MORNING WAKE UP, CIRCUS VERSUS THEATER: "Love, sorrow, fear, triumph or revenge cannot be interpreted by purely acrobatic movements." -- Antony Hippisley Coxe, A Seat at the Circus

Further ...

 "After his first wild leap, the acrobat forgot the cause, and, impressed by its effect, became more interested  in evolving physical variations than in trying to express different feelings by similar movements."

And the Winners Are! ...

GOLD  Turkmenistan’s Djiguite riders, China’s National Acrobatic Troupe, and the gravity-defying Flying Caballeros.

SILVER The Scandinavian Boards and the Martini Family’s enchanting exotic animals brought awe to the ring. Pastelito and Junior also earned this distinction, proving their comedic brilliance to be world-class.

BRONZE The Triple Breath High Wire trio, with their serene mastery of the tightrope, joined Duo Acero and Wolfgang Lauenburger in this category.

The Rise and Fall of North and Royal on Kelly Miller

When I think of the circus they ran together. I think of a happier time in my circus-going  days. Three reasons made the show special:

It was  owned and produced  by the House of Ringling , in the figure of  John Ringling North II. During its better, early to middle years, the acts ranged from moderately pleasing to outstanding. Show was very attractively costumed, and well ringmastered by the strong, clean, concise intros from John Moss.  Musical scores were mostly good.  Occasional Imports from abroad  –  top of the pack, a ball bouncing ladder juggler from Etheopia, Abrham Gebre,  added gold to the mix.

Another Big Plus: During those days, we were luckily given a rare insider view by  blogger Steve Copeland, who with his partner Ryan Combs, zealously infused the programs with inventive clowning. Steve’s hopelessly honest postings (actual crowd sizes and audience response, etc.) were daily must-reads.  Was he revealing too much?  The House of Ringling said, no, this is a free country, let him blog.

Don Covington photo / Bandwagon

In the middle of all this stood the imperially tall James Royal, above, general manager. America born, Jim was stricken by the bug at the age of 12, blame it on Polack at Medina Shrine in Chicago.  And seduced by Henry Ringling North’s great book, Circus Kings.

A rarity it seems, Royal would spend his years under tops big and small on both sides of the big Pond. He worked for and with some of the UK’s top circus lords, in various configurations, co-owner to marketing man. Over here, he had started out the Hoxie show, transferred to  Kelly Miller, and then ringmastered for the five rings of Carson & Barnes. From there to production unit manager for Big Apple Circus. 

Just in time to be ready for a call from John Ringling North II, wanting to buy Kelly Miller Circus, up for sale, and asking Jim to become a virtual partner. The two had been friends for twenty years.  Royal was then as best employed as he would ever be, Big Apple Circus giving him a year around salary and benefits. It gave him grave pause—give up all that?  But when the House of Ringling calls, who can say no?  

The following is largely drawn from Lane Talburt’s excellent  two-part piece in Bandwagon.  In the article,  Talburt writes that during Jim’s last two years with Kelly Miller,  “fissures were developing between the owner and his general manager.” Royal specified “disagreements about routing and front end of the show.” He left the show at the end of the 2015 tour. The two have not spoken since.  

The exquisitely agile Mongolian Twins

Naturally, this revelation caught my attention, without which, this post might not be. Not spoken in ten years?  Thus was I stirred to  email Jim, asking him if he could elaborate on the issues separating them.  He declined to comment, except to correct the record, that, in fact, he had spoken briefly with John on the KM lot in Hugo at the opening of the 2018 season, and that, moreover “Ours was never an acrimonious relationship.”

Okay, to the ever-touchy subject of attendance,  rarely raised in circus circles unless conducting a formal interview while a lie detector test is running. I can only speculate, based on photos of people in the seats over time, that at some point, business began taking a rather ominous dive. This may have had something to do with an arguably diminishing quality of the later shows. I have the DVDs for all them from 2011 forward,  thanks to John for sending me one each year, along with a bag of, what? Yes, Peterson Peanuts! A humorous reference to my complaining about peanut pitches being crassly inserted between acts, rather than confined to intermission.

