Cirque Grande
On the way to swim class last week, we drove by a huge red and white striped circus tent, and Robert was immediately interested in attending. His interest only grew after watching a few YouTube clips of the acts in Cirque Grande. So I booked tickets for a Sunday matinee, and the kids and I ventured to the Auckland Netball Centre about a half hour before the show, which, as it turns out, was completely unnecessary because the venue was only about a third full. Now I don’t know if it was because there was a tiny audience for our performance, or if it is because the performers are burnt out kids living in a caravan and forced to do this, but the people in the show seemed exhausted and sad. There was one kids who kept messing up and looked like he was going to burst into tears at any moment.
With that being said, there were some very cool moments where they would break into a completely unexpected and amazing trick amid the mediocrity of the rest of the show. This was the end of the first set, and you can hear the audience go nuts because it was totally unexpected after the ho-humness of the first part of the act.
This was followed by one of my daughter’s favorite acts, the roller skating. After some not-so-exciting precision skating, they pulled out this crazy maneuver:
In true girly fashion, my daughter also loved the aerial silks, and I’ve got to admit, this portion of the show was impressive:
My son, however, was most taken by the bicycling and the motorcycle finale. He couldn’t believe there were (eventually) four motorcycles zooming around the giant sphere. I’m showing the video with three so there’s some suspense as to what happens next.
Now what was my favorite part of the show? It had to be the part when Robert was picked out of the audience to be in one of the acts. I splurged and got the VIP tickets. Since the audience was so sparse, there were only a handful of kids sitting up front, so he was an easy pick. He was very nervous about going up on stage, but he overcame his fear, got up there, and later felt very proud of himself. And I was one proud mama!
Would I recommend checking out Cirque Grande? I actually would, just don’t sit so close that you can see all of the imperfections and flaws in the performers. I think we would have enjoyed it more if we were sitting back a little ways so the pulled threads in the costumes weren’t visible. I also recommend bringing a fan because the gorgeous circus tent isn’t cooled. It was HOT in there after awhile, and I would’ve been sticking to the plastic chairs if I hadn’t been wearing pants.
But you can see from the pictures below that the performances had some beautiful moments in them. There were some truly difficult and impressive pieces to the show, and the kids were squealing with delight and wonder. Cirque Grande will be in Auckland until the 17 February, but they will continue their New Zealand tour after that. The next stop isn’t too far away - in Albany - so even if you’re not able to make an Auckland show, it is a short drive north to see if later in the month.
