Page 24 - The Outdoor Showman April - June 2022

CIRCUS NEWS
Ringling’s to Return
Ringling Bros-Barnum & Bailey will reopen at US indoor venues on September 28, 2023, to tour 50 cities without animals.
Kenneth Feld, whose organisation took it over in 1967, announced in Las Vegas on May 18 it would still be called “The Greatest Show on Earth.”
Director of Casting and Performance Giulio Scatola, ex-Cirque du Soleil, said it would be a ‘narrative show’, like ‘America’s got Talent’, with artists telling their stories in performance.
They will include a juggler whose family operated Mexico’s traditional animal Circus Atayde.
They claim they used to move 500 staff and 100 animals. But audiences declined after Felds retired the elephants in 2016, and the show closed in 2017. It began in 1768.
They sold the mile-long trains in 2017. Crew will now drive or fly and stay in hotels.
Feld Entertainment Group also operates Disney on Ice and Monster Jam (a Big Truck outdoor operation.)
Justin Loomis, Loomis Bros’ Circus, said “They can call it a circus, but audiences are going to be disappointed.” (His show still features 12 ponies, five tigers and two elephants, and skips cities where they’re banned.)
Felds will debut on TikTok channel in 2023 and will issue non-fungible tokens (NFTs) financial instruments.
Alex Lacey, who presented 14 big cats in the final 2017 show, said “Without personal experiences with animals,
I fear people will lose interest in conserving them in the wild.”
Lennon’s in the wet
After two years of Covid19 lockdowns in Queensland, Lennon’s Circus at the start of the year was looking forward to showing again.
Just happy to be showing, like most Australian circuses.
They planned to play the New South Wales Northern Rivers, with fresh towns but notorious for wet-season floods, (usually Christmas to Easter.)
With a strong international program (flying trapeze, high wire, globe of death), they reached Lismore - four torrential days before the Wilson River burst its banks and flooded the city.
The main street, Molesworth
St, was ten feet under. Floods lasted a fortnight, 1,600 houses were devastated, and thousands evacuated. No shows for Lennon’s.
They splashed through floody, muddy roads to Grafton, on the Clarence River. More floods, and deluged. Flooded in for three weeks, unable to show.
Next, Coffs Harbour. Wet as shags, but they showed, and it was reasonable.
That didn’t last long.
New South Wales was again wracked with Covid, the new Omicron strain, and went into lockdown.
Port Macquarie, Kempsey and Taree, wet but not flooded. But with the virus, nobody was game go out to a circus, and 30 people was a big house.
As Hungarian Bobby, the clown, used to say, “There’s no business like no business.”
So, Cheryl Lennon
led the convoy up
the Gwydir Highway, over the Great Dividing Range, to Glen Innes, up on the New England.
That’s where Joe Perry, Sole’s Circus, used to reckon he never made any money unless there was sleet on the tent.
The sleet obliged. There were icicles, freezing weather, sleet, wind and rain. And everyone there was too afraid of the virus to come out.
“We were out of our comfort zone,” Cheryl Lennon said.
After three months of rotten weather, (and taking petrol money and not much more), they had to go north.
It was a lot of double-tripping. “Like every show on Australia, you just can’t get drivers,” transport and tent organiser Marty Grant said.
Up the New England Highway, 616 kms over the Queensland Border, they actually saw sunshine in Childers.
The town hadn’t been played for years, Queensland lifted its lockdown, and it was good.
Their luck changed. Gladstone was good for another week, then more double-tripping, 600 kms to Airlie
World Circus Day was
celebrated by shows around Australia. This poster was used around the world.
22 THE OUTDOOR SHOWMAN
Harrington’s Circus Show Big Top, Cessnock, NSW.
Beach, warm weather, and reasonable houses.
Two weeks in Townsville, a week in Innisfail (for once, it didn’t rain!), Port Douglas, and then Cairns for the June- July School Holidays.
“Back in our comfort zone,” Cheryl Lennon said. And meant it!
By John MacDonnell