Remembering Circus Report Founder Don Marcks: Chasing Big Tops Together

“I always have mixed feelings about the Ringling show and am sometimes not too interested in seeing it.  Mainly I guess because it seems there isn’t anyone there I know and I much prefer to visit than just sit in the seats and watch the full show,”  
                      --  in his letter to me from October 22, 1989

He often offered to drive or to meet me at circuses playing in the area, though never once did I actually watch a circus performance with Don.  Usually — and this was fun, I will admit — we would nonchalantly wander into the backyard, as if being “with” the show, merge with the actual staff and continue right  on in through the back door.   Victory!  Free seats!  Oh, the thrill of the illicit walk in!

Sidewall Champs

We all did it. Another circus friend and fellow Santa Rosan, Hugo Marquardt, was with me at the fairgrounds, where Carson & Barnes was playing.  We were sauntering along the edge of the tent, heading  towards the back yard.  Hugo raised his hands in applause mode, and giddily sighed -- lampooning a CFA mantra about paying your way in  --  “We clap as we go!”

The Carson and Barnes show I saw in 1966-67 holds a special place in my memory bank of great circus performances.  The vibrant program bubbled and bounced as if on air, the rings rich in talent,  the band a rollicking treat to the ears.  

Perhaps Don had taught me well.  In my youth, I relished being able to slip through anonymously.  I practically walked into the Oakland arena when the Russians were playing there.  Talk about class crash.  Well,  my bank account held a near zero balance. That was my excuse then. What was yours?

My most disillusioning experience with Don was the time he offered  me a ride to Carson & Barnes, which was playing in an East Bay location that would have required my taking  two or three bus rides to get there.  Relief!   As it turned out, he went the day before — he often planned to spend several days around a circus lot — but evidently was not  nearly as well received as he might have expected.  So he called up to tell me that he would not be going. That felt cold.

Or maybe he had encountered insulting indifference to a Circus Report pitch.  He was forever struggling to sell new subscriptions, in order to replace a continuous stream of non-renewals.

 One to Hob Nob, One to Nit Pick

When we did go together, he escaped our company the moment we entered, and vanished – somewhere  into that special space where show people lived and worked.  I would sit out and watch the show, and meet up with  him afterwards.  He lived for the validation of circus peple.

May 18, 1983: "Was in Wally Naughtin's trailer  when there was a knock on the door and in walked Vargas. He acted like he was happy to see me.  Another time he was going through the backyard and came over to tell me that he had been selling tickets and said, do you know the people who buy those tickets are crazy."

There I am at Graham Bros. Circus, 1966.  Maybe Don was somewhere in the backyard.

I recall his once actually finding me in the mezzanine seats — we both happened to be at  Ringling in the old Oakland Auditorium.  Plenty of spare chairs that day. He sat down next to me and grumbled a little, something about the show.  He must have been not very welcome that day.

Getting the Bauman Bounce 

The Felds were none to thrilled by invading circus fans.  In a particularly revealing letter, dated August 24, 1984, Don  wrote of how unwelcome he was suddenly made to feel when, while walking up a ramp at the Cow Palace between the backyard and the arena, he was confronted by a former center ring star, now the performance director:
   
    “Guess what.  Charlie Bauman told me to get out and I didn’t belong there.”

    “I’ve often heard from others that Bauman is a very difficult man to get along with and he has been rough on others who come to visit.  Even to the point of going up in the seats and telling them they have to leave and can’t have a free seat at the circus.”

    “He never does look anything other than grouchy.  He must have a miserable life”.

    Or maybe the Felds had been hounding Mr. Bauman to do the job?

 Sometimes, when having gone to a circus on my own, from my seat in the audience I would spot him down by the performers entrance, standing there with his arms folded, lost, I supposed, in a dream of being One of Them — maybe the big boss himself.  Of being with it and for it.

