Cirque du Soleil: Delirium

Like Greg and his wife, Jenn and I saw Cirque du Soleil: Delirium on Sunday night. Our seats weren’t quite as close and I didn’t take any camera phone shots, but I still enjoyed the show.

Initially, I thought it was going to follow the same formula as all the other Cirque du Soleil shows we’ve seen. You know: weary traveller/interloper stumbles into foreign world of magic and delight and learns he/she isn’t so different after all. Plus silly clowns. Minus animals.

Well, Delirium is different for two reasons:

  1. The Space
  2. An arena show is much diffferent than a big-top show. Cirque du Soleil decided to do a modified theatre-in-the-round (more like theatre-in-the-opposite-sides) to deal with the size of the venue.

    One big, thin stage and huge curtains. Bringing me to point 2:

  3. The Curtains
  4. Huge, gauzy, semi-transparent screens where video was projected. Amazing.

    The skill and engineering of these shows never ceases to amaze me. Jenn and I wondered how such disparate parts could be made whole. Imagine the schematics and diagrams needed to choreograph the performers and the multimedia experience. Stunning and stupifying.

  5. The Music
  6. Ok, three things. 🙂

    This show was much less linear (I know. How is that possible) than other shows.

    About 1/3 of the way through, they dropped the standard interloper motif and went all-out for the music.

    In turn, this show featured much less acrobatics and feats of skill/strenght than you standard Cirque du Soleil show, but it was still a ton of fun.

Honorable mention: The Ticket Prices. Most. Expensive. Show. Ever.

There you go. Cirque du Soleil: Delirium

4 thoughts on “Cirque du Soleil: Delirium

  1. Yeah, we loved it… As I said on my blog (and the metroblog for cross posting shenanigans) it was a bit more theatrical than the usual fare of acrobatics/feats of skill/strength but it still had it’s fare share.

    But yeah, the ticket prices stung, we paid $127 (not including ticketmaster fees) each for seats that were 3 rows off the floor in the club level seats, and to be honest, we were too close… Too many times we had to not only move our heads, but swivel our entire bodies to see what was going on all around. I think the noosebleed seats would have been perfect to witness the whole panoramic effect of the stage.

    Hopfully the next time they come to town it’ll be back in the ol big top where you can score front row seats for a measly $75 like Alegria back in ’04.

  2. Tom A says:

    Cirque’s Delirium is to Cirque what brussel sprouts are to a great steak; what Austin Powers is to Dirty Harry.

    Delirium is NOT what Cirque has been about. Almost no acrobats. Just 90 minutes of monotone music with heavy percussion.

    Not a WOW moment in the entire show. Not one. I’ve been to 4 other Cirque shows. They are true to form. This one is a sucker punch.

    Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away.

  3. Kiyoka says:

    I thought it was alright. The only other Cirque show I’ve seen is La Nouba. But this doesn’t impress me. It seemed like a lot of interpretive dance… it was very confusing. There weren’t very many performers like we’re used to seeing with Cirque shows. In total, there are only 8 acrobats. The vast majority are dancers. Nothing against them, but watching only dancers for an hour and a half kind of gets tiring. I would have liked to see more action on the stage.
    The ending was interesting though… that was the only thing I found remoting intriguing ^^;;;

    Like Tom, I’d advise you to save your money.

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