Various cirque notes.

Worked 2 days, 3 shows last week; 1 show Weds (inside (door5)), 2 on Sunday (outside (tent1)).

While I can't actually hum the show yet, I'm getting far more familiar with it.

The inside job is very quiet during the show, except that Varekai has something like 5 'blackouts' in it - where the ushers have the (simple) job of holding up a block in front of the exit signs, and the occasional seating of late-arriving people in the brief times you're allowed to between acts.

After the show comes the tent-cleaning. 3-4 people are the 'bartenders' - gathering all the non-empty beverages and decanting them into 5gal buckets for later draining. (I could not help but think that there are places where good money would be bet on dares to drink that unholy sludge...) A couple of people are the 'garbagemen', who haul the full trashbags out to the dumpster, and everyone's responsible for sweeping, bagging and generally neatening the tent (including picking up all the confetti which is spewed at the end of the show.

During this cleanup, I got to see various aspects of the stage reset - most notably that the cloth for the "Slippery Surface" act is pulled back out, spread and minutely inspected... this seems tedious, though understandable.

The interval between shows on 2 show days is 90m, but it's only 60m until from the end of the 1st til when the tent is opened for seating for the 2nd.

On Saturday, I was outside. We had more people arriving 45-60m into the show. We evidentially had Guy Laliberté (founder/CEO), and a bunch of the Montreal bigwigs watching for the 1st show and Tom Menino (Mayor of Boston) for the 2nd.

The break/lunch pattern for 2show days (outside) seems to be: After the show starts, one person goes to help sweep inside, while the other stays on the gate. After Anton's Net (about 20m in), 2 back-to-back 15m breaks are given. During the 1st break, the person on break is free to go shopping for merch at a 40% discount. The person on 2nd break is SOL for the day.

During intermission, one person stays out by the gate tobe senic and answer what few questions come their way. The other heads to the 'lobby'/inner courtyard to work 'PR' - a more active version of being scenic and answering questions.

After everyone's back inside, the person who didn't sweep the 1st time goes and sweeps.

After Slippery Surface, the person who took the 1st break takes lunch (30m).

At the end of the show, one person stays outside and serves as a valve, letting people out but not letting the next show's patrons in, while the other goes in, sweeps a bit (people don't have time to make too much of a mess on their way out) and resets the bags of booster seats.

During the 2nd show, everything's the same except that the 2nd lunch occurs after Anton's Net and there's no other breaks.

At the end of the show, there's more sweeping, gathering the booster seats and then the person who isn't closing (me this time) clocks out.

Exciting, no?

This week, I'm working inside on Weds, Sat and Sun. Let me know if you're coming to any of the shows and what door's on your ticket and maybe I'll try to work your door.

Various cirque notes.

Worked 2 days, 3 shows last week; 1 show Weds (inside (door5)), 2 on Sunday (outside (tent1)).

While I can't actually hum the show yet, I'm getting far more familiar with it.

The inside job is very quiet during the show, except that Varekai has something like 5 'blackouts' in it - where the ushers have the (simple) job of holding up a block in front of the exit signs, and the occasional seating of late-arriving people in the brief times you're allowed to between acts.

After the show comes the tent-cleaning. 3-4 people are the 'bartenders' - gathering all the non-empty beverages and decanting them into 5gal buckets for later draining. (I could not help but think that there are places where good money would be bet on dares to drink that unholy sludge...) A couple of people are the 'garbagemen', who haul the full trashbags out to the dumpster, and everyone's responsible for sweeping, bagging and generally neatening the tent (including picking up all the confetti which is spewed at the end of the show.

During this cleanup, I got to see various aspects of the stage reset - most notably that the cloth for the "Slippery Surface" act is pulled back out, spread and minutely inspected... this seems tedious, though understandable.

The interval between shows on 2 show days is 90m, but it's only 60m until from the end of the 1st til when the tent is opened for seating for the 2nd.

On Saturday, I was outside. We had more people arriving 45-60m into the show. We evidentially had Guy Laliberté (founder/CEO), and a bunch of the Montreal bigwigs watching for the 1st show and Tom Menino (Mayor of Boston) for the 2nd.

The break/lunch pattern for 2show days (outside) seems to be: After the show starts, one person goes to help sweep inside, while the other stays on the gate. After Anton's Net (about 20m in), 2 back-to-back 15m breaks are given. During the 1st break, the person on break is free to go shopping for merch at a 40% discount. The person on 2nd break is SOL for the day.

During intermission, one person stays out by the gate tobe senic and answer what few questions come their way. The other heads to the 'lobby'/inner courtyard to work 'PR' - a more active version of being scenic and answering questions.

After everyone's back inside, the person who didn't sweep the 1st time goes and sweeps.

After Slippery Surface, the person who took the 1st break takes lunch (30m).

At the end of the show, one person stays outside and serves as a valve, letting people out but not letting the next show's patrons in, while the other goes in, sweeps a bit (people don't have time to make too much of a mess on their way out) and resets the bags of booster seats.

During the 2nd show, everything's the same except that the 2nd lunch occurs after Anton's Net and there's no other breaks.

At the end of the show, there's more sweeping, gathering the booster seats and then the person who isn't closing (me this time) clocks out.

Exciting, no?

This week, I'm working inside on Weds, Sat and Sun. Let me know if you're coming to any of the shows and what door's on your ticket and maybe I'll try to work your door.