****************************************************************************

Next: Don at his day job, and on the road with his California Varieties show.

first posted 11.18.19

second in a series 

BIG APPLE CIRCUS SLAMMED IN LAWSUIT: Three Performers Each Claim $200,000 for Botched Tour ... Details Point to Reckless Mismanagement

From Showbiz David –  Biz Buzz Division

 

Adam Kuchler, Mark Gindick and ringmaster Stephanie Monseu, photo from the New York Post. 

How Much Do Circus Performers Really Make?

OKAY, FIRST OF ALL, to prepare you for my headline issue, what do you suppose the average circus performer makes in this country?  I would have guessed  between $20,000 and $40,000- $50,000 a year — maybe the rare ones up to 80, 90 grand.  Ringling may have once gone that high for the likes of a Bello Nock, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Barry Lubin was getting over a hundred grand from Paul Binder for his delightful Grandma cameos.  

I did a little goggling, and settled on the figures supplied by Salary.Com, looking at Cirque du Soleil, which I imagine pays more than any other still-in-biz big top, anywhere in the world. To quote:

"Cirque Du Soleil Inc in the United States  is $56,769 {average] as of July 30, 2019, but the range typically falls between $46,782 and $69,313."
                         
Okay, onto the Big Question: Why did the new Big Apple Circus owners offer three performers $200,000 each for five months of work in the so-called indoor unit, the one that never made it off the ground? And we are not talking Monte Carlo Showstoppers.   We are talking two clowns – Adam Kuchler and Mark Gindick --- and last season’s ringmaster, Stephanie Monseu.

Tour was aborted five days before it was slated to go on, "low ticket sales" the cause.

How do I know this?  Because the New York Post reported last Saturday on a lawsuit filed by the three plaintiffs  in the  Manhattan Supreme Court. Plaintiffs allege they have signed contracts, that they were let go without compensation, thus having to find alternative bookings for 20 weeks of work lost.  I doubt they could have landed such loot elsewhere.   (You may recall another lawsuit against Big Apple Circus, reported here, by two parties claiming they were promised upper-management positions, and then pushed aside and out the tent, without compensation).  Do I spot a trend here?  I have nibbled around the edges of what feels like cloudy ethics in play, to post it politely

 Who is Really in Charge?

The two-hundred-grand figure alone tells me that this show is being run by amateurs. But then, if this Sarasota-funded outfit really doubled its tickets sales at Lincoln Center last season, as heretofore claimed by current CEO,  Gregg Walker (over those of the first season out), that points to a brilliant mind at work.  Whose mind?  The same mind  at work now?  Which brings me back to the subject of Neil Kravnazh --  the retired spinal surgeon to the Supremes (of the court),  accoladed for having “saved” the circus.  Whatever happened to Kravnazh, who was generally profiled as the man very much in charge of every aspect of BAC.    According to Walker, he, Walker, has been at the helm since last summer.  But the doctor was still being quoted in news reports about the circus as late as this past March. Did somebody fail to inform him that he was no longer CEO?   And why?  If another person was behind the soaring ticket sales, Walker seems the likely one, I can see that marketing genius grabbing the power away from the doctor. My best guess.   You realize, of course, the soaring sales were talked up by Walker, but, to my knowledge, not independently confirmed.

Enough.

END RINGERS:   Barnum is back in fresh print, credit two books, one just out, the other ten years ago..  Barnum: An American Life, is drawing respectable though not glowing notices, while, The Great and Only Barnum: The Tremendous, Stupendous Life of Showman P. T. Barnum drew raves when it was released in 2009.  I'd like to read it ...  Public respect for circus plunges: Just look and listen around, rather shocking.  Ringling’s exit was received with a collective shrug, the public and media sighing, sad, but, yes, it was about time.  Those poor animals.  Circus is a thing of the past. ... Comments at the end of circus articles, one after another, echoing the same anti-circus animals, even clowns, tone: It’s about time! ... The same ill-wishers may not be so happy if race tracks are shut down, and if owning pets becomes the next big PETA-pronounced evil.  As they say, be careful what you wish for.