Of the first three shows, I saw one in person, in Brewster, New Jersey,  and  was left reasonably impressed. So Let’s argue that 2012 was the best show they put out.  Here in my view are indisputable highlights, acts I would very much welcome seeing again.

RYAN HOLDER TIGERS - Masterfully accomplished and  presented in a steady stream of maneuvers. A rarity.

FRIDMAN TORALES    Rolla bolla -- riveting

PIRATES OF THE KELLYBEAN Involving several acts, this work was  John's most enchanting production. 

CAROLYN RICE DOGS --  Flat out sensational. Damn, I haven't been this swept away since the Sephenson's dogs!

JUGGLER RAUL OLIVERAS -- Clubs, hoops, balls and hats in dazzling perfection.

ARMANDO  LOYAL ELEPHANTS -- Delightfully charming ... and, dare I say, cute?

STEVE AND RYAN CLOWNING, For creativity and dedication. My eyes brightened whenever they appeared, wondering what might come next.  And they didn't drag in the audience for hula hoops and pin the donkey.

MUSIC The two piece band of Marshall Eckelman and Michael Haerber was a marvel of sound and  contrast, delivering one of the best big top scores I’ve  heard in many years.  Bravo!

FINALE --  We are in darkness, illuminated objects are flying all around, when suddenly the lights come up and there stands the entire cast!  Bow wow showmanship of the highest order.

Okay, back to reality. After John Moss and Steve and Ryan left, what you got was a weakening product slowly slipping away.  

As recalled by Jim, the show had a "disappointing" 2016 season, and 2017 was "even worse." He lays the blame on "the lack of a good front end operation."  North closed the show at the end  2017, and in 2018, granted James Judkins the right to use the tile. Judkins recruited  Royal to the campaign.  Jim was now spreading his skills between a scaled down version of Kelly Miller and his regular position with Culpepper and Merriweather  The two hung in there for two hard years.  Business for 2018,  in Jim's words, was OK, but 2019  "wasn't good.”

Looking back on his days with John II, Jim shared this: “He is a gentleman and a very kind person ... When he was on the show, he would be in the tent watching the show at nearly every performance, and I do mean watching it. (that's him in the hat, below). This was something that the artists on the show appreciate ... He invited ideas from others for possible use in future shows. He defiantly has the ‘Ringling touch.'”
 

“John and I worked to make sure that everyone with Kelly Miller felt that what they did for the show was valued."  Which brings to mind an Al Ringling quote on the subject,  which I am paraphrasing, to wit, that nothing can so dispirit  a circus performer as a lack of appreciation.  Al had heart.  I think John II would have loved talking about the nuts and bolts of circus performance art with his great uncle Al Ringling, for whom the show itself was his greatest passion.

Most things in life come to an end.  Johnny the Sequel loved the  elephants, and, without them. hadn’t the will to go on.

Cry, Jumbo, Cry.

The Festival Begins Today

And I wish I could be there. I can feel a kind of rare excitement.  Even if all of the judging may not always make sense, this is still the biggest circus event in the world.

       SEASONAL CHEERS TO PRINCESS STEPHANIE!!!

It's incomprehensible and tears come to my eyes

Whole neighborhoods in L.A. razed.  One after another house, gone.  Most painfully, family mementos and scrapbooks lost.

My heart goes out to them all.

Wrapping 2024: Ringling Self-Reviews ... Cirque du Soleil Swallows Ballet ... Marcks and Mechanics, Kellner and Zoppe and Ring of Fame Plaques ... Doggies from Shelters, So No PETA Cracks!

             CIRCUS SPRINGS ETERNAL,  does it not?  A clump of papers, e-mails and notes before me, ignored or kept back in a gathering year-long stack, promise some kind of attention ahead, as I ramble through them before the current season goes bye bye into the barn ... After a rough shuffle, here is what randomly I face, from the top ..

