CABARET AT THE END OF THE WORLD renewable energy circus

CABARET AT THE END OF THE WORLD

We were CABARET AT THE END OF THE WORLD

A collaborative of nine artists and technicians, who emerged from diverse specializations including new circus, radical theatre and music. We came together to create a renewable energy powered circus.

We used solar panels, a wind turbine and in the end, a vegetable oil powered generator, because a production like this one, did take a lot of power. LED lights have come along way since then!
The generator was very smelly and the smell of chips was not very glamorous, so we painted it gold! We still came off stage smelling like we'd just finished a twelve hour shift at the local chippy, but it looked gorgeous! We also painted the eight metre, steel aerial rig gold. Now that was lovely.

We met up in France and pooled our resources and skills together. We were aerialists, acrobats, a hoop artist, theatre practitioners and musicians. We came up with a passionate tale of trapped circus artists, stuck inside a cabaret, running on a loop at the end of the world, trying to find an exit out. There was a madame keeping everyone under lock and key, a strange little girl on a tricycle, a drunk, ageing trapeze artist, a chainsmoking pianist who set his piano on fire. We had a torture scene over a bed of nails, a singing stage manager, an old woman with a terrible box of swords routine.

SO HOW DID WE GET A SHOW LIKE THIS TOGETHER?

We just decided to do it, formed a company, opened a bank account, applied for funding, applied to festivals and commited to it. Simple.

We toured this show in various forms for four years and also used our stage as a cabaret stage for other circus acts and bands.

We performed in France, Germany, Serbia, Spain and Portugal as well as UK festivals like Glastonbury and The Big Green Gathering.

I directed and co -wrote the show. At the time my son was still a baby, so I strapped him to my back and carried on working. He loved the circus life, moving around from place to place, meeting people and living in a caravan. One day, some of the performers were trying to make sound effects for a dramatic scene ,where terrible noises from outside our world are feeding through the door. They dangled his cup of milk in front of him and wouldn't let him take it , deliberately in order to make him cry. His dramatic cry of "titty" on the demonic soundtrack haunts me to this day!

After the first year I performed in the show too, playing a child prodidgy who has her nightmares inacted on bungee cords on the aerial rig.

This fusion of circus and theatre is perhaps my favourite performing art form. To bring, perhaps, stale circus tricks to life with character and context. To make theatre exciting with the added dimensions of aerial height and skilled tricks.

I love stories and always want performance to say something. It seems like a waste to gather a crowd and not discuss a burning issue of our times. I suppose this show was about how we know there is devastation going on outside in the world around us, but we choose to stay locked inside our own bubbles and not find a way to confront the real, outside world.

Although the show was performed fifteen years ago, the issue is getting more and more relevant. As we trawl the depths of Steemit, we are gaining more and more contact with people from accross the globe. The world today is in a terrible state, we all know it. How do we break out of our self imposed bubbles? How do we go out into the world and start making the changes we would like to see? Steemit is a start. Connection on a global scale has to be a start.

ARE WE LIVING IN OUR OWN CABARETS AT THE END OF THE WORLD?

LET'S OPEN THE DOOR AND LOOK OUTSIDE

photos are all my own or from our promotion