Carnival of Animals | CIRCA

As a long-time fan of Circa’s work for adults: beautiful, extremely polished and often very serious ensemble acrobatics, I was incredibly curious as to what their take on a kids show would look like. Carnival Of The Animals maintains some of Circa’s common features including simple matching costuming, classic musical (most of the music is from Camille Saint-Saëns suite Carnival of the Animals), and superb group acrobatics interspersed with speciality solo moments, while injecting a kids-show dose of much loved silliness.

All images: Darren Thomas, Photoco.

The acrobats did an incredible job of embodying various animals of land, air, and sea. They all had such great physicality and a total commitment to the ridiculousness of many of the scenes. They transformed into frightened squawking chickens dropping juggling “eggs”, tall and awkward penguins created from two-highs, and energetic bouncing kangaroos in a group skipping rope act. These acts were complimented by a constant video projection by video designer Michaela French. The animations of backgrounds helped give context to the animal movements on the stage, and there were some wonderful moments when the acrobats interacted directly with the projections - fear of a larger animal lurking on screen, and a particularly nice moment where they appeared to pull pieces of paper from the digital wall into reality.

There were so many animals and concepts visited in this show that I would definitely miss some if I tried to list them all. My adult brain struggled with the fast-paced changing of scenes, and I often felt that we would just get into an act before being whisked away into something else without the circus artists being able to fully explore an idea. But this show is not for me, and if the chorus of giggles throughout the show is anything to go by, the children adored every chaotic minute. 

Carnival of The Animals has been performed many times (almost 300) since its premiere in 2014, and for this season Circa redid and added sections of the show to include an ensemble of local children. These kids took part in group acrobatics with the Circa ensemble and with each other. It was a sweet addition that suited the show, and many of these kids clearly have a strong acrobatic foundation in which to grow into. It might be them in the professional Circa ensemble in a decade or so. 

Circa’s Carnival of The Animals is a captivating and entertaining trip to the theatre for kids from preschool age through to the older primary school years, and if you’re willing to embrace an hour of the truly absurd, it is also a really fun time for the adults. 

All images: Darren Thomas, Photoco.