Update 23/5/09: I’ve been informed that a number of the performers we saw are no longer with Circus Latino. It is therefore likely that the following review may not reflect any future performances of the circus.
For our weekly tradition of not-so-random-Wednesday the girls and I visited “Circus Latino”, a circus we’d spotted setting up last week next to the fire station in Frankston. While a night at the circus was a nice change and gave us something different to do for the week I could not recommend this particular circus to others at present; Silver’s Circus is apparently also in the area and — in spite of not having seen them for several years — given the good experiences I’ve had with their shows in the past would guess they may be worth a look instead. (EDIT: For an alternative point of view you can also find a more positive review of an older Circus Latino performance linked by one of my commenters here. Note that the current performance sounds significantly different to that described in the linked review.) So, why wasn’t I impressed with Circus Latino’s current act?
- Entry was a bit costly for my liking at $25 for a general-admission adult ticket. I havn’t visited a circus in several years and so have no idea of the average pricing but had been expecting cheaper. Although unexpectedly high I might have considered the fee worth it if the show itself had been better. Family and concession (with a fairly limited definition of concession) discounts were available but not relevant to us.
- The performance was a little clown-heavy for my liking. This particular circus had only a single clown — I don’t personally particularly enjoy clowns other than in smaller doses, your opinion may differ — but still had almost every second act on stage some sort of caper involving him. I also use the word “act” in the case of the clown particularly loosely; he twice came out with nothing but a large ball which he repeatedly threw into the crowd and made people bounce it back — a trick which doesn’t work particularly well when most of the seats are empty (but admittedly may have been better with a fuller crowd) — once was fine, but twice simply seemed uneccesary. These acts may have been more popular with children, although my friend Heather tells me the girls she looks after for work would have been terrified of the act with the ball.
- The audio was terrible. The Ringmaster’s (note there is a stage rather than a traditional ring at Circus Latino) microphone failed to work numerous times, and the music distorted and/or suffered from random interference sounds throughout the show. This is unfortunate given an excellent choice of music to support the performance and the fact that this was probably beyond the control of the circus; if however this is a regular occurance and not a one-off something should be done about it.
- Only one of the three people who attempted juggling as part of their act actually succeeded. He still dropped a couple of things, but I personally think that’s fine as long as it happens less than the actual succesful juggling, and his act was otherwise quite well performed and entertaining. The other two performers who attempted to juggle however didn’t succeed at all and ended up simply giving up on it.
- At one point a performer came out with bubble mix and various rings and pieces of equipment for making bubbles. They failed to make any however, and after several failed attempts and much apologetic shrugging the performer simply gave up and left. This may have been less of a problem if the performer had given up sooner when it became obvious the trick wasn’t working, but rather than doing so they proceeded to attempt the entire act, including calling a little girl from the audience on stage to help with yet another failed trick. This potentially cool act was unfortunately one of the biggest negatives of the performance.
- Some of the costumes were incredibly inappropriate for the body-types of the performers wearing them.
All that being said, there were some impressive acts and if you happen to particularly like clowns you might enjoy the show more. Definitely don’t let this review stop you from giving this circus a chance if you happen to stumble upon it at a later date, they definitely had the potential to put on a much better act with some more work.
Can’t sleep - Clowns will eat me.
That sounds like a very bad experiance and after that review I don’t think I’ll be heading off to a circus anytime soon.
Comment by Amy — January 15, 2009 @ 7:41 am
If you want to see a good circus go to the Cirque du Solei. Damn expensive, but also extremely awesome. I believe they will be back in march or april.
Comment by Ben — January 15, 2009 @ 9:56 am
Ok for the first fact. You weren’t happy with the pricing… well you can not help that. The cheapest circus I have seen was $15 for tickets and I promise you that it is way worse than Circus Latino. I have seen a lot of Circuses in Australia and I know that Latino is one of the best that I have seen. You got to think about it this way….. when you are expecting a new circus then you would be expected to be low of acts. I think this circus has been only opened for a year now and this year it was expected to be an all new show. Especially that yesterday was the opening performance for the 2009 season. I just think that you had visited the circus at the wrong time. When I went to go and visit it was on the first day and all the acts were jumbled up but when I went a few weeks later they were way improved. You just have to give it time for them to get their acts into order and all. Technically there is a ring in the circus… where they were doing their acts on the wooden stage it is still considered as a ring. I just need to say that this is not a fairly big circus and they are low on performers. You can not expect any more from them as they are trying there best to get the show over the line. 3 juggling acts you say? Well can you fill me in on the three juggling acts? When I have seen the bubble act in the past I just don’t think it should be in the show. The bubbles have never worked in that circus. The performing attire is pretty skeptical but they need some stuff like those outfits to have got to get the act done. Overall it is a good Circus and may I ask some questions about the circus that I could possibly get the answers to.
1. Was there a hoops act? Like spinning hula hoops around the performers body.
2. Can you tell me some of the acts that have taken place in the air? I am a really big fan of aerial acts.
3. What three types of jugglers are there? Can you fill me in on this.
Thanks for reading this
– sammie [!]
