It’s going down, and Cirque Alfonse is yelling “timber!” in its circus show coming to MemAud on Wednesday night.
Though most circuses include clowns and animals, Cirque Alfonse’s Timber! includes lumberjacks and farm equipment.
As a part of the Ohio University Performing Arts and Concert Series, the troupe will perform its music-filled acrobatics show in Templeton-Blackburn Alumni Memorial Auditorium on Wednesday.
“I first came across Timber! and Cirque Alfonse at a booking conference a couple years ago,” Andrew Holzaepfel, the senior associate director of the Campus Involvement Center, said. “I had an opportunity to see the show in Cleveland at the International Children’s Theater Festival and was blown away by the approach and the really positive response of the audience.”
The show, which has been traveling with its current members since 2010, is a mix of traditional Quebec folklore and the “cirque noveau” style, which is similar to what is seen in Cirque du Soleil.
Since its inception, Cirque Alfonse has performed shows in 13 countries in Europe, Asia and Australia.
The team includes professional acrobats, dancers, musicians and even a champion ex-skier. Members of the company have even been a part of Cirque du Soleil along with numerous other international circus companies.
“It was a great way to present a cirque show on our season that was both unique and with an international approach,” Holzaepfel said.
The show is different from “proper” circus acts, according to Geneviève Morin, who handles communication for Cirque Alfonse.
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“All of the apparatuses are made with tools from the family farm,” Morin said. “It’s not a typical circus.”
The theme of the show is based on farms and forestry and the expeditions of early North American lumberjacks, farmers and loggers.
“The village we live in is in the woods, and our grandfathers and uncles were lumberjacks,” Antoine Carabinier-Lépine, the co-founder of Cirque Alfonse and an acrobat in Timber!, said. “We wanted have a tribute to them and keep their spirit alive. Being a lumberjack is a part of our history.”
Timber! includes members of Carabinier-Lépine’s family, along with others from Saint-Alphonse-Rodriguez, Quebec, Canada.
“We all come from the small village of Saint-Alphonse-Rodriguez. My sister and me grew up and started the show in our family’s barn,” Carabinier-Lépine said. “My dad, sister and brother-in-law are all in the show.”
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