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CIRCUS - TV Series Featuring Big Apple Circus
Posted January 14, 2009
This show doesn't begin to air until Fall 2010, but the publicity
engine is already whirring.
From the PR Newswire:
NEW MULTI-PART SERIES PREMIERES FALL 2010
Award-Winning Cinematographers of Acclaimed CARRIER Series Turn Their
Lenses on Performers and Their Stories for Intimate Look
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 7 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In a world that offers
a dizzying array of amusements and entertainments, there is none quite
so enduring or universal as the circus. Now, over the course of many
dramatic hours, Show of Force, the team who brought viewers the Emmy
Award-winning PBS series CARRIER, turn their lenses on the circus --
not just under the big top, but far beyond it -- into what circus folk
call "the backyard," the place where the trailers are parked and the
real heart of the circus beats. Slated to premiere in fall 2010 on
PBS, CIRCUS will illuminate the sights, sounds and stories of this
fascinating cultural heritage.
"CIRCUS will let viewers escape into this world, see it as never
before and understand what it takes to live this life -- virtually an
art form -- that dates back centuries," says John Boland, PBS Chief
Content Officer. "We will enrich the revelations and discovery even
more through deep and dynamic online and educational
components."
With unprecedented access granted by the Big Apple Circus, the
filmmakers will follow the traveling company over the course of an
entire season, showcasing the circus community's wandering caravan,
"the city without a zip code." Viewers will witness the circus as a
world unto itself, with its own lingo, rules and tight-knit community.
Among the 150 adults who make up the company, there are the expected
clowns, tightrope walkers, trapeze artists and animal trainers, as
well as carpenters, electricians, concessionaires (known in circus
lingo as "butchers"), musicians, ushers, cooks, teachers and even
clergy. Performers come from all over the world to travel with Big
Apple -- the Nanjing Duo from China, the Flying Neves from Brazil, the
Rodion Troupe from Russia, Olivier Taquin from Belgium and Sultan
Kumisbayev from Kazakhstan -- making a diverse traveling
family.
"As a filmmaker, it has been an incredible window into a cultural
legacy that has never been explored before with this depth and
honesty," said Maro Chermayeff, executive producer, co-creator and
director.
Going behind the scenes, the cameras capture the training and
rehearsals, the flubs and foibles, the bravery and the intensity of
life -- and work -- in the circus. Along the way, viewers will get
lessons in how to juggle, walk a tightrope and do a triple somersault.
The series also will offer a revealing look at the ways in which the
company of a traveling big top circus governs itself. Constantly in
motion, startlingly insular and completely interdependent for months
on end, the circus community demands a uniquely high level of
sociability, diplomacy and flat-out patience. CIRCUS will explore the
various ways the company navigates conflict, internally and with
outsiders, underscoring just how challenging it can be to spend every
day and night for nine or 10 months straight with 150 other people of
differing nationalities, belief systems and backgrounds.
A fresh and highly current combination of cinema verite and unscripted
drama will allow viewers to fully explore the texture of circus life
-- and, in the process, illuminate its enduring mystery and allure.
CIRCUS will feature an interactive, Web-based educational outreach
component that will further explore not only the ideas and issues
raised by the programs, but the circus' lengthy and storied history in
the United States as well. Providing a broad spectrum of engaging
components -- from series outtakes to circus trivia, from online
interactive debates to exclusive video clips that reveal the secrets
of the modern circus -- the Web site will promote the series to new
viewers, allow current viewers to dig deeper into the show's content
and offer educators a variety of tech-savvy, attention-grabbing ways
to utilize the physical, scientific and historical bases of the circus
in their curricula.
CIRCUS is a production of Show of Force. Created, Executive Produced
and Directed by Maro Chermayeff and Jeff Dupre. Produced by Matthew
Akers.
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