{"id":584032,"date":"2026-08-29T13:20:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T13:20:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/584032\/"},"modified":"2026-08-29T13:20:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T13:20:13","slug":"cirque-alice-full-of-elaborate-acts-and-surprises-new-zealand-arts-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/584032\/","title":{"rendered":"Cirque Alice full of elaborate acts and surprises \u2013 New Zealand Arts Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples<\/p>\n

\"\"The Cirque Alice cast take their final bow<\/p>\n

Cirque Alice<\/p>\n

Civic Theatre, Auckland<\/p>\n

August 28 \u2013 September 6<\/p>\n

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples<\/p>\n

\u00a0My invitation to Cirque Alice said that the dress code for the event was A Touch of Wonderland, a request which quite a few people had taken up with several sequined jackets and dresses seated close to me and some children wearing their Frozen dresses. The Civic Theatre was at its best as well, with the winking stars and the occasional comet streaking across the ceiling of the theatre. \u00a0The theatre itself was flossed up with spotlights and laser light sparkling across the stage and audience, creating the setting for an extravagant evening. Then we were reminded of where we are and who we were to meet when the White Queen commanded us to ensure there was no flash photography or it would be \u201coff with your head\u201d.<\/p>\n

Cirque du Soleil shows are always elaborate gymnastic displays, but they are always imbedded with a story or narrative which loosely holds all the characters and the events together.<\/p>\n

The advertising for Cirque Alice\u00a0said it was a reimagined Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll\u2019s classic tale of characters and adventures but like a lot of Cirque show after establishing the reason for being there the evening takes on a rather casual approach to the narrative. The characters are all immediately recognisable \u2013 Alice, White Rabbit and Mad Hatter but their adventures and exploits take you to another realm.<\/p>\n

The show featured\u00a0a lineup of\u00a0some of the greatest circus and magic performers on earth\u00a0\u2013 from\u00a0America\u2019s Got Talent: Fantasy League, and\u00a0Cirque du Soleil the cast members were among\u00a0the very best acrobatic, music and dance talent\u00a0in the world.<\/p>\n

The various acts were set to an\u00a0enthralling soundtrack\u00a0of newly arranged contemporary takes on some of the world\u2019s favourite classical hits \u2013 Lakme, Swan Lake and Flight of the Bumble Bee while the costumes designed by Angele Aaron were stunning.<\/p>\n

\"\"The March Hare and Alice<\/p>\n

Alice (Layla Schillert) is on stage a lot of the time and with her brilliant soprano voice she wowed the audiencia with some captivating singing. There are even has a few sequences which have been taken for the book. So that when she drinks from an unlabelled bottle, she ends up fifteen metres above the stage with a vast train of a dress.<\/p>\n

But it is the Mad Hatter (Darren \u201cDizzy\u201d Partridge) who is the stand-out performer and one of the few characters who speaks to the audience He is the part magician who gets audience members on the stage. We also get quite a lot of The White Rabbit (Raphael Papo) playing his violin.<\/p>\n

The various acts are cleverly structured so that there are spectacular acts where the audience holds its collective breath for several minutes along with acts which are just amazing for the dexterity of the performers as they create small, intimate, poetic moments.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Caterpillar<\/p>\n

One of these poetic more acts was The Caterpillar (Munkhjin Tuvd, Bayarmaa Ganbat, Shinechimeg Otgonbayar and Dolgorsuren Ganbold) where the four performers balance and intertwine with each other bodies creating extraordinary patterns and rhythms.<\/p>\n

Then there were acts where you can\u2019t really believe what someone is attempting. There have been many cabaret acts where performers balance a short platform on a ball, managing to keep their balance, but when The Dormouse (Daniel Onofre) starts to pile six tubes on top of each other your heart is in your mouth and then while he is wobbling on this pile of tubes, he introduced a couple of hula hoops which he threaded through his legs and body \u2013 ridiculously complicated.<\/p>\n

The White King and White Queen (Mathieu and Myriam Lessard) wearing roller skates performed a duo, spinning around on top of a small circular stage and it looked a bit inelegant. Roller skating is pretty difficult at the best of times but the balancing and twirling that they engaged in started to seem impossible. Then when they began spinning with the King supporting the Queen with only a strip held between their two mouths the act became unbelievable and dangerous.<\/p>\n

There were a couple of acts where the performers strength and skill was obvious. The Knights (Fadhili Rashidi and Ibrahim Mwaimise) walk around, climb steps and ladders all the time balancing each other on their heads. They did it all with such grace and ease that it makes you think it must be easy, until one of them nearly trips and you realise it\u2019s not that easy.<\/p>\n

A Cirque du Soleil show is always more than just entertainment. You get to see people whose skills are exceptional and whose acts are refined to the point that they transcend regular circus and acrobatic performances such as we regularly see the at the Auckland Festival. This is what years of practice, concentration and commitment can achieve.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples The Cirque Alice cast take their final bow Cirque Alice Civic Theatre, Auckland August…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":584033,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[111,43,139,69],"class_list":["post-584032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=584032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/584033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=584032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=584032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=584032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}