Saturday, September 29, 2007

Cirque de Soleil


The arena show of Cirque de Soleil, Delirium, started its European tour two weeks ago in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
I remember the early nineties, when Cirque de Soleil really started to make money, they had their European HQ in Amsterdam. With an enormous tent on the Museum Square in Amsterdam. I think that they had that tent there for at least one year. And it was tremendously difficult to get a ticket for their shows! Everybody wanted to see it.




Now 15 years later, different shows are touring at the same time over the different continents. And in 2004 Cirque de Soleil was no. 22 of the Brand Index of Interbrand.

Delirium set out to accomplish what no other Cirque du Soleil show has done before. This show tours from city to city, performing in an arena for only a few nights at a time before moving to the next location. The central concept of the show is to focus on the music of other shows. Because of its success two weeks ago, the three shows were sold out as soon they were announced. On the last day they decided to give an extra show in Rotterdam.

Delirium is a touring production designed to be presented in arenas, unlike Cirque du Soleil's other touring shows, which are generally performed in the round in specially designed tents. Delirium's stage is set up on the arena floor, bisecting it lengthwise. Its two-sided, raised stage allows for an alley theater-style presentation: the audience sits on both sides of the stage, at times able to look over the central stage to see the spectators on the other side. This presents unique staging challenges, in that the most important actions must be visible to both sides of the audience.

Unlike other Cirque du Soleil shows, where the musicians are off to the side and mainly out of view, Delirium's six musicians are often in plain view, and can be seen interacting with the other performers and various stage elements.
Despite the extraordinary complexity and size of Delirium's stage, it can be assembled inside an arena in approximately 9 hours.

As far as I know, Cirque de Soleil never performed in Istanbul, which is a pity since I am sure that Turkish people would love this!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

They were here 5 months ago for over 3 months and now they building full time Cirque de Soleil here in Dubai:)) Loved it..

By the way; Warner Brothers (within Abu Dhabi), Paramount in Dubai, Naive Paris (within Abu Dhabi) are also will be establish here Dubai full time:)) they will be completed by 2 years.

Unknown said...

we know, Arabs are buying everything...do they censor the show?..))

Anonymous said...

yes They do:))