Impro Cirque, a Festival Classic

Considering Impro Cirque has only existed for just over a year, and the Montreal Completement Cirque circus festival is only in its second season, referring to either of these events as 'classic' may be somewhat presumptuous. But you know what? I stand by my statement. Impro Cirque is a festival classic. And I suspect that as the festival continues to grow, Impro Cirque will not only be at its heart, but will also be one of the unique elements that truly makes the entire festival shine.

At least it will be if the organizers are worth their sawdust.

But we're not here to discuss the future. We're here to discuss the very recent past!

Friday and Saturday night saw this year's installments of Impro Cirque at MCC. Unlike last year, the teams were virtually the same each night. As such, I don't feel quite as bad about having missed Friday's match.

One of the wonderful things about Impro Cirque is that the fine folks of Les Improduits continue to develop and refine the event with each edition. New touches include showing a photo of each artist along with a blurb as they are being introduced, as well as displaying each round's parameters on screen during the improvisation, the latter being a particularly smooth move on their part.

Both teams were excellent panicked bunnies of the roue Cyr

Sadly, there was also a great loss to Impro Cirque this time around. Philippe Trepanier, Impro Cirque co-founder and head referee, is currently performing with Cirque du Soleil's Zarkana and was therefore unavailable to referee during the festival. Replacement Roberto Sierra may have gotten the job done, and I mean no disrespect to him, but he's no Philippe. As referee, Phil not only managed what was going on on-stage, but he also embodied a character specific to the Impro Cirque universe. He was the villain of the piece, the dastardly referee who both audience and artist could rally against. He somehow managed to elevate a simple improv match into something more. Of course I applaud and congratulate him on his move to Cirque du Soleil, but I must say, his absence was definitely felt tonight.

 
Phil is to Impro Cirque as Chairman Kaga is to Iron Chef. 

Is that more clear?

Seeing as this is already incredibly long, perhaps I should move on to the actual event...

Competing tonight!

On the red team:

• Claudel 'Mademois'Hell' Doucet
• Alexandre 'El Diablo' Lane
• Lisa 'Creeps' Eckert
• Ryan 'Hadouken' Shinji Murray
• Kaelyn 'Special K' Schmitt

On the blue team:

• Joseph 'ChingChong' Pinzon
• Ethan 'The' Law
• Anny 'The Plant' Laplante
• Richard 'Richie Rich' Maguire
• Émi 'Votez' Vauthey

Where to begin? The vibe was definitely very different from previous Impro Cirques I've been to. I suspect that a lot of that had to do with the vast majority of the audience never having been to an Impro Cirque before! Also, I think the artists were a little tired from the previous night. You could feel them losing steam a little bit mid-way though the second half.


As with anything, there were a couple of low points during the night. The two improvs I found least successful were “Earthquake” and “Hangover”.

In my opinion, the Earthquake improvisation (performed on a portable tight wire) didn’t work for two reasons. The first being that with only a minute and a half, the artists were virtually out of time before they even set up the pretext for the improv, or set foot on the wire. The second is that I don’t think any of the artists really do tight wire. Though in fairness, Anny did attempt a full turn.

  

As for the Hangover improv… well… the discipline was ballet and was obviously chosen so that Émi could show off her pointe shoe skills. And I feel that that’s basically what she did. While her counterpart tried to act hungover, she just danced like a perfectly sober ballerina. Moreover, she went over to the opposing team to discuss the improvisation before it started! I have never seen that done before and was under the impression that part of the challenge of theatre improv/circus improv is that you don’t know what the other side will bring to the table. And even with the pre-planning, it was only at the very end of the improv that they seemed to find some kind of stride, and by that point it was too late.

Then of course, there are the high points...

For the first time in my experience at Impro Cirque (I've missed a lot of them) there was an improvisation in the category of "Rewind". Basically, each team picks one discipline, tonight it was either trapeze, hoop or hand to hand. The first team will do an improv on their chosen apparatus and then the second team will replicate that improv, only backwards. Then the second team will do its own improv on the apparatus they chose, which the first team will have to recreate, again, in reverse.

Not only was this format incredibly interesting, but it showcased some of the most impressive skills of the night, notably by Joseph Pinzon on dance trapeze.

 This was after a one arm chin-up

Replicate this, jerks.

But the hands-down best improv of the night was with Joseph and Claudel.

Two artists. One tissu. And a healthy dose of glam. The category was Lip Sync, and the song was Don't Stop Believin' by the cast of Glee. As soon as the music came on, I knew Claudel didn't stand a chance. And while Joseph did win the point for the blue team by a landslide, there's no doubt that the improv was as good as it was because there were two Divas, not just one.

Rachel Barry, eat your heart out.

All in all, the one thing that really separated this night of Impro Cirque from others that I've seen is the way the teams worked together. Even though they were technically competing against one another, any time both teams were up at the same time, you'd kind of forget that and really believed you were watching a single, unified troupe. It was actually really nice.

If you didn't have a chance to catch Impro Cirque this time around, you're sure to have another chance. Might I suggest liking them on Facebook so that you can keep up to date on their comings and goings? They went to Argentina, so you never know when they may come near you!

For more pics and to find out who wins, check out after the jump!