            “A WEIRD AND WONDERFUL LIFE” for the  Zoppe Family, headlined a 2022 story from Redwood City’s On Line,  Dan Brown, profiling the old world Zoppes, with a focus on the current Zoppe leading the zip, Giovanni. They are doggedly old tradition, circa1842, all except for not using candles.  Why not? Answered Giovanni’s wife and marketing director Jeanette Prince, to Brown:  “Only because the fire marshal won’t allow it!” In the tent photo, above.     

   SCOTT O'DONNELL,  Circus World’s departing CEO, letting go of having to deal with its new bureaucratic owners, the Wisconsin Historical Society, as he tactfully implied to me when I called him.  An undercurrent of acute disappointment came through ... A big big loss in my outsider opinion.  A new CEO yet to be named.  The selection might tell us about the split.  Watch for a big name insider.

         COME ALIVE! ... Staying closer to  vintage sawdust, the new musical in London town, Come Alive!  The Greatest  Showman, is drawing boffo notices and luring good crowds to  its little 700-seat big top .. . Seems that the parade flies highest  on songs and acts, lowest when stumbling through inane story telling nonsense: Whoever went to a circus for this?  Memo to theatre snobs of increasingly idiotic irrelevance:  Out, damn dramaturgs, out!

           SID KELLNER WAS SOMEBODY ONCE   His brief reign as big top tycoon with James Bros Circus, founded with a popcorn machine in the 1950s, left some of us forever enamored of what he might have been.  Among them, Don Macks and Alex Smith, the later  recalling for me the day at Bentley Bros Circus in Vallejo, 1989, when Sid was guest of honor.  Chester Cable  "gave  great stories about Sid, wrote Alex.   "He was a handful," added Winni McKay.  I can relate, having toiled for King Kellner, and yet still miss his him to this day.
   
           GIVING NEW RINGLING A RAVE  While major media refused to review the circus that dare not speak its name,  in effect letting it review itself to Q&A reporters, a few others  fearlessly filled in the void.  London’s front line circus watcher and critic Douglas McPherson issued golden accolades, impressively noting the absence of many Cirque things that some of us, myself among the doubters, expected to see.  “Ringling has not switched camps.  There is no story line here, no theme, no message, no attempt to dress circus up as art.”

         SO HOW NEW OR NOVEL IS IT?  “It’s a traditional circus,  perhaps we should say New Traditional," opines Douglas.  I like that, although “new” is still being mostly met by an avalanche of unhappy Yelp Reviewers, wanting nothing to do with a sterile makeover.   I’d guess there’s a younger crowd ready to be entertained, and  that, given ticket and concession pries, the Feld of Felds may be cleaning up, ho ho.  Show has dates lined  up into spring.

       “WITH THE GREATEST OF EASE,” we once sang of the daring young man flying high. That word ease, and example of which -- Belmonte Cristiani, above, long ago -- feels more  meaningful to me now, as the ageless delight is more and more strapped to mechanics (lifelines, kids).  An abundance of unprotected ease charmed my heart while watching one of my favorite DVDs, highlights of the Ringling show as broadcast in 1968.  Then to my eyes, ease was more noticeable than now. Ease in the landings.  Ease in the connections. And why might that be? 

        THE PERILS OF SHUNNING PERIL  Could it be that performers in a circus without mechanics  are driven out of fear to perform  more cleanly so as NOT to risk a fall?   Oh, how softer the landings, how crisper the connections back then, before Soviet Circus era safety wire precautions invaded and practically emasculated  the rings.  Oh, how majestic the artistry!  Even Charlie Bauman, such a gracious showman, held court among his chummy tiger friends  with the greatest of ease!

           PRAY FOR  THE RING OF FAME PLAQUES  Many were attacked by  recent storms, leaving them smeared and cracked.  An update down the Covington Chute from the Circus Ring of Fame Foundation, tells of a dire outcome for 160 plus plaques  to be   “pressure washed.” The damage of each will be assessed for restoration treatment, expected  to go well into 2025.  A sad tale.

         HAS THAT ACT A NAME?   Increasing frustration, pulling up a website and wishing to see photos and names of the acts.   You might find photos with no names, or you might find nothing.  Here are three shows that deny us the obvious:  UniverSoul, Royal Hanneford, and Zoppe.  I understand this annoyance is also offered Brit fans by some of the circuses over over there. 