This is 1956, not 2017

IN THE CLASSROOM, ALL IS WELL: Argues noted academic author Janet Davis, having penned an op-ed piece for the Wash Post, chirping that we are actually living in a very good time for the circus.  Arguing we lived through the same emotional frame back in 1956.  Really?  Back then, the public wept over the demise of the Ringling big top. Newspapers wept.  Editorial cartoons wept.  All of them to my knowledge.  Back then, the public en masse flocked to big tops, GUILT-FREE, to enjoy performing animals and slightly, lovable, eccentric (okay, devious) clown characters, along with the thrillers.  And back then, shows like Ringling-Barnum and Beatty-Cole did not fade into history books, but rebounded for another fifty seasons.  And what have we to support the Davis doctrine:  She cites two shows as examples of a still-thriving big top scene:  Circus Flora and Cullpepper Merriweahter ("still going strong").  Lame.  I’m canceling your course, prof.  Think I’ll enroll in Gender Detection Studies.  I hear the actively dating young are lining up to grab that one.


Many thanks to Barry Lipton for the New York Post link.   

He Doest It Again: USA's Wesley Williams Spins More Gold At Spainish Circus Festival ...

Once again, that powerhouse American kid on the tallest rideable unicycle, Wesley Williams, wowed 'em Over There, riding away with a Gold Elephant. He was one of only two acts to land the Gold, the other, a fabric duo from Russia.

Among the Gold, Silver and Bronze Elephants handed out, Russia claimed a total of five, The U.S, China, and the Ukraine, one each.

Williams rides, they say, the tallest unicycle in the world.

Wallenda NY High Wire Walk a Washout ... While Nik Stays Safely Strapped to Safety Wires, Viewership Takes a Plunge ...

* UPDATES, 6/24: Fake daring-do just won't cut it anymore.  Turns out that Nik and sister Lijana were strapped to safety wires, looking more like injured patients re-learning how to walk.

* 5 million watched the stunt on ABC, down from the 10 million who followed Nik Wallenda's 2012 walk, also protected. (He has taken similar outdoor walks elsewhere in past years without mechanics.)

* About the safety harness, Wallenda told a reporter he was "totally cool" with it, giving as a reason his concern for his sister.  High wire walkers who work with mechanics are not true high wire walkers at all, and that is putting it politely.  What they should do is come down to earth and walk the low wire, and preserve the aura of integrity.

* I caught a clip of Nik strapped to an elaborate high-tech harness.  Pitiful.  A further smear on the vanishing mystique of great American circus , which comes off looking even more impotent compared to some TV reality shows. Karl Wallenda must be grieving in his grave.

"TWO PEOPLE, 25 STORIES ABOVE TIMES SQUARE!"  Great come-on.

Actually, I am putting this out the night before, having just discovered an ABC special I knew nothing about -- Nick Wallenda and sister about to take a  wire walk over Times Square.

Got to give it to these two: They make perfect personalities for this kind of stunt, somehow managing  to come off above and beyond the vulgarity sometimes attached to these old-fashioned exploits. She is a discrete looker, drawing a fashionable sympathy talking about not being totally secure with an ailing ankle.

He, cool guy still, says he cares more about his sister than his own balance aloft.

And I am already nervous, or should I say concerned?  But I will have no idea whether or not they make the crossing, for I will be sleeping through most of it.

Have a good night.

Seeking Circus in a World Without Ringling: Two Years Later Feels More Like Twenty, as More Shows Shorten Routes, Shrink Big Tops, or Fold

 
      THESE DAYS, I am wanting something to be there that almost never is anymore. And so, I see it through and beyond other things that come my way.

    * WHITE SHAFTS  of light streaming through a TV commercial, and I see  sunlight pouring in through the sidewalls and down onto the hippodrome track of an old fashioned big top in halcyon days gone by.  Gave me a  short-lived tingle.  Was only a car commercial.  Above, a photo that matched my memory, not of Ringling, as I recalled, but of the smaller Daily Bros. Circus in 1949. Smaller then seems giant now.

