Page 22 - The Outdoor Showman magazine January-March 2023

CIRCUS NEWS
The new normal
It’s a new year, and what appears
to be a new normal.
Australian circuses recorded a mixed bag of results: starvation early in ‘22, much better in the second half, and still mixed in ‘23. Late ‘22 was recovery mode. Hudson’s
Shane and Nancy Lennon say
their Hudson’s Circus did better
business as ‘22 went on.
Major inland New South Wales cities
were bread and butter for them,
with usually two-week stands.
“Because of the two-year Covid lockdown, they were fresh, and once people found out there was a real main-stream circus around, they came out,” he said.
Usually, the second week was better than the first, and the run didn’t
churn up too many towns.
Goldie the clown is back after a six- month season at the Gold Coast Dream World, with an up-graded comedy car and several other strong spots. Wife
Jo de Goldi again Ringmistresses.
Beau Pearson’s disco dogs are new,
and a hit. He also presents two camels.
The globe has two riders, plus Hudson Lennon, now eleven. Shane presents
five liberty ponies, and there’s a guaranteed triple-somersault in
the fast South American flying act
that climaxes the performance.
When they resumed showing on
January at Springfield, Ipswich, west
of Brisbane, business just got better
and better over four weeks.
Then it was into NSW for Murwillumbah
in March, flood-hit Lismore, Casino, Grafton, and back into Queensland
for Easter holidays at Coomera.
Still in NSW, and sometimes Queensland, Kane Harrington’s Circus Show is
playing small towns and contracted country Ag shows, to good effect.
Now in their second year, they
played Woodstock, NSW, the
first there in living memory.
Victorious
Silvers and Royale both slugged it out against Covid lock-downs in ‘22 in Victoria, basically Melbourne, but both say
business improved as the year went on.
By ‘23, things were back to the new
normal - whatever that is. with Victorian red tape and ground rents hitting new heights, and insurance, when it’s available, up through the roof. Hard slog!
In February, Damien Syred marked 17 years running Circus Royale. He bought it from
Goldie, back at Hudsons
Crackup Sisters, Winton, Q.
and Busselton. More to come.
Locals like it, and when the money’s
flowing, “Why leave?” Geoff Weber asks.
Rudi and Natalie Weber (Weber’s Circus)
are taking time out to build a home on their block near Jacob’s Well, northern Gold Coast, near home base of the other Weber Circuses. Ashton-Rodriguez
Jan (Ashton) Brasil and aerialist daughter Chantel put together a stylish 90-minute circus for four weeks at Brown’s Plains, Brisbane, for January-February. It included plenty of relatives from Infamous,
before they jetted off to America.
Excellent production, top acts and they made money - but Jan says it’s too hard
to get top acts and staff to keep it up,
so they’re retiring to their Munruben property, now crowded with a lot of Infamous gear parked in the yard.
Chantel and partner Jefferson will continue with their fast-moving aerial, clown and globe attractions around Australia. Infamous off to the USA
Sensational New Year news: the Pepe
Ashton cabaret-circus, ‘Infamous’, after seven great years in Australia, has packed up, holus-bolus, and moved to Florida, USA. It’s a typical eye-watering gamble,
the first time an Australian show
to do it since Wirths in1893.
Pepe’s pulled off some audacious
moves before, and there’s nobody in the business who doesn’t wish him well.
They’re getting help from Ashton cousins who’ve been established there in the
Wirths, young June Grant
Hudson Lennon,11, takes a bow.
Frank Gasser, in the only time in decades a circus has actually been bought. Dingley Dell and Avalon were better stands. Silvers Circus started the year with
their usually-reliable stand on
the main highway on Mornington Peninsula. Predictably, they’ll stay
around Melbourne for much of ‘23.
Tony and Cathy Maynard’s Eroni’s Circus played around the Bellarine Peninsula, after regular tent-hire jobs in January. They’re opening up new Melbourne
sites with a traditional balanced family circus, and locals are responding well. Kevin Parker’s Mini Circus, with more birds than the rest of Australian
shows put together, continues to play country Ag Shows and aged homes
in Victoria and South Australia.
THE Circus
THE (Harry Weber) Circus did some hard yards over New Year: Perth to Tasmania, back to Whyalla in February, jump to strife-torn Alice Springs, and then an extended March-April season in Darwin. It’s a big, glitzy, modern show,
well bridged, playing fortnight-or-
more stands to good houses.
Moscow
Bert and Josephine Weber’s Great Moscow Circus, now minus MarkEdgley, has stuck to Western Australia, mainly Perth suburbs, south to Bunbury
20 THE OUTDOOR SHOWMAN