         AND OVER THERE IN BRIT LAND, the lions aren't roaring any more than they are over here, and  most big tops leave four legged critters out of the lineup.  Doggie stars everywhere should go on strike!    Has anybody heard of The National Dog Show?  Slowly, some of our more timidly produced shows are daring to reboot canine capers.  Big Apple Circus  brought back a pack of them to its recent Lincoln center opus. all only because, of course of course, yes, yes, okay they were  “rescued from dog shelters.”    Below, the three human fountains on Big Apple -- a knockout.

       CIRQUE DU YOU TUBE  Circuses near and far are never far away on You Tube, and that’s an armchair luxury.  Cirque du Soleil on the comeback trail is putting out one hour compilations of acts from three of its shows, and what a leap from where they were when last I saw them.  Now what I behold is  the most  persuasive merge yet of circus and ballet.  And I thought it couldn’t be done.  There’s even a fake animal on  the bill.  Really, rebranding is in order: Cirque du Ballet –  Eye Candy Acrobatics.  Would two hours of what I saw hold me?  Not so sure, the artistry seemed on the fundamental side, the acts maybe Montreal made. There latest opus, ECHO, a $30 million baby three years in the womb, is drawing wildly mixed notices, the negatives impatient with opulently obtuse narrative nonsense. Below, oh by gosh by golly, a fake horse -- out of desperation?

          BILLION DOLLAR BIG TOP  Per Fortune Magazine last April, though Cirque’s attendance is up from from pre-Covid levels  (sales then dwindling), they “remained saddled” with half a billion-plus in debt. No longer much of a fan, yet I rue, driven by the mesmerizing eye candy alone,  not having seen them when they were in San Jose recently. You Tube images are shimmering, bodies flying and floating over and around each other through staple acrobatics.  Yelp reviews reveal a growing number of people growing tired of it all. 

           DOWN THE LANE OF TALBURT  A late-breaking entry,  inspired by watching on You Tube a video he took of the wining Beatty-Cole performance in 1993, this is to acknowledge his great visual  contributions  to American circus history.  I am watching all the acts, clearly filmed, unlike so many videos taken by patrons from a fixed location, behind poles and patrons passing. Such a pleasure.   Thank you, Santa Lane!

       A TELLING VOICE I WILL MISS:  The passing  of Bill Taggart at 94,  a prime contributor to my coverage of the last days of Ringling under canvas in 1956, as profiled in my book Fall of the Big Top.  His days  on the Big Show in the yellow ticket wagon involved show-sanctioned short changing, a rather shocking  reality he made known to me and  in articles he wrote. He also shared with  me a disclosure on John Ringling North's personal proclivities, hard to believe, but then backed away and asked me not to repeat them. Maybe more on this in the coming year.

            RARE VALIDATION AT CAMBRIDGE A smiling cross-pond discovery this past year that my first book, Behind the Big Top, originally published by A.S. Barnes Over Here, the Tantiviy Press Over there, was published  an online in 2009 by Cambridge University Press.  A cap and gown for me?  I  had felt honored that the book was was reviewed by  circus connoisseur par excellence,  Antony Hippisley Coxe, excerpts of which appear at the top of the book's listing.   These seem to include only his  warmly affirmative words, not his extensive criticisms of incredibly inept editing and sloppy research on my part, all justly held.  I look forward to re-reading  Coxe's  wonderful 1951 A Seat at the Circus.

        STILL MISSING CIRCUS REPORT   The nice lady e-mailing her pleasure over the fist of seven posts I did on Circus Report founder and long time publisher, Don Marcks (she was a part of his variety shows), and anxiously waiting for more to come, and then, when more came, going silent thereafter.  Did I err in showing his more human side, such as a marriage quietly annulled?  Many of us still rue the absence of Don's labor of love, Jim Royal among them: "In those pre-internet days, Mr. Marcks provided a very valuable service to our industry." Were Don alive today, I have no doubt that he would be putting out CR online.