    * CANADIAN BASKETBALL  stars cheering victory a few nights back in Oakland at Oracle Arena.  Watching it on TV, I saw in my mind's eye an older version of the same building, then called the Oakland Arena, when the Moscow Circus in 1967 packed ‘em in and even turned ‘em  away.  I saw Ringling the following year begin its nearly half-century run there.  Then, they kept the house lights on most of the time — shows seemed  sunnier, easier to watch.   Seasons came and seasons went, rose and rocked, fumbled and fell.  Crowed sizes shrank, until the house lights went dark, the Felds, I figured, wanting to hide thousands of empty chairs from view.  And then you know what happened.  

    * RADIANT GHOST-LIKE images of prancing horses, perfectly in step,  surreally circling a German ring, making Circus Roncalli an easier sell to a public losing faith in the ageless delight. The owner offering lovely  “holographic” stand-ins for the real thing. (look up the word.)  And I strain to imagine myself in the tent feeling any visceral connection to this synthetic substitution. Too perfect to appreciate. 

How can audiences claiming a moral high ground cheer such illusions that celebrate the very thing they find so onerous in the real world?

     SOMEDAY – SOMEONE may ask me,  why did you leave the circus?  And I will tell them no, I did not leave the circus. The circus left me.  Nothing is forever, they say.  Maybe not even what Philip Astley so brilliantly invented.  Can you imagine Astley atop a holographic horse?  I prefer my circus organic, weeds and all.

So close to the abyss?  Now, Kelly Miller, like Carson & Barnes has been doing and might still do, is going dark during the summer months.  Might we ponder the meaning of it all?

    “TOO NEGATIVE are you!” you may cry.  Go ahead, yes, there is still plenty out there to see, you will claim    Sure, there is – in bits and pieces, in ever-smaller servings under ever-smaller tents.  American circus is devolving down closer to the six-hundred seats that the Ringling Bros. offered Baraboo when they opened in 1884, not to mention discarding half or more of its defining features.

    A FINE LANE TALBURT  video update on Carson and Barnes follows their new European style one-ring tent being hydraulically raised, resembling a high-tech construction project -- so far a cry from Dory Miller's messy five-ring smorgasbord.  But how can you not admire these Byrds, still refusing not to fly.
.
TINY TENT, the new normal?  Take a gentle, supporting visit to the Venardos Circus. Reviewed with embracing flexibly by Herb Ueckert in the Circus Repor, he found much to enjoy:   “At times, words are inadequate to accurately describe a circus performance such as the case with Vernados.”  (I would love to know what Herb honestly thinks of the entire circus scene, in words inadequate or otherwise.)

      IT ALSO HELPS to downsize your expectations going in.  These days, I’m going in with my mind gratefully set on the John Strong scale.  John may have taught me at the county fair  decades ago how to savor a home-cooked little circus show.  Cozy and close.  Neighborly.  Less can be, must  be also entertaining. Maybe Mr. Sanders on the campaign trails can figure out how to have government fund  our circuses, too.  Free shows for all, but even then, how many people would come?  (Yes, that was a bit cruel – I have shed enough to tears to earn my observations)

Got a big hand, John!

   ALL AROUND us near and far, larger realities deliver what I can’t refrain from reporting:  Dare I mention that Switzerland’s  Circus Nock is now calling it quits?   I read about this in the circus Report, which itself is calling it quits end of the year. “The deficits have grown,” writes someone for the Nock family.   Animal rights pressures, the key reason.  You aren’t surprised, are you? 

Similar problems said to be facing and maybe dooming Circus Knie, too. Yes, I typed Circus Knie (1803-?).

    LET'S FACE IT, Kids.  Okay, I’ll kindly skip what I  was about to say.  Let me default to my good friend Kenny Dodd. We were chatting on our old land lines quite a few years back about the  state of the circus, and Kenny, as if I needed a gentle nudge  away from my functional optimism of the moment, said: “David, ah, remember vaudeville?  And .. what, David ... happened     to     vaudeville? ... Remember?”