Comment by Sammie — January 15, 2009 @ 1:23 pm
Melbourne is awash with circus choice these summer holidays.
Circus Oz will be in Frankston next week, currently in Geelong, Circus Sunrise is in Docklands http://www.circussunrise.com.au/, Stardust Circus is one of the Austalian circuses owned by the Lennon and West families and is at Rosebud until Sunday, Silvers is at Mornington until Sunday and then at Casey Shopping Centre http://www.silverscircus.com.au, Circus Olympia is at Altona from Jan 22.
Circus Latino is a small new circus struggling to get established and survive and grew. They have been performing for less then a year. The other circuses listed are owned and operated by professional show families and are all big and established. Please do not judge all circuses on one persons experience with a smaller newly established show.
Circus families work hard to take their entertainment to the people and need your support. Each of these circuses have different styles and content, some have animals, some have world class international acts. $25 is an average ticket price, all will do a group discount, most offer family prices or concessions. The important thing is to go!
Comment by Barry Nixon — January 15, 2009 @ 3:50 pm
As mentioned in the original post I havn’t been to a circus in quite a long time and didn’t have a baseline for pricing. I was expecting cheaper, but if that’s about the average then feel free to disregard it from the list of complaints. As Barry mentions in his comment, there are group and concession discounts available - although in the case of this particular circus their definition of concession is a little more limited than many other places - your student card or low income card are not acceptable.
@Sammie: Sure, I may have just got them at a bad time; it was clear some of the performers were a bit nervous, but when things went right for them they were obviously quite talented and I hope things do improve for them. I actually guessed that they might be relatively new when watching the show, although there was no indication of such in the signage or introductions given.
Regarding the ring - no, there isn’t one; they use a stage instead. That wasn’t actually a complaint but simply an observation of the different setup. I actually think the format of having people seated at ground level around the stage rather than on tiered seating around a ring is potentially a good thing for them, as small children are sometimes scared of the possibility of falling through tiered seating.
I noticed the small number of performers you mention, and that’s fine as well. I would suggest however that rather than having practically every second act from the same clown they could simply make the whole performance a little shorter and drop one or two of those - having the inflated ball come out (especially with a small crowd where it wasn’t working as well as it could have) twice seemed particularly uneccesary. Again as mentioned in my original post, this may just be my personal dislike of some of the acts clowns put on rather than acrobatic performances and the like, and I’m sure that the clown may appeal more to others — children in particular.
I suspected the bubble act might have just suffered from an off night and think she should have given up on it sooner; certainly not dragged a little girl up on stage when none of the other attempted tricks had worked. This would have been an excellent addition to the performance if it had worked, but if what you say about it never working is true then it should really be cut from the performance - an entire act that just outright doesn’t work had a significant impact on my impression of the whole show. Perhaps if they can get it working reliably outside of the performance with more practice the bubbles could make a good addition to the performance in future.
I’m out of time now, but I’ll be back to respond to other points and to directly answer Sammie’s questions at a later stage.
Thanks for reading and for the responses!
Comment by Jason — January 15, 2009 @ 4:19 pm
Searched the net and found this review of Circus Latino. I have never been to Circus Latino.
Comment by Barry Nixon — January 15, 2009 @ 6:04 pm
@Barry: I edited your post to link to the review in question rather than containing the full text, I hope you don’t mind. Anyone considering visiting this circus should certainly give Barry’s link a quick read, it’s a review from someone who had a much more positivie experience, albeit with what sounds like a significantly different show than the current one. I’ve also edited a link to this more postive review into my original post to provide some balance for anyone who stumbles across my review from a search.
Again, I’ve unfortunately no more time to spare right now, I’ll be back with those other responses later.
Comment by Jason — January 15, 2009 @ 8:30 pm
I have been to Circus Latino 5 times last year && I had thorougly enjoyed the show && I am very sure that I will be going to check out the show again because it was a great experience. Maybe they were having a bad day or something when you went or maybe as mentioned before it could just be because it is the start of a new year for the Circus Latino.
Comment by Jordan — January 15, 2009 @ 8:48 pm
Alright, back to finish my responses. Apologies for the delay.
To begin with, I didn’t say three juggling acts but rather three acts which involved juggling. Only one of these was specifically a juggling act and was in fact very good. I commented originally that the specific juggling performance only had a few (in my opinion quite acceptable) mistakes, and it was a valuable addition to the show.
Two other acts which were not specifically focussed on juggling involved attempts at it and failed however; the first was a balancing act with a performer balancing on a ball, stacks of small platforms balanced on a cylinder, etc. He did a very good job of the balancing part of the act but ended with an attempt at juggling which wasn’t so succesful; personally I’d suggest he may have been better simply leaving it out until he had more practice, although had it been succesful it would have been an excellent addition to his performance. The other act involving an attempt at juggling was from a woman who was balancing on a horizontal beam in an aerial performance - once again, her performance was quite good except for the addition of a completely unsuccesful attempt at juggling. It may well be that both of these performers had an off night, and this alone certainly wouldn’t have given me a negative view of the performance.
