ENTERTAINMENT DAILY: ENT4- CIRQUE DU SOLEIL

(14 Dec 2000) English/Nat

Title: Cirque du Soleil
Location: London
Date: 13th December

Over the last ten years the derelict Battersea Power Station, overlooking London's River Thames, has been earmarked as the site of the capital's first fun park, an entertainment and leisure center and a cinema, shopping and hotel complex. But all these grand designs ground to a halt, bogged down by planning and financial problems. Now one of the most successful theater impressarios in the world today is set to take it over - temporarily at least. French Canadian, Guy Laliberte, the owner of Cirque Du Soleil, has taken the decision to house the London production of Quidam beside the power station (as opposed to the Millennium Dome, which was suggested.)

The show Quidam was created by artistic director, Franco Dragone.
A more scripted show than Alegria, Saltimbanco and other Cirque predecessors, it integrates performance and theatricality to a greater degree than previous productions, and draws on the emotional relationships between the performers in the troupe.

A young girl (Amélie Landry) fumes, she feels she has already seen everything there is to see, and her world has lost all meaning. Her anger shatters her little world, and she find herself in the universe of Quidam, the world of the nameless passer-by, a solitary figure lingering on a street corner, a person rushing past. Anyone, anybody. Someone coming, going, a member of the crowd, one of the silent majority.

The girl is joined by a joyful companion (Matthew Baker) as well as another mysterious character (Mark Ward), who will attempt to seduce her with the marvellous, the unsettling, and the terrifying.

Cirque du Soleil's ninth production, it premiered in Montréal on April 23, 1996.

The new troupe is made up of over 50 performers, ranging in age from 12 to 43. Once again, the cast hails from the four corners of the globe: Canada, United States, France, Russia, Ukraine, China, England, Argentina, Belgium, Australia and Israel.

The production boasts a 120-foot overhead conveyor, whose five imposing rails take up the entire interior surface of the Big Top. This system is used to bring performers onto the stage and to create a multitude of special effects in various acts.

Created by Benoit Jutras, the music of Quidam draws on influences that range from classical music to the most eclectic and contemporary sounds. And for the very first time at Cirque du Soleil, the voices of a man (Richard Price and Craig Jennings) and a child (Amelie Landry) are used.

As one would expect of a Cirque Du Soleil production, Quidam offers a variety of acts where high-calibre acrobatic performance goes hand-in-hand with aerial, high-flying, balancing and manipulation acts. In store for spectators are the German wheel, banquine, Spanish webs, diabolo and aerial contortion.

Also on the program, a hell-raising trio of crazy clowns who take cruelty to the limits while lending a touch of purity, poetry and tenderness to the show.

The remaining creatives in the team behind Quidam include: concepts Gilles Ste-Croix, set designer Michel Crête, costume designer Dominique Lemieux, choreographer Debra Brown, lighting designer Luc Lafortune, sound designer François Bergeron and artistic director Serge Roy.

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