After acclaimed appearances in Vancouver, at the Diamant de Québec and in Toronto, the avant-garde Australian circus Gravity & Other Myths presents its show The Mirror at La Tohu. The troupe, which has been pushing the boundaries of its art since its birth in 2009, is once again keeping its promise with this fascinating creation.
The show, billed as the most ambitious of the six created by Gravity to date, is breathtaking from start to finish.
The Mirror does not present a succession of scenes where the acrobats perform the numbers one after the other according to the disciplines. It is more of a collective cabaret mixing dance, aerobatics, music and video for more than an hour. It’s funny at times, often breathtaking, human and magnificent from sunrise until the curtain falls.
The show revolves around our sometimes obsessive relationship with screens, vehicles through which our gaze seems to plunge into the world, but which above all refer us to our egos and the representation that we want to maintain of ourselves.
From this theme which touches without stiffening The Mirror, nine acrobats perform an almost uninterrupted dance for 80 minutes. Together, they perform, to the electronic music of composer Ekrem Eli Phoenix, a choreography which unfolds in thousands of gestures executed with astonishing synchronicity and punctuated by the wonders of the circus which further magnify the dance.
The bodies rush, twist, fly at times from one end of the stage to the other, pile up and twist in a spectacle which enjoys defying Newton and his law of gravitation. The physical performance of the performers is colossal, their determination to push the boundaries of the possible, fascinating to observe.
Halfway through the show, for example, at the moment when the acrobatics multiply to the point of almost seeming easy, the ballet stops and one, two, three people pile up on one person’s shoulders and hold pose for several minutes. The human base grimaces with effort and the audience, glued to their seats, takes the full measure of the feats that have been taking place before their eyes from the start.
Darcy Grant’s direction does a lot with few resources. A giant screen planted on the boards recalls those that the “ Homo instagramus » scans compulsively in search of “Like”. LED lighting, sometimes fixed, sometimes held by the performers, drapes the stage in a dark, dense, sometimes languorously scarlet atmosphere.
The Australian actress and singer Megan Drury also joins the acrobats to revisit some classics from a repertoire that goes from immortal to Summertime has Toxic, the pop bomb of Britney Spears. Its score does not clash with the heart of the show — quite the contrary. His appearances, with a portable camera aimed at his face, give rhythm to the whole thing and opportunities for the audience to laugh heartily.
Gravity & Other Myths returns to the metropolis a few months after the presentation of The Pulse, last July, as part of Montreal completely circus. This new show once again leaves a lasting impression of wonder upon exit: run for it.