for the average viewer.

“Do you need to watch all four hours? Not really. For an average viewers' guide, the second hour Monday (at 10) and the first hour Tuesday are the best. Meanwhile, Leitzel aficionados will want to savor the full four”     

                                                                                                                                                       

To be sure and fair, all of the reviews have much to sing about.  The film footage alone is a wow, and opening segments captivate with tents going up, locals off farms roused to the riveting spectacle of circus day once upon a glorious time. Just thought I'd get that out of the way.

Okay, onto the program's unfortunate missteps.

Circus Reporting from the trenches

Latest issue of The Circus Report has done a bang up job in printing a wide array of feedback from circus fans and pros, 10 in all.  Here are some of the comments:

Thanks to Bill Schreiber, who allayed my shock over the gruesome image of a huge elephant entrenched in chains coming out of a box car, which to the average TV viewer surely screams ANIMAL ABUSE!  How glad  and relieved was I to learn  from Bill, recounting in Circus Report something that Slim Lewis had told him:  "Most of the chain was for show and truly unnecessary for controlling him, but it made Tusko seem more formidable  than he actually was."   Very troubling (or spiteful ) that this context was not mentioned.  Given the typical sight of elephants coming out of the cars fairly freely, did someday even ask?

Don Covington:  "It also incorrectly suggested that the Ringling enterprise was the only significant circus of the day, ignoring almost all the competition.”

Maxine House: “All those wonderful tented (and Shrine) circuses were left out!” 

And then comes Pittsburgh

One thing everybody seems to agree on is that the show’s abrupt ending is beyond comprehension. This will surely leave an impression with younger generations that the circus died right there.

My favorite quote, from Gary Payne: “Born in 1955, I can attest to having seen about 1,000 circus performances that apparently didn’t exist.” 

                                    Why, oh why?

Wayne McCary: “Only the producers know why they chose to end the show with the closing of the Greatest Show on Earth in Pittsburgh in 1956.  That finality in the program undoubtedly gave the impression to the general public that the circus industry came to an abrupt end at that time.”

John Ringling North's first season opener, 1938

Okay, let me guess.  While working on my review, I  developed a profile in my mind of producer-writer-director Sharon Grimberg.  I could see her coming  from the New England area, where she would more likely have been exposed to the Barnum lobby, and I wondered if she might be an animal rights activist  or sympathizer.  After posting my review, below, I went a-goggling. I found that American Experience is based in Boston, but I could find nothing about Ms. Grimberg's personal life or politics.

I have two theories:

1.  She started out intending to produce a biography of the Prince of Humbug. The one through-line through this jumbled enterprise is the name Barnum.  The other showman covered were all significantly involved with him -- Forepaugh as principle rival (I'm surprised they missed the Sacred White Elephant war between the two), Coup, Costello and Bailey as partners, and the Ringlings, who kept his name famously alive.  Somewhere along the way, the story got extended beyond its original focus.  By then,  Grimberg ran out of funding or interest, and rushed to wrap in Pittsburgh.  21 minutes for John Ringling North.  Actually, deduct the minutes taken covering the Hartford fire --- North was not running the show then -- and North gets maybe a total of 16 minutes.   I rest my case.   A bit too far fetched?  Okay, how about this:

2.  Harboring a private disdain for various alleged forms of abuse under the big top, Grimberg  wanted to end on a down note, sending viewers off subliminally conditioned to feel guilty about ever again patronizing a circus with animals.  

Am I off the cliff? Then, the laugh’s on me.

Thank god for the DeMille film. No, they can't take that away from me.

SUNDAY MORNING REPLAY: PBS Under the Big Top: Circus Kings Shine, Barnum Dominates and Darkens Half-Baked, Error-Prone Three-Ring Charmer

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Television Review:  The Circus
PBS/American Experience
4-hour anthology in 2 parts
Twice seen for this review, October, 2018

