Flying High
When Eric Loia walked into the War Memorial Arena Wednesday night, he didn’t know what to expect. He never thought he would actually become a part of the show he and his family were attending, though the hectic atmosphere of the performance should have tipped him off.
Clowns emerged on stage hobbling around through the checkered florescent lights. A potbellied, hunched back announcer in red coat tails and a top hat drove back the clowns and silently began to greet the audience.
‘Whoopah!’ yelled a female clown, and the music began as a band of white-faced clowns serenaded the announcer who had chosen a dance partner from the crowd. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Cirque du Soleil in Syracuse,’ said the female clown, officially starting off ‘Alegria’ – a show that explores the connection of power, youth, and energy with weakness and age.
Cirque de Soleil, an entertainment company that mixes circus, acrobatic and ‘street entertainment,’ will perform the show in Syracuse at the OnCenter’s War Memorial Arena from Sept. 9 to Sept. 13. Discounted tickets are available for students. Megan Lauria, an account manager in public relations for Pinckney Hugo Group, which handles local public relations for Cirque de Soleil, said this is the first show the group is performing outside the curtains of a big circus tent.
‘People don’t have to fly to Vegas or to a big city anymore,’ Lauria said. ‘Cirque du Soleil and ‘Alegria’ can come to them.’
Scantily clad Indian fire jugglers, seemingly naked clowns, an army of acrobats, a pair of beat-boxing miming clowns and a mysterious singing ballerina have descended on Syracuse.
An acrobat on a high-flying swing takes the stage first, serenaded by the ballerina and her band of white-faced clowns. As she flips and turns on the swing, the acrobat shadow dances along the walls of the War Memorial. She makes her daring stunts seem easy as her body moves gracefully through the air. ‘It really is a true circus,’ Lauria said. ‘It’s a family event.’
But in the middle of the show, Loia was pulled away from his family. Three acrobats had just finished jumping and flipping off of balancing beams supported only by the strength of other acrobats, and two clowns had taken the multicolored stage to attempt the same act.
The clowns clumsily tossed their flimsy, wobbly pole back and forth and dropped many imaginary acrobats as they pretended to throw them high in the air. After accidentally killing three of these imaginary performers, the clowns turned to Loia.
‘I was a little bit scared going up there – I didn’t know what they wanted me to do,’ said Loia. But after charming the crowd by mimicking the clowns, Loia got up his courage and stood in the middle of the balancing beam the clowns had placed on the floor. The clowns closed their hands in prayer that they would not kill Loia as they had their previous imaginary acrobats, and each picked up an end of the beam. Loia stayed put while the beam folded from the efforts of the clowns. The crowd went crazy.
Rachel Reile said she also came because of family. Her mother saw Cirque Du Soleil in Georgia and recommended the show, so when Reile saw an advertisement for ‘Alegria’ on TV, she said she jumped at the chance to go.
‘I loved it,’ said Reile, a junior at the State University of New York Cortland. ‘My favorite was the clowns … It’s not like your normal circus. It’s more of a show.’ Lauria said the great thing about Cirque du Soleil is that you can see the troupe more than once because the stage and acts change with each show.
Reile said she realized there were some parts of the show that were different from what her mother saw in Georgia when she called her during the intermission. ‘They didn’t have the trampolines when my mom saw it,’ Reile said.
For Loia and his family, this show was definitely a unique experience. ‘It was fun,’ Loia said. ‘I usually don’t do things like that, so it let me out of my normal zone. I wasn’t expecting that at all.’
Published on September 9, 2009 at 12:00 pm
