The grouping of several blue and yellow tents, 60 or more trucks the size of moving vans, construction workers and staff running in and around this makeshift village can signal only one exciting event — Cirque is in town.
Opening Aug. 15 for a limited engagement, Cirque du Soleil makes its Washington home under the Grand Chapiteau (big top) at the Plateau at National Harbor. Tickets are now available for the latest production, “Totem,” written and directed by Robert Lepage.
Since its world premiere last April in Montreal, “Totem” has left its mark on 12 cities in four countries, its cast of acrobats mesmerizing more than 1.5 million spectators thus far.
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| Tickets are available online at cirquedusoleil.com/totem. |
“We are very proud to create a show about the evolution of mankind,” said “Totem” publicist Francis Jalbert. The show traces the fascinating journey of the human species from its original amphibian state to its ultimate desire to fly like the thunderbird at the top of the totem pole. “It’s the evolution of the human body and it’s also the evolution that each of us goes through during our lives.”
And so, in 10 acrobatic acts, 52 performers represent characters such as a giant turtle, the symbol of origin in many ancient civilizations.
“It’s like a journey,” said Jalbert. “We create different environments for each act in the show by using a lot of video projections. So the set is evolving from a volcano to a marsh to an ocean. You really feel like you’re traveling with us for an hour and a half.”
The majority of the acts are completely new to Cirque du Soleil, and Jalbert says the creators are pushing the envelope with the way they have integrated these acts into the theme of “Totem.”
The tent seats approximately 2,600 people. The sheer number of spectators is not lost on the show’s producers, as Jalbert so eloquently points out when he notes, “Part of the experience is that we travel with our own theater, so when you enter the big top, you enter into our world, where you forget you are sitting in a canvas tent and you let yourself be transported to the world of ‘Totem.’ ”