When I learned that the formidable American Experience was coming out with a documentary on American circus history,  1793 to 1956,  naturally I had high expectations, wondering how they would treat the period through three epochs -- from the one ring show of English horse rider John Rickets, bringing to America the modern circus invented by  Philip Astley, to the three ring spectacles of Barnum and Bailey, and then onto how they were artfully transformed and refined by John Ringling North in 1938.
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Although, in real life,  P.T. Barnum did not enter the picture until 1871, here he enters it from the get-go, fairly dominating the first two hours of The Circus with his bombastic,  perversely amusing ballyhoos, his freaks and fakes, clever humbugs and various exotic animals.   The talking heads who wax lyrical about circus artistry -- the consensus seeming to rise on the word “transcendence” -- do not wax lyrical about anything that Mr. Barnum brought to the tent.  In fact, he was obviously more a sideshow huckster than ever a circus king

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 Barnum on Broadway, at the Museum: Frank Lentini,  above; Jo-Jo, the Dog Faced Boy, below

 

When producer-writer-director Sharon Grimberg finally  gets around to the starting point at Philadelphia in 1793, incredibly, no mention is made of Philip Astley -– an unconscionable insult to the British, who this year are celebrating the 250th anniversary of Astley’s one-ring gift to the world.

Instead, one of the talking heads (name not shown), rhapsodizes over the launch in Philadelphia of a “distinctly American”circus.  Nice try.  Distinctly American lay decades ahead.   The exceptionalism on display at Ricket’s Circus was very British.

Beyond Barnum, whom Grimberg can’t seem to get enough of, she turns her most passionate attention upon a select few big top movers and shakers, telling their compelling stories with a rich array of visual materials at hand.  Among the many nuggets, film footage inside the big top during the 1944 Hartford fire is stunning; a clip of Con Colleano dancing on the low wire is pure gold.

The good news is that Adam Forepaugh receives outstanding coverage.  So do William Coup and Dan Costello, who talked the retired Prince of Humbug into joining them to take out a  new circus, which opened in Brooklyn in 1871, and within a  year, was on rails and appearing under a large tent in two rings.  Not noted is how Barnum simultaneously rented out the use of his magnetic name, two summers in a row, to a  rogue showman, Peggy O’Brien, which gave rivals ad copy ammunition: “Barnum’s Show is Divided!  One Half Here, and The Other There.    Which Are You Going to See?”  The  treachery so disgusted Coup and Costello, that the short-lived partnership was soon history.  Barnum’s New England lobby may wish to skip this one.

Most impressive of all is James A. Bailey, who joined up with Barnum in 1881 to form — distinctly American —  the first three-ring circus.  His genius for big top logistics shines through, especially when. in 1897, Barnum having died six years before, he manages to ship the entire show, tents and all, to Europe,  where he tours it triumphantly for five years to “almost” constantly packed houses. I question that.  Back in the states, now facing a five-brother juggernaut, Bailey’s invincible grip on public favor wanes.  Like a man yet to come bearing the initials JRN, he suffers seasons of declining patronage.  They all do.
       
Around about here, we are pulled down into gloom and guilt by the intrusive allusion to animal abuse, which feels like a PETA pop up ad appearing on the screen.   In this instance, of  how only less than 20% of the animals Barnum and Bailey purchased from other lands allegedly survived the cruel shipping conditions to America.  Pretty shocking.   There’s also the account of how P.T. wrested away Jumbo (it feels more like a theft) from the British Zoological Society, leaving countless children in tears.  I’m siding with the moppets.

Other issues raised concern a display of “uncivilized peoples” in the menagerie and, of course, the freaks.  Is the imposition of learned commentary even appropriate?  I say no, for these reasons:  Imposing modern sensibilities on the circus as it impacted the public over a hundred years ago throws everything out of wack, out of a reality far removed from today’s. Being pulled into the classroom, so to speak, detracts from the experience of watching circus in context of the times. I want the closest thing to what my forebears experienced.

It is worth noting that the recent Ken Burns film on Vietnam, a staggering masterpiece, left a panel of academic historians miffed overs its “deliberate exclusion of professional historians from their 80 talking heads”  “We weren’t trying to make arguments.” explained Burns.  “ We didn’t have a political agenda..”

Like a bright new sunny day dawning, come the Ringling brothers, who were  young and gleamingly  handsome on bill poster art, open to new ideas (giving some customers their first look at a movie, inside a special black tent).  They paid female performers the same as they paid the men, and they supported the suffrage movement among like-minded women on show  They became famous for being by far the most honest-dealing of the lot, although as to the hiring of Pinkerton detectives to monitor the midway for all manner of pick pocketing and card sharkery, curiously, that credit goes here  not to the Ringlings, but to  Barnum & Bailey!  A baffling revelation.  

