Tuesday, January 6, 2009
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A Blog designed for discussion of topics related to, but not limited to, Circus, Zoos, Animal Training, and Animal Welfare/Husbandry. Sometimes opening up the dialog is the best starting point of all. And if for nothing else when people who agree and don't agree, get together and start discussing it, it will open up a lot of peoples minds. Debate and discussion even amongst themselves opens a window where there wasn't one before.
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20 comments:
I'v looked at the video of this thing and was, shall we say, less than impressed. I have teen age kids with better aerial skills and as a prop boss (lead technician or whatever) would throw that silly thing full of water out in the trash. I wonder what electrical codes are violated in having her get wet then grab a metal ring - oops circeau - attached to a metal cable to a metal winch with an electric motor? Maybe this is headed to Bing Bam Bong or Zim Zam Zap or whatever.
Is this show is Vegas? I saw a billboard with a similar photo on it on the strip?
Gary,
We had this discussion in the past, the act started with a girl named Laura Miller a few short years ago, then Irina(who looks the best by far) started one with the "champagne" glass instead of the Tahar tube that Laura used. It would obviously only be a very short time, before every body had one. Such is the creativity/artistic skill of the circus. Copy somebody else's success, and argue for 50 years who was first. LOL
Wade
It's supposed to be a diamond, not a champagne glass
And things are a little different over here. Prop bosses can bitch all they want, but they don't have any say so over the performer's equipment. If the props weight 10 tons it is still their responsibility to erect them and handle them with extreme care to avoid damage, scratches or dirt. The artist and producer are the ones making judgement over the quality of the acts, not the ring boys.
Warren,
Do you know how many airealists, jugglers, acrobats, etc. critique animal acts? LOL It has nothing more to do then with "cute and charming" and half naked in a champagne glass. Dreamers or Scores is not Martha Graham or Alvin Ailey.
LOL
Wade
Anonymous,
I realize it is supposed to be a diamond, "champagne" glass in a joke. It still looks better then the first one that was a tube.
It is the public who should make judgment over the quality of the act's. Without in put from the fans. That's why the "he's my friend, she isn't my friend" debacle has hurt quality so very much. That and trying to give every member of the family a job, regardless of skill or talent.
Wade
Since it hasn't been mentioned, the only place where Irina Bouglione has performed this act is at Cirque d'Hiver in Paris. The prop comes up from beneath the ring, having been positioned there on rollers.
John,
Visions of Siegfried and Roy. Great effects on a permanent stage, built for the show reduced to basically a high line Marshall Brodine Magic Show when it was taken on tour, and didn't have the advantage of permanency.
A point I think to the gent who objected to moving something heavy or large, "that is your job. The Producer produces, and the Artist presents. You set up/get ready what ever it is they need to produce/present, regardless of what it is. The lighting director lights, the band leader music's, etc. etc.
Wade
Addendum to John,
I posted a you tube a while back of her performing this act outside for a television special. Her costume and beauty was just as impressive in the sunlight as it was in the spotlights. But then T & A look good just about any place, in any format.
Wade
y'all,
I this is an excellent act!
I am a professional aerialist/dancer who has performed not only in circus.WTF does difficulty of tricks have to do with it ?It's a piece, an excellent ,imaginative, using all her parts even her hair piece of aerial, aquatic theatre.It is not what you do ,but how you do it !!
and actually she has also performed outside in the fresh air but a little more pg
Rebecca,
It is tits and ass, pure and simple in it's most primitive form. No more no less. The greatness is in the fact that she is one super hot lady. What the heck is pg?
Wade
Wade, I'm one of those aerialists who on occasion offer criticism of animal acts just as I do aerial acts. I feel my experiences in the past allow me to be realistic in forming opinions of what I see,although I refrain from criticizing training techniques beyond my limited experiences. This diamond or glass or whatever somebody wants to call it with a half naked woman is not an aerial act. It is not quality dance as you point out - it is a T and A routine that belongs in a strip joint somewhere. Since it is not, as one poster stated, what you do but how you do it, the I would be wrong to criticize a cage act in which a few tigers sat on seats and a half naked woman slithered around on the floor as being a bad cat act?
