The Circus is Coming to Town

Smirkus Music Intro...bedding the following:

It was kind of a rainy evening. I’d gotten lost, I’d forgotten to eat dinner.

And so I wasn’t in the best of moods when I finally entered the Big Top to see Circus Smirkus perform in Manchester recently.

Ringleader: Ladies & Gentlemen! Welcome – to Circus Smirkus!!

I don’t know if it was the lighting, or the crowd, or the children, or the beautiful red ring like a soft spill of melted crayons - but there was some kind of secret something that took place the moment the Circus started.

I was no longer hungry, it wasn’t raining, and I hadn’t gotten lost.

Everything was A O K.

I was five years old and there was nowhere I’d rather be...

Smirkus Theme

Waves of tumblers and acrobats, clowns, and jugglers shot from the velvet curtains.

This percolating chaos of things and people were flying and flipping and then it all collapsed as the group shifted into a tightly choreographed dance.

LIVE MUSIC

For the last 21 years Circus Smirkus has been doing summer tours of New England.

Each year they start from scratch with a whole new theme and a fresh crew of young troupers.

This year there are 2 performers from New Hampshire.

Aerialist Greylin Nielsen is from Temple and acrobatic clown Shea Vaccaro lives in Wilton.

They’re both 16 years old.

Greylin had just come off performing some aerial stunts with her partner.

She tells me she’d started honing her skills when she was young.

Greylin: It’s a funny story actually because my parents – I used to practice handstands in the house and my brother and I would do handstands and juggle and we scuffed up the ceilings pretty badly cause he’s really tall, so they built us a barn so that we could practice outside of the living room.

The artistic team works the entire year getting the show together,

But about 3 weeks right before the circus hits the road everything comes together
Greylin: The first week is crazy because it’s a new show and everything is new and you’re just so excited to be out there performing it and showing people what you can do and what you’ve been working on in 3 weeks. It’s a really heartwarming experience. The entire thing is heartwarming. And then you get to a point where the show is comfortable, and you start being able to perform it as a show rather than “Look at what I just learned!” There’s a very fine difference.

The Circus calls Greensboro, Vermont, home and even though its performers are all young, there’s nothing amateur about it.

Troy Wunderle is the Ringmaster.

Troy: We’ve had performers that have gone onto all the major circuses. In fact just this week we had Tim Holst from Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus come and hire 3 of our clowns…. And it’s thrilling for us to know that we have performers in Cirque de Soleil, in Big Apple, in Ringling Brothers in shows in Asia and Europe and it allows the performers in this tent now to realize that, boy, if you have a dream and you’re willing to put the effort and work into that dream, it can take you as far as you can dream...

For some performers, several dreams are unfolding simultaneously.

Before I could talk with Shea Vaccaro, the 16 year old clown from Wilton was mobbed by a very short, glitterfaced gang of autograph hunters:

Sean: Do you have to give out a lot of autographs?
Shea: Ahh...Yeah. There’s a lot, but it’s been a dream of mine, so...
Sean: To be giving out autographs?
Shea: Yeah. Ever since I was a little kid I’ve practiced my signature. (laughs) So it’s great. I got 2 dreams. I get to sign autographs and I’m in Smirkus, so it’s good.

After the show Troy Wunderle described one of the secrets of the circus’ success:

Troy: We’re 35 shows into our tour and today, in our evening show, we threw in 4 tricks that were thought up by the troupers just today.

It’s this vital, in-the-moment, on the tips-of-its-toes technique that somehow manages to find continual expression in the show.

Everything is animated and pulsing with life.

Composer Tristan Moore wrote all the music and he sits with a percussionist high above the performer’s proscenium and together they bang out a silky hypnotic dance house accompaniment.

You can lay a series of colorful brick and cement words down – joyful, exuberant, enchanting, magical - but you can’t really describe any experience like this.

There’s a simple part that can’t be explained.

No one is shot through a cannon. No world records are shattered.

Something very down-to-earth and human gets unearthed here.

You’re reminded of something that you forgot and you realize that a good circus is nothing but an extension of our natural urge to play.

To jump around, to pretend.

To show off while making each other happy.

Circus Smirkus is a beautiful playfulness – designed and organized, practiced and orchestrated, dropped into costume, dazzled in lights, covered in smoke, set to music – and then set free.

For NHPR News, I’m Sean Hurley.