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Cirque du Soleil is a Canadian entertainment company and the largest contemporary circus producer in the world. Located in the inner-city area of Saint-Michel, Montreal, it was founded in Baie-Saint-Paul on 16 June 1984 by former street performers Guy Laliberté and Gilles Ste-Croix.
Quidam was the ninth stage show produced by Cirque du Soleil. It premiered in April 1996 and has been watched by millions of spectators around the world. Quidam originated as a big-top show in Montreal and was converted into an arena format beginning with its 2010 tour in North America. It then changed back to the Big Top for a 3-month run in Seoul, South Korea before returning to an arena show for its tour to Oceania. The show performed for the final time in Christchurch, New Zealand on February 26, 2016.
Saltimbanco was a touring show by Cirque du Soleil. Saltimbanco ran from 1992 to 2006 in its original form, performed under a large circus tent called the Grand Chapiteau; its last performance in that form was in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on December 10, 2006. A new adaptation of the show started touring North America on July 31, 2007, with its first stop in London, Ontario, Canada. The new version was staged in arenas with fewer performances in each city it visited. The new version closed at the end of 2012.
La Nouba was a Cirque du Soleil show that ran for 19 years in a custom-built, freestanding theater at Disney Springs' West Side at the Walt Disney World Resort in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. It was a contemporary circus performance featuring acrobats, gymnasts, and other skilled performers. The show's creation was directed by Franco Dragone, who also directed many of Cirque du Soleil's earlier shows. Its title derives from the French phrase faire la nouba, meaning "to party" or "to live it up".
Guy Laliberté, is a Canadian billionaire businessman, and poker player. Along with Gilles Ste-Croix, he is the co-founder of Cirque du Soleil in 1984. The Canadian circus company's shows have since been seen by more than 90 million people worldwide. Before founding the company, he had busked, performing as an accordion player, stiltwalker, and fire-eater.
Corteo is a Cirque du Soleil touring production that premiered in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on April 21, 2005.
O is a water-themed stage production by Cirque du Soleil, a Canadian circus and entertainment company. The show has been in permanent residence at the Bellagio in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States, since October 1998. O, whose name is pronounced the same way as eau, the French word for "water", takes place around and above a 1.5-million-US-gallon (5,700 m3) pool of water. It features water acts such as synchronized swimming as well as aerial and ground acts. The O theatre, which is designed to resemble a 14th-century European opera house, has 1,800 seats, thus allowing the performance to be watched by 3,600 people a night since the performance usually plays twice in a given day. The theatre was also designed to meet the special demands of the show.
David Shiner is an American actor, clown, physical comedian, playwright and theater director.
Philippe Decouflé is a French choreographer, dancer, mime artist, and theatre director. As a child he travelled extensively around Lebanon and Morocco before learning his skills as a teenager at the Annie Fratellini École du Cirque and the Marceau Mime School. While frequenting Parisienne nightclubs he discovered and was attracted to contemporary dance, and he eventually moved to the Centre National de la Danse Contemporaine in Angers to study under choreographer Alwin Nicolais. After briefly working as a solo dancer, he formed the Découflé Company of Arts in Bagnolet in 1983, moving it to a former electrical works in the Parisienne suburb of Saint-Denis in 1995.
Olga Pikhienko is a circus performer who specializes in handbalancing and contortion. Pikhienko started in rhythmic gymnastics at the age of five. When she was eleven, she started performing with her father, Sasha Pikhienko, at the Nikulin Circus based in Moscow. Olga's act with her father won them a gold medal in 1992 at the Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain in Paris. In 1993, they won a silver medal in Beijing, China at the World Festival.
Koozå is a touring circus production by Cirque du Soleil which premiered in Montréal, Quebec, Canada, in 2007. The show was written and directed by David Shiner, who had previously worked as a clown in Cirque du Soleil's production of Nouvelle Expérience. His experience as a clown and his time with Switzerland's Circus Knie and Germany's Circus Roncalli informed his work on Koozå.
Banana Shpeel was a touring stage show created by Cirque du Soleil which premiered on November 19, 2009, at the Chicago Theater. The vaudeville-based show was directed by David Shiner, who also created Koozå. The show lasted less than a year, only playing in Chicago, New York City, and Toronto. The show was cancelled in 2010, due to its poor reviews and many complications.
Michael Jackson: The Immortal World Tour was the first of two theatrical productions by Cirque du Soleil to combine the music of Michael Jackson with Cirque du Soleil's signature acrobatic performance style. The show was written and directed by Jamie King and produced in partnership with the Estate of Michael Jackson. The arena show—which is very similar to a rock concert—began its tour on October 2, 2011, in Montreal. After touring North America for one year, Immortal continued through Europe, Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the Middle East before returning to North America in February 2014 for a total of 501 shows from 141 cities. It is the most financially successful Cirque production and highest grossing tribute show in history.
Zarkana was a Cirque du Soleil stage production written and directed by François Girard. It began as a touring show in 2011 and was converted to a resident show in Las Vegas in late 2012. It premiered at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on June 29, 2011, and later toured to the State Kremlin Palace in Moscow and the Madrid Arena in Madrid.
Iris was a resident Cirque du Soleil show based in Los Angeles, California. It premiered on September 25, 2011, after preview performances which began on July 21, 2011. The cost for production of the show was nearly $100 million, which included the cost of renovating the Dolby Theatre in which the show was housed. Iris was written and directed by French director-choreographer Philippe Decouflé. The show explored images from the history of cinema and featured elaborate choreography, acrobatics, and a variety of contemporary circus acts. The name of the show, Iris, comes from the camera diaphragm as well as from the colored iris of the human eye.
John Gilkey is an American actor, director, comedian, juggler and clown.
Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away is a 2012 American 3D family fantasy film directed by Andrew Adamson. The film premiered on October 20, 2012, at the Tokyo International Film Festival, and was released theatrically in the United States on December 21, 2012.
Gilles Ste-Croix is a Canadian entrepreneur and the vice president and co-creator of Cirque du Soleil. He started Cirque du Soleil with co-founder Guy Laliberté. His son, Olivier Rochette, a technician with Cirque du Soleil, was killed by a blow to the head from an aerial lift in an on-set accident in November 2016.
Red Bastard is a live bouffon clown theatre show written and performed by Eric Davis.
Raphael Cruz was an American acrobat, clown and actor. Cruz is known for having played the lead role of Buster, a Buster Keaton inspired character, in the cinema themed Cirque du Soleil production Iris.
References
- ↑ Copstick, Kate (August 5, 2013). "Interview: Red Bastard – Joker in the pack". The Scotsman . Archived from the original on September 18, 2013. Retrieved October 10, 2013.
- ↑ Bellafante, Ginia (August 21, 2005). "A Funny Kind of Love". The New York Times .
- ↑ Donnelly, Pat (September 25, 2011). "Iris is even more than meets the eye". The Province . Archived from the original on May 26, 2015.
- ↑ Kharakh, Ben (March 26, 2007). "Eric Davis, Clown and Buffoon". Gothamist. Archived from the original on August 11, 2011.
- ↑ McElroy, Steven (September 3, 2006). "Modern Clowns With a Fear Factor". The New York Times.
- ↑ Ramanathan, Lavanya (June 1, 2011). "Clowning with the audience". The Washington Post .
- ↑ Chan, Bryan (September 14, 2011). "Cirque du Soleil performers before and after photos". Los Angeles Times . Archived from the original on April 3, 2016. Retrieved March 4, 2012.
