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One Ring or Three

The American Circus has always been a little different than European shows, although many performers have come from the European shows to appear in America. Performers nowadays come from around the world—Asia, Latin America, Africa—and are homegrown as well.

With Cirque du Soleil bringing European-style circus and competition to the American market and animals rights groups like PETA pressuring traditional American circuses to stop the use of animals, many shows have been facing a decline. One company, however, has resisted and continued to grow.

The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus has grown from one show under a big top with three rings to a super show of two full three ring circuses crisscrossing the USA in major markets. Characterized as the red and blue tours, the shows are what they’ve always been, a mix of human and animal exhibitions of skill, daring and visual entertainment.

This year the company has expanded by adding a single ring show, the gold tour, advertised as the "Hometown Edition." It is clearly aimed at smaller markets and has a more limited schedule than the other shows. In some respects it seems to be part sideshow, part "cirque" and part traditional American circus.

It played here in mid-January at the Ocean Center. Unlike the larger three ring tours, it didn’t appear to be tied to the railways. The week before the big blue show was in Orlando at the T. D Waterhouse Center. If you read the local papers you might have gotten the idea that the show was merely progressing from Orlando to here.

Nope. Different show altogether.

That does not mean that it was any less of a show. The big three ring shows always give you more than you can take in. A multitude of beautiful girls twirling on ropes while others balance on trapeze bars becomes one girl on a rope and one girl on a trapeze, making it infinitely easier to watch.

Instead of three troupes of acrobats, you get one, same with elephants and other acts. Two or three clowns do the comedy and each has a major spotlight. Everyone who comes early for a performance has a chance to interact with the performers and meet virtually everyone who will be entertaining.

As always, there is audience participation. The evening I was there, Clown Tom Dougherty apparently brought up a girl from the audience for a skit. In the midst of the skit the performance she gets a call on her cell phone. He snatched the phone away and drops it down his trousers. The look on the girl’s face is priceless, only bested by the look she gives the phone when he retrieves it and hands it back to her later.

This is an intimate show, intended to bring the audience closer and determined to reinforce the idea that the circus is more than a tradition, it is family. The younger performers are introduced with their ages announced. Jon Weiss, a clown without face paint entertains with patter and balancing huge objects, and shares the show with his wife and children.

What else did you miss? A Ringmaster, Ted McRae, who can stick his head in an alligator’s mouth and introduce audience members to a pair of Burmese pythons. An Elephant named Doc clearly enjoyed the applause his stunts brought. Sylvia Zerbini swept into the ring with a small herd of horses that performed a sort of equine ballet. Sapo, a man who can contort himself beyond belief. Clown Mitch Freddes, who is no slouch at acrobatics and contorting. Trapeze artists and jugglers and acrobats and motorcycles zipping around a steel cage, oh my! And most of all, the children of the circus and the children who came to the circus, all enjoying laughter and the spotlights with equal fervor, you just can’t beat it.

You big kids can go to Ringling.com and see where all the shows are playing and find out much more about the shows, the stars and how you can be a part of it all and help keep the tradition alive.