CIRQUE DREAMS: JUNGLE FANTASY Reviews

AM New York gives the show 1 1/2 out of 4 Stars:

Whereas a typical Cirque du Soleil show combines European circus art with ambitious, often difficult concepts, Cirque Dreams, also a no-ring and non-animals circus, is far more straightforward, kiddy-friendly and bland.

Blown-up, air-inflated tree trunks cover the stage and the performers are dressed as amphibians and reptiles. The color design is meticulous and the individual feats are pretty impressive, but the G-rated, Disneyesque concept gets wearisome pretty quickly.

The backup musical score is pretty awful, but it was amusing to watch the female narrator sing about absolutely nothing for two hours...

http://www.amny.com/entertainment/stage/am-cirque0625,0,6303152.story

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Pretty uneducated review, it's not even a Cirque du Soliel!

Yes, i did, and while I agree with some of the opinion, and feel that these reviews will be pretty much the average review, it was still uneducated to claim it was a cirque du soleil produced show, and makes me curious if some of those comments are based on the fact he was expecting Cirque du soliel

"... but it was amusing to watch the female narrator sing about absolutely nothing for two hours..."

I just find that absolutely hysterical.

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wow.

Variety is Negative:

There’s no narrative thread, but within a crowded frame of gnarled vines and thick foliage, a boyishly charming jungle adventurer (Marcello Balestracci) is lured into a fantastical world of flora and fauna by Mother Nature (Jill Diane). She sings generic inspirational lyrics like “Nature will set you free” or “Watch and you will see your inner self come to be,” usually accompanied by a character billed as Soultree (Jared Burnett), a Fabio copycat sawing furiously on an electric violin, his sculpted torso and oiled tresses emerging from a tree trunk.

The interchangeable songs by Cirque Prods. musical director Jill Winters have titles like “Eyes Wide Open,” “You Can Grow Too,” “Courage” and “Strange Things,” but their words are pure nonsense. With vocalist Diane cranking up the dark sensuality and fierce enunciation in apparent homage to Shirley Bassey’s Bond themes, it’s merciful that long stretches of lyrics are incomprehensible over the disco-Muzak-meets-funked-up-faux-classical score...

http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117937538.html?categoryid=33&cs=1

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Talkin' Broadway is Negative:

...it’s easy enough to accept actors in turtle, frog, and unicorn costumes, to say nothing of the coterie of black-light owls and moths seen cavorting at the start of Act II. But when emus (native to Australia, I feel obliged to point out) start gliding across the stage on skateboards and meandering about with baby carriages, the illusion of the jungle is more than a little compromised. Not that consistency is to be necessarily expected - this is, after all, a stage lark and not a geography lesson - but when a show’s setting is all that differentiates it from scores of imitators, doesn’t it make more sense to get that right than to find ever-more inventive ways to get the leading man to remove his shirt?

Even if such a question is not one a show like this is supposed to inspire, at least it pinpoints the creators’ priorities. There can be no question that Goldberg and his colleagues have successfully distinguished their brand from that of the other, much more famous troupe with the word Cirque in its name. But that one built its reputation on variety and invention that gave greater weight to its humble appreciation of the untapped potential of the human body. Cirque Dreams: Jungle Fantasy revels so much in vague, unrealized ideas that you’re filled less with wonder than with the intense hope that du Soleil will come out tomorrow.

http://www.talkinbroadway.com/world/CirqueDreams.html

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The New York Times (with Charles Isherwood reviewing) is Mixed-to-Positive:

...Tastefulness, obviously, is not among the pronounced assets of “Cirque Dreams.” But the show’s low-tech simplicity is endearing, and a nice contrast to the hydraulics-heavy Las Vegas extravaganzas of Cirque du Soleil. (There’s just one set, a fanciful jungle landscape by Jon Craine, abloom in vines and mushrooms. In the second act, set at night, everything goes Day-Glo.)