By the time that The Circus reaches the year 1938, John Ringling North barely makes it onto the lot in this lopsided 4-hour anthology – long enough (21 minutes) to come off looking like a talented but inept manager in a final segment that feels fragmentary and rushed.  He gets credit for his whimsical elephant ballet and for some rave reviews his upscale brand of circus received, but no mention of  the great crowds his eclectic showmanship drew in the best of seasons.  He is implicitly  linked to gross mismanagement partly blamed for the 1944 Hartford fire that killed 168 people, mostly women and children.  The fire, which dominates this section, did not not occur on North’s watch, but on that of his cousin, Robert Ringling.  Left unrevealed is the long-simmering enmity between the houses of John and Charles Ringling, and how it erupted into the Ringling family wars of the 1940s, with North eventually prevailing.

Not until I watched the film a second time was I hit like a bolt of lightening by the most shocking and shameful omission of all, which raises all sorts of questions concerning Grimberg’s true intent.  (I will not look into her background until after posting this}.  Comes the season of 1956, plagued by a long-festering Teamster’s strike.  One talking head: “The circus was writing its own ending.”   Then comes Pittsburgh, where the show gives  “one final performance.”  Another troubling error.  The circus gave two shows that day —   the first, to a half house at 6:30; the last starting two hours before midnight, when all 9,856 seats were packed and another thousand or so were strawed.    

North issues a press release announcing that he is closing the show and sending it back to the barn.   Alright, yes, he did.  And so then ...?  I am on the edge of my seat, wondering if, during my first viewing, I missed the part when North announces his plans to open the circus the following spring at Madison Square Garden, as usual, and then take it out on the road playing indoor arenas. No, I did not.  Incredibly this key part of the release – so integral to understanding the truth of that last stand under canvas -- is left out.  Whatever  Grimberg was trying to achieve, it seems clear that evidence was willfully excluded to advance a false reality. One can only speculate what her agenda might be, but certainty it was not to affirm any future for the circus.

Twenty one minutes for John Ringling North, one of the towering creative forces in world circus history.  Twenty one minutes for him to look like a loser and vanish.  So much for the captivating parade of circus stars from far and wide that he unstintingly offered Americans; for the ingenious seat wagons of Art Concello;  the arguably unprecedented costume design brilliance of Miles White;  the dazzling midway makeovers of Norman Bel Geddes and then Bill Ballantine;  the academy award winning movie by Cecil B. DeMille that captured it all so gloriously.  None of that is  here.  What is here, instead, is the end.

Betty Hutton and Cornel Wilde in The Greatest Show on Earth

Why the abrupt fade out in Pittsburgh?  Why so misleadingly bleak an ending?   The documentary is pitched as  “the rise and fall of the American railroad tent circus.”  Okay, technically, this may give them cover for bringing down so ruthlessly premature a curtain on Pittsburgh, but it hardly gives them cover for the 80 or so years they spend on Barnum’s pre-circus antics and early American circus history — eighty years before , repeat, before that great American circus train they ballyhoo even began to roll. Not their stated focus.  Makes no sense.

All of which amounts to a wholesale evisceration of all that came after Pittsburgh, and I need not go into detail here, other than to make clear, The Greatest Show on Earth continued on for sixty more years.  North put it indoors and back in the black, and, ten years later, sold it to the Irvin Feld family.

I can’t help but wondering why so many major contributors to American circus were missing in action during the film’s time frame. To name but a few:  Arthur Concello, Antoinette Concello, the Bloomington circus community, then the prime source of leading trapeze acts world-wide,  Dan Rice,  Miles White, Barbette, Irving J. Polack, Louis Stern (Polack Bros), Gargantua, American Circus Corporation shows, Cole Bros, Sells Bros, Alfred Court, Francis Brunn, Lou Jacobs.

Given the vast terrain of circus history either ignored, short-shrifted or bungled  by Grimberg and colleagues, I  am left, still, dreaming of the ultimate documentary from Ken burns.