As far as "ring boys" deciding the content of the show, Please point out where I said that, Anonymous. I have served as a prop boss for many producers who took the imput of their prop boss into consideration when booking the show. Likewise, I have worked with many an act that showed up with junk for equipment to make the equipment safe, workable, and show friendly. I recall on a major multi-unit arena show a very famous trapeze Washington act arrived with a complex motorized rigging using what were nothing more than washing machine motors requiring European voltage and the show duplicating the motions of the rigging with a completely new rigging, properly powered, grounded, and controlled. No cost to the performer, no change to the act, and something that could pass an electrical inspector's requirements. I never refused to handle any act's equipment but often was given permission to use show owned equipment to replace the junk the act provided that I had to handle and work with. Sorry but if a well known high wire act shows up with cable slings they take out of K-Mart bicycle locks, I'm not going to use them. As a prop boss, my job is to handle all equipment carefully and meet the needs of the act for its :perceived artistic merit" but I will not handle props that pose a risk to me, the show I work for, the crew, You plug in your 14 gague extension cord with the ground broken off to run your 208 volt winch if you want but don't expect me to help you or to allow my crew to help you.
Warren
Wade,
to you it is t & a.
Where do you get your facts, your information ? are you trained in any of these elements????
to your educated trained eye ??,( have you studied composition, choreographed, performed, directed,been directed,studied movement for performance been in theatre,studied music ,are an aerialist and a dancer..)it is t & a to you..I studied these things Harvard summer Dance, 2 years ! on scholarship, and my painful brutal very honest 4 years at the Martha Graham School of contemporay Dance. so I am qualified to make an intelligent ,unemotional opinion.
are you the expert of all things??
respectfully,
Rebecca
Rebecca,
I never said I was an expert on any thing. As I would ask anybody in reference to an animal act, "in comparison to what/whom, I use the same criteria when I look at another type of act. I compare a single aerial act to Dolly Jacobs on the Ringling show. Dolly's act had all the things you mention, which this act does not, with the addition of T & A which this act has. The greatness of this act is the T & A, which is advantageous to a female aerialist.
Warren I started out as a prop boy in the circus, their job is to get the show up, no more no less. The prop bosses job is to see that they set it up.
I had a number of prop men tell me on time, "we would like to see how these performers would work, if we didn't set up their stuff. There would be no show." I corrected them and said, "they could set it up if need be, but none of you fellow's can train tigers, elephants, to a high wire, or trapeze." I have never agreed with the need for a performer to "make themselves generally useful."
Wade
Wade, was I wrong in refusing to use a cable sling with aluminum swage sleeves applied over the plastic coating on the K-mart sling. Of course, I was over ruled by the performer who then fell some 20 feet trying to get up to the platform when the cable (wire rope) slipped out of the inferior sleeve, with the improper compressions for any type of load?
Or, to put this in an animal connotation, should I have just stood by and let a floor plate pull loose and fly whereever with Doug Terannova and a tempremental elephant doing rides in the ring with Willie Pages arguing with his wife over the rigging security when I was trying to release pressure on the failing point that neither the elephant trainer nor the aerial professional saw happening and just let them go about their business because my job was to put it up and take it down?
I've encountered far too many acts - aerial, acrobatic, and animal that have no idea of how to deal with their equipment.
I can't count the number of times I repaired arena sections, fixed flats on transfer cages, and patched animal props on the fly while the trainer and, if they even bothered to have one, groom went to eat or something more important that making sure their act would work.
Yes, I took dance classes with Martha while teaching at a college in New York just after getting my Masters degree. This did make me a better performer but not the prop boss that I became. My experiences as one to bail out everyone else made me a pretty good prop boss. I learned what is good circus from some of the greatest - not my choice but those who are great - and know what I am speaking about in techncal circus. Gary, Dog, Tyrone, and all the guys of my generation who never were recognized for their knowledge taught me well about the back end, Charly, Tommy, Buckles, Johnny, and such taught me about the front end and Iwas just a lowely aerialist and acrobat with no history behind me.
I'm ranting again and it is time to shut up. I'll close with the opinion that this diamont thing may be dance theater but it is nothing more than a tits and ass piece of junk as circus.
Warren,
With all due respect, I think you are as wrong as cancer. The producer should have insisted that it be up to code, and i they couldn't do it by show time, they should have been payed off/or released if that was a contract stipulation, and thanked for their time, and never used again. In regards to the other folks they are the artists and they are who the public buys a ticket to see, not the producer and not the riggers/prop crew I have no objections to their actions.