    “NOBODY WANTS to be in a circus tent” under the heat of summer, said the unnamed  Knock family source quoted in Circus Report.  Maybe our friends on summer hiatus in Hugo can relate to this curious development.

    BACK TO THE CELEBRATION at Oracle, where the legendary Warriors played their last game of the season, ending up in shreds. “A Shakespearean  tragedy,” a local sportscaster called it.  Oakland got the dream team’s golden years — never having seen a game, yet I have followed a touching story of these hoop wizards and their forever-loyal fans with respect. But now, the city of insatiable greed and self-glory across the bay, where the team is headed to play in a new luxury arena fit for fickle billionaires,  may be stuck with the leftovers.  Oh, how sweet can be the instructive hand of fate!

    PEOPLE ARE WONDERING, now what will happen to Oracle, still a quite attractive arena, thank you. The ice shows, I imagine, will still come, and sporadic rock concerts will draw rockheads and preen and blast away.  Another circus, ever?  One came so close, maybe,  but based on recent  news out of New York, I guess I won’t be going to Oracle anytime soon to see the new “indoor” version of the Big Apple Circus.

It closed before it opened.

Big Top Aftershocks: Big Apple Circus Arena Tour Crashes Before it Opens ... All Dates Cancelled

UPDATE, 6/18:  Here's a link to a remarkably revealing article about Big Apple Circus's current travails, which appeared yesterday in the Philadelphia Inquirer.  A friend of this blog sent it my way.  Rather amazing to see a major newspaper digging as deep as this report does.  Kudos to Ellie Rushing.

https://www.inquirer.com/business/big-apple-circus-tour-schedule-canceled-arena-bankruptcy-philadelphia-new-york-20190617.html
 
This just in ...

ALBANY, Ga. (WALB) - The Big Apple Circus said it has canceled its shows in Albany next month.

The Albany Civic Center announced the shows back in April.

The circus was set to do an arena tour this summer, performing in Albany during the first week of July.

The civic center posted on Facebook that the circus cancelled its arena shows to “reconceive the tour.”

The civic center said that if you’ve already bought tickets, you will get a full refund.

Management Earthquake at Big Apple Circus: Kahanovitz Axed ...Dufresnoy Signing Acts, Guiding New Show ... Horses Out ... Olate Dogs In ...

This just in from the latest issue of Spectacle magazine on-line:

Ernest Albrecht, who has been trying to chase down rumors of a shakeup in top tier management, was able to get the Big Apple Circus to  issue  the following official statement:

 “Neil Kahanovitz is focusing on other pursuits and is no longer working with the Big Apple Circus. We are extremely grateful to him for getting the circus to where it is now and wish him the best of luck with his new endeavors.”

Writes  Albrecht, "Dufresnoy, in fact, continues to be involved in all aspects of the circus including the beginning discussions for the new tent show." 

He's scouting and signing acts.  West Hyler to direct new tent show, Housch Ma Housce to clown.  Show to erect heavy aerial rigging and have people "flying around everywhere,”  And I LIKE that. I have all along felt a lack of earthy excitement. Vidbel's horses and mutts are out,  Olate dogs acts are in, set for two ring romps.  

I have sensed a cloudy deviousness about the retired spinal surgeon who will have managed Big Apple for less than two years. This feeling is  born partly of his shocking lack of ethics in touting reviews of the show (see my postings on the Wall Street Journal below).  As circus producer, he seemed to favor a rather staid, if respectable, lineup of acts.  This is not based on my seeing  either of the editions. but of impressions gained from reading New York reviews.

Do we assume that lackluster business played a part?   This would not apply here if a claim made to the Wall Street Journal  by (new?) CEO Gregg Walker is true.  He stated that Lincoln Center ticket sales jumped by 95% over the previous year.  An astonishing accomplishment.   If really true, one can only speculate on any number of possible reasons that may have hastened the doctor's exit. CEOs who produce such dazzling results do not as a rule suddenly disappear.  