The acts are sometimes standard, sometimes inspired variations on acrobatics and aerial gymnastics, juggling and balancing and limb twisting. They are performed with the usual daredevil panache and ouch-that-must-kill elasticity by the assembled international hordes. (Most are from Russia, Ukraine and Mongolia. Are there job fairs over there for these kinds of shows?) One of the most enjoyable sequences, believe it or not, was the frisky opening festival of jump-rope. One of the strangest was the “Blackbird Hairialist,” a woman who performs a series of airborne spinning feats while hanging from her ponytail. This does not look like fun, although it could offer a cheap alternative to a facelift.

The cheery presence of Mr. Balestracci, who jumps in and out of some acts and assists in others, provides a nice through-line. The children scattered throughout the audience seemed to be having a good time. Meanwhile you could practically see the little thought bubbles above the heads of many of the adults in the audience: “I must get back to the gym.”

http://theater2.nytimes.com/2008/06/27/theater/reviews/27cirq.html

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Saw this tonight. If you go into this thinking it is going to be a Broadway show, you will come out disappointed. If you go into it thinking it is going to be pure fun, you will enjoy it. I went in with low expectations and really enjoyed myself. The acrobatics/tricks/strength-gymnastics moves were fantastic. I also really loved the lighting for this show. The woman who played Mother Nature wasn't very good and the lyrics were abysmal, but for me, this show was about the visuals and the stunts, not the music/lyrics. The lead guy who played the Adventurer was also really hot...had a stunning body (he was shirtless a lot of the time). Also, the closing number with about 6 hot shirtless guys doing acrobatics was SO HOT. Very erotic. Reminded my friend and I of Broadway Bares. In fact, this entire cast could probably put on thier own Broadway Bares! I, along with the audience, had a great time. There are certainly worse ways to spend an evening...

The New York Sun is Mixed:

...This may offer a sense of just how tangentially the jungle theme has been integrated into the more typical circus fare. Mr. Goldberg's standard ploy is to put his acrobats center stage and flank them with a small handful of costumed animals who meander through and/or do a low-grade dance step. A wide-eyed protagonist named the Adventurer (the engaging Marcello Balestracci), ostensibly plucked from the audience, joins in here and there before ceding the stage to the headliners. Cirque Dreams has logged many hours on the casino circuit (look for "Pandemonia" at Foxwoods and "Holidaze" at Mohegan Sun later this year), and "Jungle Fantasy" would actually benefit from being hacked down to the 90-minute "tab versions" that Las Vegas prefers.

But Cirque events are a notable exception to the rule that shows are only as good as their weakest link — the music and concept pretty much always pull up the rear. Everything rides on the physical feats, and the vast majority of those in "Jungle Fantasy" are daring enough and clever enough to captivate audiences of all ages without overstaying their welcome. From the tiny Mongolian contortionists (sorry, Contorting Lizards) to the enormous Russian strongmen (oops, Jungle Kings), these gifted specimens execute their routines with a sharp eye for pacing and a minimum of pandering. An early bout of double-dutch jump-roping expands into triple and, amazingly, quadruple dutch, and the second act boosts the "wow" quotient even higher with an eye-catching trapeze duo and a pair of zoot-suited giraffes (Vladimir Dovgan and Anatoliy Yeniy), who navigate uncanny balancing acts on a variety of cylinders and platforms...

http://www.nysun.com/arts/above-and-beyond-a-three-ringed-affair/80798/

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Anyway, back to the show...

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"Pretty uneducated review, it's not even a Cirque du Soliel!"

The review wasn't saying it was affiliated with Cirque du Soliel, but rather it was also a no-ring, non-animal circus.

Also, if you read the first paragraph:

"Don't be misled by the title. Cirque Dreams is not Cirque du Soleil. In fact, Cirque du Soleil even sued Cirque Dreams for trademark infringement. But in fairness to Cirque Dreams, the court found that "cirque," French for circus, is too generic for Cirque du Soleil to claim possession."

He rarely compares these two shows except to mention the misconception and the fact that they are both big non-animal, no ring shows.

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