Not long ago, circus was a major form of entertainment all over the world. For years, Indians enjoyed the circus in its myriad hues. The 1970 movie, Mera Naam Joker, by the famous actor, Raj Kapoor showcases the world of circus. It brings to light the fact that no matter what goes on in the personal life of a performer, the show must go on.
During my recent visit to my parents in Dehradun, I got to know that the iconic Parade Ground was hosting ‘Raymon Circus’. The posters caught my eye, and memories of childhood flashed in my mind, when our parents used to take us to the circus. At that time, circus was considered HUGE! It would be advertised long before it came visiting the town. People would enthusiastically wait for that day, they would excitedly wander around as the circus staff pitched the tents and once the show timings were put up, they would restlessly queue up to buy tickets to watch their favourite acts. Circus was held in much awe at that time.
Fast forward to today’s time. Today there are so many forms of entertainment available for children. The most important being the infamous video games which have taken away the simple joys of childhood from every child’s life. I better not start getting on with it, else I’ll end up writing the entire article about how annoying these gadgets are!
Well, coming back to the topic, as soon as I saw the posters of Raymon Circus, I decided to take my son for a circus show. I felt it was the right age for him to know about this art. Having travelled to various countries at a very young age like most children of today and having watched so many art forms of various countries, I wasn’t certain that he would enjoy this particular thing but I had nothing to loose. So, three generations - my mom, my son and me, set out to enjoy an evening show! The senior most generation had numerous memories, the middle generation had a few of them and the youngest generation had absolutely no clue of what was in store.
As we took our seats, the first item of the show was announced. It was my personal favourite, The Trapeze. Now there’s something quite captivating about the art. The trapeze is a horizontal bar hanging by two ropes and free to swing, used by acrobats in a circus. They hang onto the bars, swing in the air,take some twists and them comfortably grapple onto another suspended trapeze. This act has always enamoured me and I watch it with baited breath. The coordination between the two artists as to when one of them will leave her/his trapeze and as she/he swings in the air, the other artist on the other trapeze, mostly hanging upside down, catches hold of the arms of that artist. It is totally amazing to witness this act! Every time they did this successfully, we cheered and clapped.
The next few items included the rope acts by performers from Uzbekistan, in which the artist would swing around the rope, go up, come down and perform miraculous acts with dignified ease. Another was an act where a performer, enticed the audience by swinging thirty hoops around her waist all at the same time without even a single one falling. Then she twisted her waist, went upside down, picked up the bow and arrow with her toes and in an inverted position, performed archery! This act left every single person in the audience completely spellbound.
Another act included artists from Thailand in which they performed some scary acts by putting not one but five, twenty inches knives inside their mouth. The audience watched with gasps when they made an artist lie on the floor, blindfolded his partner, put a cucumber on the navel of the artist on the floor which his partner was supposed to chop off without of course injuring his partner. The audience had mixed reactions, some shut their eyes, some cheered, some watched in stunned silence. As the artist cut off the cucumber with one brisk stroke, the audience was definitely relieved. They performed more such acts and much to my relief, finished their acts soon.
As the background staff dextrously cleared the stage setting between various acts, the jokers did the filler acts. Looking at the shabby clothes and their sad eyes, as they joked about and people laughed at them, I was instantly transported to the movie, where Raj Kapoor, who was a joker in Gemini Circus, had to make people laugh, no matter how much sadness engulfed his heart.
One more act which left us completely stunned was when a performer drank almost half a bucket of water, topped it up with concentrates of red and green colour and then took out a fountain of first green colour and then of red colour. It was mesmerising to see how he could manage to keep the two colours segregated inside his stomach or wherever he was retaining it , and then shoot out different coloured fountains!
A few more acts of a girl balancing on a rope, and then putting a row of cups and saucers by picking up from one toe, throwing it up in the air and then efficiently placing it on the head without using her hand was certainly wonderful. Since acts by animals have been banned now on account of animal cruelty , there was just one act in which parrots performed some cute synchronised acts.
The show ended after almost two hours of performances. Each act left us speechless. We were dumbfounded by the skills of the artists. As opposed to my expectation, my son thoroughly enjoyed every moment. After every act he stated how staggeringly talented these artists were and how much more recognition they deserved. I felt a quiet satisfaction as I’d made my son witness a stupendous art and he had not failed to recognise and appreciate it. Three generations who had entered the circus tent with different expectations came out with the same emotion. We had unanimously enjoyed THE CIRCUS!
No comments:
Post a Comment