Welcome to the latest edition of Fascination, the Unofficial Cirque du Soleil Newsletter.
It’s been quite a wild month, hasn’t it? Between the fervor around the announcement that Cirque2016 is officially Lúzia and SodaCirque (the previously announced musical collaboration between Cirque du Soleil and Soda Stereo), to the excitement surrounding TORUK-The First Flight’s premiere in Bossier City, the airing of The Wiz on NBC, and PARAMOUR being featured aboard the DREAMSEAKER in this year’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade… yeah, it’s been quite a month for Cirque du Soleil. But that’s not all! It seems Cirque is ramping up its plans to begin construction on that resident show in Hangzhou, China, will once again set sail upon the high-seas with experiences on MSC Cruise Line ships, and has even signed a contract to place some kind of show or experience at a theme park in France. Details regarding all of these announcements can be found in our NEWS section this month.
And throughout all of this chaos, at 9:00pm on November 20th, La Nouba celebrated its 8,000th performance! How about that! Check out an image here: (https://www.cirquefascination.com/?p=6889). It’s a bittersweet milestone though, as La Nouba continues to change. We’ve already discussed some of the upcoming changes – that a B-Boy dance group will replace the opening jump rope number and an aerial pole performance (similar to what was featured in ZAIA before it closed) will replace high-wire – but it also seems that by the new year La Nouba will lose its counter-tenor too. Ralph Daniel Rawe, who has performed the male counter-tenor voice at La Nouba since January 2004 with aplomb, will be moving on… and Cirque du Soleil has decided not to fill that role. (Just as they decided not to fill the Pierrot Acrobat’s role when he left.) Counter-Tenor was a major part of that show and its loss is disheartening!
On a brighter note, on November 23rd, Cirque du Soleil’s twitter feed teased that the world of OVO was buzzing with action again, and it didn’t take long for a new tour – an arena tour – to be announced! Check out dates in our ITINÉRAIRE section this month to see when OVO will be coming to your city. The tour begins on April 8, 2016 in Lake Charles, LA! JOYA celebrated it’s 1 Year anniversary this month too, and we’re quite excited to announce that a CD featuring the show’s music is on the way! According to JOYÀ’s Facebook page, in just a few more days, the JOYÀ CD will be on sale at the theatre’s boutique. No word yet whether it will be available digitally (on iTunes or Amazon), or be for sale through Cirque du Soleil’s online boutique. But it’s finally here Cirque music fans!
Did you miss watching THE WIZ LIVE on NBC the other night? If so, don’t fret! You can still catch the special in a number of ways: first, via a re-broadcast the evening of December 8th. Second, you can now find a stream on Hulu. And third, on DVD, beginning December 22nd! Also included on the DVD will be the NBC special, The Making of The Wiz Live, featuring the behind-the-scenes story of producing this live television event. Thursday’s live telecast of The Wiz Live delivered hit ratings, averaging a 3.4 rating, 11 share in adults 18-49 and 11.5 million viewers overall to dominate the night for NBC. It was the network’s best Thursday average in total viewers, excluding sports, since September 2014, and nearly tripled NBC’s best 18-49 Thursday average, excluding sports.
In FEATURES this month we continue our look back at Guy Laliberte’s Poetic Social Mission into space. In Part 1, “The Countdown Begins” we listened as Guy took us through his first steps. In Part 2, “Training Kicks Up a Notch”, Guy got settled in, and passed a few essential tests. In Part 3, “Getting My Hands Dirty”, Guy gets down into the nuts and bolts of his training, and now we continue with him getting a bit more hands on with the actual equipment he’ll be flying in, covering the month of August 2009. We’re half-way through! The second feature is a fantastic read on the 2015 Pan-Am Games Opening Ceremonies by Lighting & Sound America. This lengthy article by Alan Hardman, was published in the magazine’s October 2015 issue, and dives right into the technology and staging of the opening ceremony that 45 DEGREES wonderfully put together. It may have looked easy but it was quite an undertaking! And we thought we’d honor Corteo’s closure with something a little special: an interview our friends over at TheChapiteau did with Gabriel Christo a couple of months back when he was still with the show. We’ll miss Corteo when it closes later this month, but it warms our heart to hear how favorable Gabriel talks about Corteo, and, of course, what he’s doing now (which is also relevant!)
As always we also have the relevant posts made to Cirque’s Facebook pages, and updates to Cirque’s touring schedule.
So, let’s get started!
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