Latest news with #CalMcCrystal
Telegraph
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
There's no better way of spending a family evening than Gifford's Circus
Celebrating its 25th anniversary yet seeming to have been a fixture in the circus landscape for aeons, the old-world charm of the Cotswolds-based Giffords Circus offers an antidote to everything that's miserable about the UK at the moment. The sight of Giffords' big-top, with attendant gypsy caravans – as if spirited from the pages of Dickens but serving lots of good grub and drink too – is itself enchanting. And the bucolic vision of its late founder Nell Gifford of like-minded artists pitching up on village greens is honoured by the picturesque stop-offs. But the visual delight is maximised by the 1950s America-themed show itself, which, with Cal McCrystal directing, has the aura of a fully-fledged theatre production. Projected imagery of rippling water bathes the ring-floor to help conjure a dreamlike resort inspired by Atlantic City. There's neon signage for Sal's Motel, a soda bar booth, palm trees, and a bandstand. The retro music, performed live, emits a sunshine blast of nostalgia. An opening bout of beach-ball, for instance, is conducted to the happy-clappy sound of doo-wop hit Lollipop, a grinning acrobatic troupe from Ethiopia casually juggling clubs and stepping in time to the tunes. This isn't one for those craving a lot of spectacular death-defying daring – no one is flying from a trapeze, being shot from a cannon or whizzing at speed on motorbikes. Much entertainment is provided by irrepressible resident buffoon Tweedy. Cast as the motel bellboy, he kicks things off with inspired ineptitude involving a deck-chair, and continually tries to sabotage the cheesy variety magician (Maxi), his yearning for ice-cream climaxing in a drenching melée. The animal contribution is also lo-fi and reassuringly genteel: a brazenly bribed Shetland pony and an eager Patterjack are the cutest mascots. It's all very English, with a put-on American accent. Yet while homespun, it still reaches for the stars – and takes risks. The young Garcia brothers (Antonio and Connor) elicit awe with their lithe, gravity-defying handstands, spinning headstands and Charles Atlas physiques. Their parents, Pablo and Vikki provide tongue-in-cheek jeopardy, dangling from a renegade vintage air-plane. Spanish beefcake Randy Forgione Vega whirls high in the air, wielding hand-straps and old-school machismo. But for elegance, grace and a sensuousness that defines the show's judicious mix of flamboyance, flesh and family-friendly fare, there's no beating Daniela Muñoz Landestoy from Cuba and Noémi Novakovics who hails from Hungary. The pair ascend to the sound of Gershwin's Summertime (blissfully sung by Nell O'Hara) and hang suspended and twirling using just their hair for support (ouch!). It's all over in a flash, yet you intuit the long dedication and sense of personal destiny behind it. We must treasure these folk – and their art-form. An art-form perpetuated with toil, sweat and thrilling bravura by Giffords. Tours to Sept 28; tickets: giffordscircus
Irish Times
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
L'Elisir d'Amore review: A perfectly OTT Claudia Boyle sings thrillingly in INO's winningly slapstick take on Donizetti
L'Elisir d'Amore Gaiety Theatre, Dublin ★★★★★ Irish National Opera is closing its season with six nights – four in Dublin plus one each in Wexford and Cork – of comic opera, a genre in which the seven-year-old company already has a really good record. Donizetti's L'Elisir d'Amore feels like a ball not to be dropped. Its popularity and permanent place in the repertory have their roots in the fact that for an entire decade, from 1838 to 1848, it was the most performed opera in Italy. But comedy gives a ball a unique slipperiness – think about the unfunny flops of stage and screen that we've all cringed through or abandoned. Therefore, to complete the slam dunk that L'Elisir d'Amore promises on paper, INO has entrusted its season finale to Cal McCrystal , a director for whom comedy is a speciality. This is his first production for INO. He had never seen L'Elisir d'Amore before. And the audience laughs. I laugh. 'A good comedy,' McCrystal remarks in the production's programme, 'is where people laugh hard and a bad comedy is when they sit quietly tittering. I like big loud laughs.' And it's big laughs that he secures with a comic modus operandi that is unapologetically physical, visual slapstick. READ MORE Once or twice as I'm laughing I find myself wondering, Who isn't? Who is disappointed? Disgusted? And there are indeed moments when comic antics threaten to undermine the music and cross a line that McCrystal acknowledges but likes to approach. But those moments are seldom. Although McCrystal's relocation of the story to the American wild west has been done before, styling Nemorino as Woody from Disney's Toy Story is probably a first. When he first appears I think ahead to act two and wonder how the cartoon-cowboy look might diminish the emotional impact of the opera's most famous and non-comic aria, Una Furtiva Lagrima. But by then the agile and sweet-toned tenor Duke Kim has endeared himself as the story's lovable, love-struck hero. We don't care what he's wearing, and the song hits home. L'Elisir d'Amore: Claudia Boyle. Photograph: Ros Kavanagh L'Elisir d'Amore: Duke Kim and Claudia Boyle. Photograph: Ros Kavanagh L'Elisir d'Amore: Gianluca Margheri. Photograph: Ros Kavanagh American Gothic: L'Elisir d'Amore: Photograph: Ros Kavanagh Kim is surpassed in vocal agility by the neat and thrilling coloratura of the soprano Claudia Boyle , as Adina. Crucially, Boyle also brings an excellent comic presence as she flaunts her numerous costume changes, each more Scarlett O'Hara than the last. She is perfectly OTT, as is the bass Gianluca Margheri, as the alpha-male love rival Sergeant Belcore, the unabashed display of whose gym-chiselled torso makes us all wither with despair on Nemorino's behalf. Funniest of all is INO's always dependable funny man John Molloy, less than a year on from his hard-hitting depiction of the Older Man in Trade , Emma O'Halloran's gritty two-hander. As Dulcamara, the charlatan purveyor of the titular love potion, Molloy is consistently comic in gesture and inflection. Conducting, Erina Yashima keeps the music light-footed and lively, ably co-ordinating her large, busy chorus, where McCrystal has embedded so much funny dancing and caricature. He and the designer Sarah Bacon must have had a blast slipping in Laurel and Hardy, Abraham Lincoln, soldiers as Keystone Kops, and the grim-faced couple from American Gothic, Grant Wood's 1930 painting. L'Elisir d'Amore, staged by Irish National Opera , is at the Gaiety Theatre , Dublin, on Tuesday, May 27th, Thursday, May 29th, and Saturday, May 31st; at the National Opera House , Wexford, on Wednesday, June 4th; and at Cork Opera House on Saturday, June 7th
BBC News
12-02-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Giffords Circus celebrates 25 years with retro American show
One of the UK's best-known traditional travelling circuses is celebrating its 25th anniversary with a new 1950s America-themed magicians, musicians and clowns will be part of the Giffords Circus show, which is named Laguna troupe will go on tour in the Cotswolds from 17 April to 28 September, starting in director Cal McCrystal said: "Set in the buoyant and sunny era of 1950s America, Laguna Bay is a spectacular blend of fun, excitement and charm." In 2022, Giffords Circus was invited to perform an act at the Royal Albert Hall for the Royal Variety 2012, Giffords Circus has been guided by Mr McCrystal, and award-winning director, writer and directing career spans Cirque du Soleil, the Royal Shakespeare Company, Irish National Theatre, English National Opera and Glyndebourne Sauce – a travelling restaurant – will return to accompany the Laguna Bay tour, serving a banquet-style three-course meal on selected evenings.