Reports Albrecht, "there are several rumored explanations still hanging about."

I feel a renewed hope for the Big Apple Circus spirit, but feel a futility in their flirtation with a second unit for big arenas.   And I continue to believe that  they need to  let go of  their insane addiction to the long Lincoln Center date, the punishing rental fees being what they are, and focus more on other city parks.  Cunningham in Queens is heavenly.   They say Brooklyn's Prospect Park is more beautiful than Central Park.

Where is Paul Binder?

And, they need to reach out and ingratiate the support of Big Apple circus founder Paul Binder,  the best pied piper the show ever had.  I am sure, with a smile and call for advice (heck, send him to Monte Carlo to scout acts), he would be a happy trouper once more.  Better than that alone, offer him a second act as top dog -- but confine his role to the performance and hold him to the tight budgetary restraint of others whose control over the kitty is absolute.   

Albrecht is riding the story, promising more news is it surfaces.

Chance Chat with Circus Bella Fella Leaves Me Felling Blue ..

 
Just back from an afternoon stroll.  Quiet sunshine, trees above a sleepy stream below, a guy and girl sitting on the edge, about where you see that rock, looking down.  Passing by, I glanced back -- had I seen  “Bella” on his jacket?  

Reversing course, I had to ask “Circus Bella?”

Yes, said the guy.

“Were you with it?”

“I was."

“How did they do on Treasure Island?”

He brightened, they did good, I think he said.  Excited, I wondered about business — wanting something a little more specific. "So," going gentle at first, I guessed "the houses, half full?' 

“Well, yes," he answered, "and we had some sellouts.”

“So, are they going back next year?”

He answered no.   And I wondered why, and  yet could not  bring myself to ask if it had  been profitable.  He talked up the annual summer season ahead.  Was that all, to myself I wondered.  He turned my attention to big plans in the works.  They had signed a memorandum of understanding with somebody, and this would  bring them new dates in the spring and fall.

I could not help wondering if something had gone wrong on Treasure Island, so I returned to the subject.  He gave a little, revealing that a restaurant, maybe the Mersea, for they played in Mersea Meadows, had backed out, or tried to, of some agreement.  From there, I let up.

“We are not returning to Treasure Island,” he said once more, with a bleak, almost disparaging finality, and it felt as if something had gone wrong that he would not disclose.   They are animal-free.

I wished him well, and walked, on, and crossed the street and sat on a bench on a pleasantly detached  dead-end street, where people with dogs sometimes pass, and sat there under the sun feeling a pang of sadness for Circus Bella.  It made me realize how happy I had been when I learned last year of the Treasure Island date.  It sounded like a bold new future underway.  Already history.

Another setback for the contemporary circus in this country.  The visit to Treasure Island had sounded so promising on the rise, they had secured an attractive tent, as it turns out,  on loan from Ramos Bros. Will they be using it again, I had asked the fella. He seemed unsure.

Circus Bella  will be out again as usual, come summer, playing free shows on variable grass and dirt in variable city parks around the Bay Area.

On Treasure Island, where they had played through the month of December,  they had added acts and sold tickers at surprisingly high prices.  I can only conclude that not enough people bought tickets to make the venture worthwhile.     Surly, they do not shun success.

But of course, I did not share this feeling with the nice fella wearing a Circus Bella jacket.

These days, one holds their breath with a kind of sensitive respect for the trouping wounded.

MIDWAY FLASH ... California Senate Bans Performing Circus Animals ... Assembly Expected to Ditto ...Horses and Dogs May be Spared, Camels Not

Bye Bye Big Top, headlines the Sacramento Bee.

Another cold curtain comes close to crashing down on our disintegrating circus scene.  Remember the circus, anyone?

Sacramento, land of leftward politicians, is voting exotic animals off the lot. Next stop, the Assembly,  then likely onto a signature from Governor Gavin Newsom.

Writes Andrew Sheeler in the Bee:

"The language initially could be interpreted as banning not just circuses, but also wildlife conservancy and education groups’ outreach efforts.