We have a unique profession, different in many respects from any similar profession in the world. The artist does not set the lights, sound, etc. for the concert. There are folks skilled in that task. When the football player is finished for the season he does not take a job painting the club house. When the rodeo cowboy arrives in Vegas at the nationals, he is not there to set up the stalls or unload the trucks, he is there to do what it is he does.
When the baseball player is too old to play, he leaves or becomes a sports caster, he does not sell hot dogs so he can be around the game. Even Hulk Hogan never set the ring, that wasn't his job, he was there to entertain. And the roadies better damn sure not forget to put a breakaway table under the ring,or there would be hell to pay.
As I said, I started out as a groom, so I have been there done that, and respect and revere a great one, but I am no longer a groom. I could not afford to be a groom again, and they payed me too much to shovel shit. They are "their" animals, they need to provide me with what I need to complete the training assignment.
I was around some great prop crews/bosses in the mid 70's, Bobby Hubler, Johnny Pardini, Jakie, Paul McClausland, Mike Duke. Legendary crews that have been discussed numerous times on the history channel. That was in the old day's. Bill Bannister does a fabulous job at Evansville, but he has to contend with a union crew provided by the coliseum. I have also been on shows with 2 prop men and a frantic producer/rigger/prop boss/shrine ass kisser.
Nothing wrong with shoveling shit, if that is what you want to do. Nothing wrong with being a prop man if that is what you want to do. Nothing wrong with being a rigger, if that is what you want to do. But it you want to be a trainer, you are not a groom any more. If you are the prop boss you are not a prop boy any more. If you want to be an aerialist's you are not a rigger any more. The term "generally useful" is only used in the circus, no other living live entertainment venue. I suggest it is one of may "ideals" that has just about crushed her.
Videos of this lady were posted long ago as an example of no standard in this industry, and the hiring of something based on nothing but T & A I have illustrated another up above. Some of us have caused great alarm over the years by addressing just that.
Rants are fine Warren, and I hope your situation works out.
Why don't you have a shot at the issue I raised about high school being historically male now said to be terrible compared to the old days, being dominated by females today. No body seemed to want to touch it. I would hate to think there is a connection.
Wade
Wade, I didn't comment about the state of high school beeing less in quality due to women being the predominant riders beecause I am not a connisour of the art form and there by do not feel qualified to judge the minute details that would qualify someone as a great rider. I just enjoy seeing magnificednt animals and riders working together. I am leaning more and more from this blog and its discussions, often going off to find out more about horses and riders discussed here.
I did comment on women at the SRS being a forward social step so long as the women were expected to meet the same historically high standard set by that organization.
When I watch circus animals, I may not be able to discuss the fine points of training, but I can appreciate good looking animals working in an apparently mutually respectful situation with neither frightened by or dominating the other. When I visit back stage, I look for clean housing areas and facilities, and attention to detail and the facilities provided.
I moved from performing into technical work after a near fatal battle with botulism which left me with some permanent motor damage. I had always liked the science of rigging and since there were no standardds for circus rigging I educatted myself trough attending seminars and training courses taught by manufacturers of the hardware we used, leding riggers in the arena and theater, and explored the theory of dynamic and static loading, load ddistribution, and learned the staandards set by OSHA for industrial lifting and suspension of loads holding people and over people. I earned the respct of many performers and producers for my concern for safety and caution and care in handling equipment and getting shows into less than ideal situations. A 2.5 year stint on RBBB led me to Universal Orlando where as rigging supervisor for special events and entertainment I rigged and created special effects for circus acts, film, television, corporate events, holiday events, concerts, parades, magicians, - you name it. I remained there for 10 years and noww teach circus skills in a social program that used circus activity to promote social change with young people from age 5 to age 82. I still occasionally consult on rigging projects and design, build some custom props, and serve as the primary risk management officer for the foundation that sponsors our circus program. My limited knowledge of animal work came about because I enjoyed seeing and observing them, asked questions to some great people who were willing to answer, remembered what they told me and was willing to help when asked. I never signed a contract that included a "generally useful" clause. I often did more than my contract called for because I wanted the show to be the best it could be and was willing to help others if they needed it.
Warren,
Again with due respect, I have seen a great, great number of animals, who "appeared" well off, but in actuality, were mentally destroyed after a number of years with a "cute and charming" but oh so inconstant trainer/presenter. Most of the time care and well being is an indicator of ones compassion/skill. And sometimes it is a patch for ineptness.
Wade
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