       LET THE FIFTIES PROUDLY PARADE!  Let me send you off whistling up a long long list of circuses touring these shores in the year 1959, as provided by John Swan’s The Circus Review.   You might be as amazed as was I, coming  across this by accident.  And who was the idiot quoted on Pledge Break Society’s (PBS) intolerably sloppy documentary, Circus, clamming that Ed Sullivan "killed the circus" in the the 1950s?  Here are all the circuses he did not kill.

Humbug!

UNDER-CANVAS CIRCUSES

Adams Bros. & Sell Circus.
Beers Barnes Circus
Carson & Barnes Circus
Cristiani Bros. Circus
Clyde Betty & Cole Bros Circus
Famous Cole Circus
Garden Bros. Circus
Hunt Bros Circus
Hagen Bros. Circus
King Bros Circus
Kelly-Morris Circus
Mills Bros. Circus
All G. Kelly & Mile Bros circus
John Strong Circus
Sello Bros Circus

INDOORS, BALL PARK CIRCUSES

All American Circus
Bailey Bros Circus
Clyde Bros Circus
Circorama
Dobritch Circus
Orrin Davenport Circus’
Don Francisco Circus
Faabian’s circus
Gil Gray Circus
Gene Holter Wild Animal Circus
Garden Bros, Circus
Hamid-Morton circus
Harold Bros Circus
James Bros. Circs
Polack Bros Circus
Rudy Bros Circus
Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus
Tom Packs Circus

The billowing big tops remain a world unto themselves, operating slightly on the edge of mainstream society and culture. And may they remaini that way – exotic to robotic, real or fake, candles or no.

Keep your cards and e-mails coming. You never know what might appear here next December 31. I am not so prone now to carelessly throw stuff away.  In fact, if the stack warrants, I might do a mid-year catch up in '25.

HAVE A HAPPY SNAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

SHOWBIZ DAVID'S HOLIDAY FAVORITES IN CINEMA

1  IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE

Were I pushed to name the greatest American movie, this would be it. Not until last year watching it and being struck by the brutal darkness that descends upon its final scenes, all thanks to the genius of Frank Capra, did I come to this feeling.  Jimmy Stewart's best performance.

2  HOLIDAY INN

Much better than the sequel, White Christmas, this great 1940's musical sails along from song to song, dances up delights, has a good story line with a twist, and  great Irving Berlin score.  Most of all, for its breezy brevity and swift pacing.

3  A CHRISTMAS CAROL 1938 or 1951

Personally I'd give the edge to Reginald Owen in 1938 from MGM, although others seem to favor the 1951 version with Alastair Sim. Both pack an emotional wallop.  Tears are perfectly acceptable on this side of the Big Pond.

4  MEET ME IN ST LOUIS.

A masterpiece from director Vincente Minnelli . The songs include two classics, the miraculously thrilling "Trolley Song," and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." Judy Garland in her prime. No film makes a better case for the importance of family over monetary ambition.

5  MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET.

Love the tingle of it all, the busy New York atmosphere, the masterful performance of Edmund Gwenn, who brings off the role as few could.  A role he was born to play. Best of all, this brings back a spirit of Christmas closer to the one I grew up in, long before the secular sphere began it's attack on Christmas, religion and the binary family.

 6  THE SOUND OF MUSIC LIVE 2015, BRITISH

No, not the overly long movie. And yes, you may miss Julie Andrews more than you can bear, understood, but at least  give this one a chance.  It stayed very close to the original script, reinstating two great songs on the darker side that had been callously 86d from the film, but did not reinstate the lovely "An Ordinary Couple" Instead, with Oscar Hammerstein gone, Richard Rodgers composed both music and lyrics -- if you can call them that -- for the weirdly awful "Something Good" to replace it.

7  A CHRISTMAS STORY

Maybe? I must confess, I dread the scene where the kid's tongue gets stuck to a pole. Otherwise, I suppose this one rates high, and maybe I should try watching it again. 

ELF?