'These animal act bans are superfluous laws that will be selectively enforced, making criminals out of good people,' the U.S. Association of Reptile Keepers said in a statement upon the bill’s introduction.

The bill also was opposed by groups including the Cheetah Conservation Fund, Discovery Valley Animal Hospital, the Snow Leopard Conservancy and the Southwest California Legislative Council. While the USARK has withdrawn its opposition, the other groups have not
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In response to the criticism, the bill’s author, Sen. Ben Hueso, D-San Diego, tightened up the definition of the bill, specifically wording the ban so that only circuses would be affected."

Lions and tigers and elephants.  Camels, too, then why not horses while they're at it?

Dogs next? Don't rule that out in the State of Insanity.

Which makes me wonder, if one blunderful day, some genius doctor At UC-SF advocates gender reassignment for strange-acting animals.

My Letter to the Wall Street Journal, Re: Big Apple Circus Ad Fraud, New Arena Unit, Biz Claims ...

Actually, an e-mail I sent to  Charles Passy at the Wall Street Journal regarding his story, "For It's Next Act, Big Apple Circus Goes on the Road," reprinted in The Circus Report.  

UPDATE:  Read about Mr. Passy's reaction to my post below.

Dear Mr. Passy,

When last we met by e-mail, I shared my astonished reaction to a review by your paper of the Big Apple Circus -- as quoted by the Big Apple Circus.  You may recall they merely lifted from a story you did on them, quoting how they described their own show!  That you allow this ad fraud to continue (take a look at their website) suggests the Journal is a party to the brazen deception. No?  I wonder what really went on behind the scenes to allow for such. 

Strange, the Journal, whose Saturday edition I read regularly,  sometimes stresses its adherence to rigorous ethics.  Evidently, at the circus, this may not apply.  My guess is that somebody made a little easy  money on the side, or a huge stack of free tickets -- or maybe a free spinal adjustment -- in order for the Journal's good name to be nailed onto a fake review.  Does this not bother you?   Oh, that's right, it's only the circus.

Huge indoor arenas have become the morgue of the modern day circus, plagued with ever-declining attendance.  More than ever, the public seems to want small -- at least the illusion of a half way decent crowd around them.  BAC is a small show, no longer "produced" so costly as it was under Paul Binder, so the idea of their saving money on not having to "produce" the indoor trick, since it will be a carryover from last year, is a bit of a stretch. 

Their claim of skyrocketing ticket sales is impressive, if anywhere near the actual truth. I remember once being interviewed by Forbes, and questioning Kenneth Feld's claim that his circus played to 10 million people a year.  Forbes evidently did some intelligent fact checking of their own (rare for a circus story), and estimated the figure to be around five million.

Anyway,  I will be looking forward to the next review of the Big Apple Circus by the Wall Street Journal.

 From The Wall Street Journal story, High Wire Act for Big Apple Circus,  October 26,   2017

As quoted on the Big Apple Circus Website, featuring a string of excerpts from reviews.

CHARLES PASSY RESPONDS

I emailed Mr. Passy a link to my blog, and he responded, assuring me that  nobody at the Journal would have gained from any association with the Big Apple Circus.  I printed his full reply, believing it to be fair,  and sent him the link.  He was taken aback by my doing this, so I offered to remove his reply, and he gladly accepted.

In his e-mail which I deleted, he remembered my bringing the matter to his attention last year (In fact, I published his reply then), and he believes he forwarded the issue on to higher levels of management at the Journal.

He wrote, “to be honest this happens all the time ... Broadway producers are legendary for ‘finding a quote’ and taking things out of context.”

To be honest, I find his last assertion more than a stretch and a bit wobbly, for while Broadway producers are known for quoting out of context, they quote from actual reviews, not from advance feature stories, as Big Apple Circus has done here.  This is what in my view makes the matter doubly astounding, and begs the question, why does the Journal allow such a blatant deception to continue?

Interesting story.