10.23.18

Coming Soon to a Theatre or Tablet Near You: PBS on American Circus History --- Warner Bros. on Leitzel & Codona -- Disney on a New Dumbo ... And There's More on the Inside! ...

Still waiting-praying for a great  new movie on the  circus, might PBS have the ticket? Come October 8,  American Experience to present a two-part, four-hour documentary. The Circus.    I can’t wait.  I keep telling myself that somewhere, somehow, a film maker is bound to stumble upon big top gold.  It’s  loaded with triumph and tragedy, skullduggery and betrayal and spangled glory.  Too much of this is too often ignored (The Greatest Showman) or grossly overdone (Water for Elephants).

Also come October, comes the return of Big Apple Circus to Lincoln Center — IF BAC returns.  My projection is devoid of solid evidence, although a very nice lady who answered the phone when I called (she sounded like the member of an Old World circus family) told me, yes, they are coming back, she thinks, or I am the one thinking?  She just does not know when. Anybody out there know what kind of business they have been doing?  Anybody out there still reading this? (Update: Show opens at Lincoln Center October 20)

Hollywood is on a sawdust roll:  Just when I was about to give up on the once-touted new film in the making about the tumultuous lives of Leitzel and Codona, Queen in the Air,  I googled up good news: Indeed, according to Deadline, as of April 12 last, the producer  “is sticking with Warner Bros. and the theme” It's the WB name that fuels my enthusiasm   Dream along with me for an epic set starring the  mammoth six-pole Ringling-Barnum  big top of the 1920s. Take a look up there ... Can ... you ... imagine? ..

 When elephants flew: Disney is remaking its celebrated 1941 animation,  Dumbo. This will be a live action, directed by Tim Burton.  Due out March 29.   Wonder if Dumbo will fly?  Hard to tell by the charming tease.  There are images of a real baby elephant.   Dumbo airborne is likely to be a puppet or robot.  Regards to which, people in high tech places are talking up robotic acrobats, jugglers and peanut vendors (I added the vendors)  soon to be stiff-executing your way.  I just can’t wait.  No, I CAN wait. 

In the meantime, back here in real time:  CBS Sunday Morning did a sweet little segment on Kevin Venardos, he once of Ringling red with whistle, then for a time a “homeless ringmaster.”   He’s now fronting his own one man,  one very long truck show.  He sets up outdoors, acts coming and going over various dates, ringmasters them with humble joy, and seems to love seeing even a few dozen people in the seats.  His fate is a poignant sign of our trembling times, and you gotta respect Kevin's infectious dedication.  For CBS, he revealed a warm,  sincere passion for the Big top that I hadn’t felt from him when he ringmastered for Big Apple and later Vargas.  I feel for this guy and wish him grateful crowds.
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SIDE SHOW STOPPERS: Sir Harry of Kingston writing up Kelly Miller in Circus Report: “It has no animals, but many great acts. It is not a circus without animals, but a circus according to Jim Judkins.”  I feel your let down, Harry. . I have argued for a few dogs, etc.  And yet, I can see the smartness in what Jim has done.  He has made it impossible for the animal rights activists to muck up the midway. They are anointing his tent for this fact alone.  I hope, assuming Jim can come home a few pennies richer,  that he will relent in time and let the dogs in the tent.  Hey, they are stealing the stage on America’s Got Talent. ...... Tim Tegge,  spinning out a persuasive review in Circus Report of  the Nellie Hanneford  Shrine show in Oklahoma city, for which he ringmastered.  I so enjoyed Tim’s deliciously detailed write-up, that it felt like the best damn circus I have been to in some time!  Oh, wait, I haven’t been to any circus in some time ... Kenneth Feld, remember him?   Broadway producer? Wondering what he is up to these post-Ringling daze,  I googled his name and was mighty impressed to find that he and wife Bonnie produced the big New York hit, Dear Evian Hansen.   Really?  When you report, you are supposed to dig, so dig I did, all the way to the Broadway database. Turns out the Feld names appear among literally dozens of other names, all  listed as “producer."  Once upon a season, there were backers, sometimes called angels. Now called "producers".