What about more recent hit films? So, I took on this one, my reaction in texting shorthand: first part in Santa’s factory, loved it, Bob Newhart’s humor steals the scene.  Will Ferrell to NY to find father, a stone faced CEO bore  Ferrell's  hyper antics grow flat, hollow fast.  Jim Carey should have played the role. No desire to see again.  85% critics on Rotten,    79% pop meter.

Incredibly, there are so many Christmas movies out there, and yet the way they are rated on various "best" listings can differ widely.  A gem on one raking can be a dog on another.  For my eyes, classic Christmas films remain canonized in a far more socially unified time. And I will say no more, but.... Humbug!

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.  

Still a Few of Our Favorite Things ... A Sweet Little Show Tune Conquered the World of Jazz ... Now the Holidays Call

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens
Bight copper kettles and warm woolen mittens    

I first heard those words from the voice of Mary Martin on the original cast album of The Sound of Music, broadcast on our radio one Sunday evening in late December, only a few weeks after the show had opened on Broadway to great reviews.    A week or so later, I had in hand my own copy of the snowy white cast album. Decorated in delicate foliage, in colors gold and red and green,  how like a lovely Christmas morning gift it felt.   In a few weeks, it would reach the number one spot on Billboard’s Best Selling Albums and remain there for 16 straight weeks. Sometimes at the skating rink during club practice, they played it.

Brown paper packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things

In those sunnier days, Rodgers and Hammerstein were the gods of musical theatre, able to capture in song the widely shared sentiments of Americans.  One evening in the early 1950s, a televised toast to their magic was broadcast simultaneously on ALL three major networks.  Point made?

Cream colored ponies and crisp apple strudels
Doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles   

I could never have known how fate would coddle and guide this musical up a most remark road, gradually cementing its charms into the hearts of Americans.  The movie that followed a few years later achieved a phenomenal success.  Two words may have spelled its everlasting lock on our hearts: Julie Andrews.  Years later, people flock to movie houses to participate in a sing-along of the songs as they appear on the screen. 

Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes
Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes

In 1961, through the soprano sax of jazz musician John Coltrane, My Favorite Things became an almost instant classic, and would become Coltrane's most requested song ever, and his personal favorite of all his recordings. It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1988 and certified gold in 2018.

A few magical days ago, while listening to a local FM adult contemporary station that plays non-stop Christmas music every season, came the sweetest young voice singing the song.  And I felt a rare connection between that night long ago, listening to Mary Martin, and now, hearing the song from a new voice on the radio, making it feel like a perfect addition to  the holiday cannon, as if it had always been there.

Silver white winters that melt into springs ... 

11.30.22

SUNDAY OUT OF THE PAST: They Read Me, They Bleed Me ... They Hate Me ... They Hate Me Not!

First posted  on July 18, 2010


As an update to this re-posting, let me add that I hold in the highest regard John Ringling North II and James Royal, who have never assaulted me in the fashion described below. They have remained most congenial, responding to my request for photos for my last book, Inside the Changing Circus, sending me annually, unsolicited, a copy of their program magazine with a bag of peanuts.

In the Circus Report that he founded and slaved over for most of his later life, the late Don Marcks once pointed me to a small space on the back cover that sometimes hosted adds. other times went blank. Said he, “How about your column there?”

I was very touched by the unexpected offer from someone who was my direct opposite, but resisted his polite invitation, telling him “eventually, I will write something that will cause you problems, and that will be it.” Don dreaded the discontent of circus owners and as a rule edited on the super safe don’t-rock-the big top side.

I knew Don well, as I knew the small insulated circus world well. They, most of them, are sheltered from criticism by the fans and by media indifference. Indeed, many a performer could last a lifetime under small tops, even in Ringing rings, and never face a legitimate review.

Before we fell into a kind of soft unspoken estrangement, Don once complained to me over the phone (we talked often) about circus fans who sent in glowing notices of Circus Vargas. He was growing tired of it. He printed their predictably rosy notices nonetheless.

Another time, Don told me, “I got a review of Circus Vargas. The guy was pretty critical, so I didn’t print it.”

That was Don, and that is how the circus world would like it to be.

Which brings us to the thorn in your side, that nagging customer who can inject unsettling opinions into your beautiful backyard paradise where every circus is the best it’s ever been, and better than all the others.