I think that’s all the points I wanted to respond to from general conversation, so I’ll move on to answering the three questions from Sammie now:
1: No, there wasn’t a hoops act. If one of the performers normally does this I think it would make an excellent addition to the show, preferably in place of one of the acts from the clown.
2: There were a few aerial acts:
The first was by a female performer on a ring suspended in the air. About the first half of the act — although very well performed — was pretty basic gymnastics apart from the fact that it was performed in the air, the impressiveness of which was diminished somewhat by an excessively obviously visible safety line (although the performers certainly shouldn’t take uneccesary risks!). A few select parts of this performance were however quite skilled, and overall I’d consider it to be a good performance and a worthwhile part of the show. This act in particular however was one that suffered from an inappropriate choice of costume, as I probably wouldn’t have thought anything negative of it had the performer not had to quite obviously adjust her outfit whilst suspended in front of the crowd several times; even one or two adjustments may have been acceptable, but with the count of times she had to do this it’s quite clear the chosen outfit simply didn’t fit, which is a shame given she performed a later aerial act in a perfectly acceptable outfit with no unsightly adjustments required.
Another aerial act early in the performance involved a male performer using a shorter pair of cloth straps and was very well performed. No major objections to this act, it was quite entertaining.
The same performer as the first ring act later returned for an act on cloth ribbons, this time with a much more appropriate choice of costume; the performer in question in obviously good at what she does, and I’m disappointed at being forced to mention costuming as a negative in her other performance. This particular act was one of the better of the night’s show and involved a series of the usual sort of tricks carried out in an aerial ribbons act, all very well performed.
Lastly, there was an act by a different female performer carried out on a suspended horizontal beam which largely consisted of an impressive head-stand balanced on the beam; twice normally, once with the beam swinging, and once with the beam spinning. This was an impressive, entertaining and well performed act. This was one of the acts where juggling was attempted unsuccesfully for some variation.
3: I think I’ve already answered your question about the juggling in my existing responses, so I won’t repeat myself here. I will however emphasise that the act specifically focussed on juggling was very well performed and quite entertaining.
Lastly, if I were to make some suggestions to this circus, they would be:
- Given the apparently new act and performers, it may be in your best interest to lower the price of admission by a small amount ($5?) across the board of different admission rates until such time as your act is more polished, at which time people may be more happy about having paid that amount. Again, this is only my own opinion, and it may well be that the majority of guests do not consider the price unacceptable.
- If an act doesn’t work, cut it from the performance for now. At present the only one I would really apply this to is the bubbles, and the comment I recieved from Sammie seems to support the idea that this is a regular failure. At the least you should not call a volunteer (especially a little girl) out from the crowd unless you’re at least reasonably confident of success, which cannot be the case given the total failure of the rest of this particular act. You can always add the act back in a later stage if after more practice you think it can be made to work.
- Try to choose costumes appropriately. I don’t think any of the performers are even close to being considered out of shape by any reasonable person, but this does not prevent the fact that if an outfit is simply too small it will create a negative image. Again, I think it’s a bad thing to even have to mention this, but unfortunately it creates a bad impression of the entire show. Appropriately fitting outfits aren’t that expensive and should be a relatively rare purchase - spend the money on it.
- Consider telling people that the circus is relatively new up front and that the act is new. Although I guessed that this may be the case there was no actual indication of such. If I had been expecting this I may have judged the quality of the acts less harshly as Sammie suggested in her comment.
- I’m willing to accept that it’s probably my own personal preference to dislike the extremely regular appearances of the only clown in the circus, but at the least you could refrain from repeating the same act (throwing the large inflated ball into the crowd) twice; once was enough.
I do hope this circus improves with time, and am quite sure that will be the case. I cannot however in good faith recommend any of my friends see it at present unless they’re willing to accept that it may be a sub-par experience when compared to the other acts currently in the local area.
Comment by Jason — January 16, 2009 @ 2:37 am
Was the high wire being used in the show?
Comment by Jordan — January 18, 2009 @ 12:58 pm
I stumbled across this Circus Latino section by accident and read your comments with interest, Jason. I’ve seen this show many times and I generally have to say that the show is exellent - like anything, it can always be improved and refined but these things are all part of the excitement of watching this great performance art.
I have to also say the Argentinian performers (especially the guys) are absolutely top notch - the juggling is insane - that guy pushes the limits every time I’ve seen it and always seems to give it 100% (every time I see juggling at another circus it is never as good)
Comment by David — January 18, 2009 @ 6:50 pm
@Jordan: No, no high wire, which is again unfortunate given I’m told they do actually have an excellent high wire act.
Comment by Jason — January 18, 2009 @ 8:04 pm
Just went and seen circus Latino today and have to agree with Jason on pretty much everything, it was too expensive, they failed on every attempt of juggling, the costumes were as stated inappropriate. They definately need to work on their act.
Comment by Ebony — March 29, 2009 @ 6:47 pm