END RINGERS: Sad to see that France's long-venerated Pinder Circus sliding into bankruptcy.  It’s not as easy over there as some over there would have us believe ... The ever precarious Garden Bros. Circus  rated F by the Ohio Central Better Business Bureau.  Reason being, beyond free tickets, adults complain of having to fork over  too much money for concessions. Well, at least the show showed up before  proceeding to piss them off.  That’s a Garden bonus ....

Back to Queen of the Air:   Here is how the producers can make the film --- an imperative these daze --- PC-certified. And shut down feminist rage against women not getting stardom in a sexist circus back then.  Give cameos to a few of them who did:  Bird Millman, May Wirth, Mable Stark, Ella Bradna,Winnie Colleano,  Luicita Leers (surprised?)  I could go on....If I am asked to name the greatest stars of the golden age, I would come up with more women than men.


Oh, what glory Winnie Colleano brought to the big tops. Behold and believe:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DEBzkC3cnE

 

 

Photos: Lillian Leitzel, May Wirth, Bird Millman, Mabel Stark

 

PBS -- Warner Bros. --  Disney.  Heck, we've got some heavy weights on our side, and I'm waiting to NOT be disappointed again, with regards and regrets to the P.T. Barnum who never made it to the screen.

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Showbiz David's new book Prime Time Rising

rises in nine days!

Bello Nock Wows America’s Got Talent — Until He Doesn’t ... In the Wider World of Reality TV, a World Acclaimed Circus Star is Just Another Humble Competitor ...

 
The millions who watched Bello perform so winningly on America’s Got Talent would not have known of his world-acclaimed status.. I have a feeling that the show actively recruits circus acts — the better the act, the better to give the programs more variety and thrills.

A few weeks ago during semi-finals, I finally got to catch Bella’s act on the Wheel of Death.  Indeed, to watch the best of Bello (I imagine) for the first time. For, you see, I am now after all these years a  fan of Bello’s unique gifts.  Call it a belated discovery.
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On the big wheel, he ingeniously combined acrobatic dexterity, bravado and comedy to win me over in a big way.  What I liked was how he built his routine, first inside the wheels, and then on the outer rims, cleverly escalating the danger.

The prop itself is one of the best props ever to give the circus an almost guaranteed thrill. One need only ride it and stay aloft to keep any crowd awake and tuned in, cell phones ignored.

And so I had my breakthrough moment with this Bello fellow, whose relatives I remember on Ringling in 1955, atop their tall lean "sway poles," but not really doing much.  Made for great ad copy --- mid air exchanges!  Nothing like what you might be imagining, folks.

I remembered Bello’s early days on Ringling when I could never know where to place him — goofy kid clown?  Lazy daredevil?  I could not find a compelling focus.

On the AGT stage, the judges were wowed. And scared to the pits of their stomachs.  So was the audience. Indeed, what won them over was true danger -- the stark clarity of Bello working with no safety aids. This will only deepen their respect for the genuine and artistic risk-taking performer.  

Alas, the Monte Carlo Gold Clown winner ended up, as eliminations proceeded, being pitted against a roller skating act.  One would stay on. The other would go home.

What an odd pairing.  The judges had expressed possibly more enthusiasm over the skaters. And so I grew anxious.  Could he really lose out to ... the unthinkable ???

I cast my silent vote for Bello.

The judges cast theirs for the skaters   A roller skating act!?!  Bello lost out to a roller skating act!  What a humiliation.  Okay, to its credit, the skaters did more than I usually see in these types of acts.
I have seen so many of the same sort over the years, that I have grown jaded.

I felt such a sadness for Bello, who had to take it, and take it,  graciously he did..

Really, what Bello achieved encompassed many more skills. In my book, there can be no comparison.

What next for this open-minded television show that is  helping to keep alive the ageless lure of ring wizards?  And before not thousands or hundreds – or dozens – but millions.  Doesn't that make you feel good?  It does me. So what next?  Jenny Vidbel's bohemian barnyard?  A young fiery flyer attempting the quad?

Why not? 

Best of all, these judges appear totally free of a tainted bias for the precious Cirque du Soleil school of circus.  It is so satisfying just to watch them react with almost a child like wonder to what passes before their eyes. They are the perfect panel for circus performers of all stripes.  I say, bring more big top on!

The circus has three very good friends in America’s Got Talent. And in this we can take heart.