It was in Don’s paper that a piece I wrote looking back at Irvin Feld’s career, sometime after Mr. Feld passed away, caused probably a more vicious reaction than had ever greeted anything penned about the circus. Feld employees took out venomous attack ads in Circus Report. About a dozen or more. Some full pagers. Not a soul came to my defense. They bled me yes, and I did not die. And I still will not die. Bleeding is a part of my bizarre mission. When you get away with mouthing off in national print at age 14 (in The White Tops), it tends to go to your head, especially when, many years later, Variety signs on.

My most recent encounter with a hurricane of hostility arrived upon my posting a review here of Kelly Miller Circus. Some of you have no doubt seen it. Maybe you were amused. Maybe you half way agreed. Or considered me a number of things not fit for print — in more ways the one. In the eyes of the offended, I’d made a total fool of myself. That's the risk you take for daring to reveal your feelings, for you risk going against the grain. But how else?

One of the comments slung at my posting by that ever-ubiquitous contributor “Anonymous," whose profanity I did not allow onto the lot, found irony in my “legendary expertise” (a compliment, Anonymous?) being unaware that the names “Nellie” with “Hanneford go together. No, what I really failed to link were the names “Poema” and “Hanneford.”

I looked elsewhere, to one of the three Kelly Miller blogs, this being Steve and Ryan’s. Amidst some controversy, Steve, a classy guy, posted his own comment, “everybody is entitled to their own opinion.” Among other comments, Jon turned what he doubtlessly considered a negative into what I consider rare validation. You see, Jon lumped me together with the snobby New York critics’ crowd. May I take a bow please!? “Mr. Pompous ‘I live and die in New York’” he called me. (Mr. Pompous lives in Oakland, CA.) Well, it beats beings bland. And since I no longer disco into nights of senseless danger, gotta do something for cheap thrills.

Jon described my review as “a homework project.” Now to that, Jon, I can relate. For years, even after landing bylines in Variety and getting published in book form, I still felt like I were trying be a writer; lately, I’ve promoted my self-regard to writer trying to be a writer.

I'll grant that Jon might be on to some prickly things about me, but he goes totally off the rails when he accuses me of a mind set that was “formed before the presentation was presented.” If only he knew what was actually in my mind when I sat down to take in a performance of Kelly-Miller in Brewster, NY — and how what I thought I might find was significantly altered by what I actually found.

As for my carrying on like a know-it-all New Yorker, that tickles me pink lemonade. Why? Because, for starters, I think the NY critics are the toughest, and they think for themselves. Growing up, I admired how, following another opening night, they were forced to form their opinions in hours or less, rushing back to newsroom typewriters or to telephones to call in their notices. No time to stick their fingers in the wind or equivocate their immediate gut reactions down to intellectual mush. I read and treasured Walter Kerr almost every Sunday in The New York Herald Tribune. And when I landed my first byline in Variety, that only emboldened my stubbornly independent ways. Whatever I am, it's me that you get. I just wish, trust me, that you'd get a lot more voices and a lot more opinions -- in declarative review form.

"Pompous" if you please. English class room deficient if you must. But bias in advance? That I fight all the time, admitting that, yes, I too am human, but I think the conscious struggle to fight bias has made me a better, fairer reporter. Two things that remain uppermost in my thinking and approach: Number 1. Keep your mind an open slate, and let the arists in the ring paint their pictures on it. Number 2. The circus, ever since jugglers began in Egypt ,acrobats in China, is forever changing. It is not a fixed form. So, by all means adhere to a golden cliche: judge each show on its own terms.

Which can be a shock to my system as well.

And sometimes, a thrill. Never know what awaits me when, pompously, I embark on another homework review project. Considering how quaintly irrelevant I am obviously viewed by my dissenters, I'm thinking of making my entrances on to the lot in cape and carriage, but the Witness Protection Program refused me that guise.

[photo, at Carson & Barnes Circus in Half Moon Bay, CA,1995, by my nephew Jeffrey Hoffman]

7.18.10