MCC 2012 - L'Impro Cirque

It breaks my heart to say this, it truly, truly does, but last night's edition of L'Impro Cirque was underwhelming at best.

I am a huge fan of L'Impro Cirque. The first time I saw it, I thought it was the most brilliant, revolutionary bit of circus I had seen in ages. I even changed a ticket for some other show I was supposed to see so I could go back the second night. Since then, I have been to every evening of Impro Cirque I was in town for and have advised everyone I know to do the same. I actually stopped random strangers in the street yesterday and advised them to go see Impro Cirque last night! So believe me, I'm not being an overly critical circus artist right now. Just a disappointed fan.

There's no way to really pin point what was amiss. Overall, the night felt chaotic. Things didn't seem to flow as smoothly as in the past and while the night is meant to be wild and fun, things seemed to go past the frivolity and start to veer off toward self-indulgence.

As with the last match I saw, the absence of co-creator and head ref extraordinaire Philippe Trépanier was deeply felt. This new ref (I didn't manage to get a program to take home and I don't have access to anyone's names...) was very inefficient. It seemed to me like he was trying too hard to be the star of the show instead of actually doing his job. In my opinion, he failed to maintain order and did a very poor job of enforcing the rules. Where were the penalties? Why was the time limit so often disregarded? And why, why did the artists get away with completely ignoring the themes?

I couldn't believe the dance trapeze improv. While the Blue team's player clearly had never done trapeze before in his life, he at least respected the theme (eternal rest) and tried to do something with it. But the Red team? That girl didn't even give the theme a second thought and just acted all cute and smiley while speeding through some trapeze moves. Dreadful.

And why did the Blue team not have a single aerialist when there were two aerial improvisations in the show and two aerialists on the other team? The boys who went up made a valiant effort, but I've never seen such an imbalance in the two teams. It was pretty disappointing considering the level they've had in the past.

 

But the most horrifying moment of all was when one of the Cyr wheel artists lost control of his wheel, went out of bounds, crashed into a table, and hit three members of the audience! Those things are very large, and very heavy. The artists on the Blue team were incredibly apologetic, and the staff of Cirque Eloize (the host venue) addressed the incident immediately, that's something that should never happen. And it could have been much, much worse...

There were, of course, good moments as well. The Blue team's graphic Abominable Snowman improv was pretty funny. And the Blue team somehow having to duplicate the Red team's acrobatic bicycle act was absolutely brilliant.

And while I'm pretty sure those in charge immediately regretted the decision to have a Top Chef themed improv complete with real vegetables, the resulting madness was outstanding.

From what I understand, both nights will feature the same artists. I suppose it's good that they'll have a second chance, and will probably do better with a performance already under their belts. I was told that unlike previous editions of Impro Cirque, there was no workshop for the artists before hand. That seems to have a made a huge difference in the quality of the performance.

Every company is going to have its bumps in the road and it would seem that after 16 matches, Impro Cirque has hit its first big bump. It was a rough night and those in charge know it. I'm curious to see the steps that will be implemented to improve the overall quality of the show in the future.

Moments of weakness aside, I do need to congratulate the folks at Impro Cirque on one thing: part of their mandate is to include the whole of the circus community and to let everyone have a chance to play. In my experience, not everyone is cut out for improv. It's really hard. But more and more often in this town, people get hired because of who they know and a lot of really great artists just kind of fall through the cracks. And if you don't give people that chance, how will they ever grow? And who wants to see the same people on stage every time anyway? One thing I've loved about Impro Cirque is discovering new artists. So get those kinks worked, Impro Cirque! Not only does this town love you, but we need you.