The Daredevil Opera Company - Cirkus Inferno

The Herald (Scottish National Newspaper)
Friday May 30, 2003
Mary Brennan

There’s a certain age – seven is about right – when a circus seems like paradise. Things that grown-ups say no to – like walking washing-line tightropes, or lion-taming the neighbor’s fierce dog – are everyday activities there. Heck, a circus positively encourages you to make a career out of dangerous stunts and clowning. Cue Canada’s Daredevil Opera Company with their exuberant whiz-bang celebration of slapstick and mayhem, Cirkus Inferno. Before long, we all want to run away with them in the hope that Lady (Amy Gordon) will give us a shot on her Jet Skates or Lucky (Jonah Logan) will enlist us for the gravity-defying Pogo Moon Shot.
At first, the twosome are clutzy latecomers, scrambling over rows of seated youngsters and scattering popcorn everywhere. Didn’t an official-sounding man just warn everybody not to make a mess? By the time Lucky and Lady are onstage, ignoring very large warning signs and rooting around among the props, the tally of “uh-oh” moment is into double figures and rising. They are effortlessly accident-prone and totally lovable. Hilarious cartoon mishaps come complete with orchestrated biff-bang-whallop sound effects and they even use fire and sparkly pyrotechnics. It is calculated clowning that gives a fresh energy to traditions sustained by the likes of Buster Keaton, whose look (and outlook) are reflected in Logan’s performance. A mega-hit-a-roonie, folks!

The Seattle Times
Thursday, May 15, 2003
Melinda Bargreen

Cirkus Inferno: Messy, Explosive, Virtuoso Clowning
Forget “opera”; that’s just part of the title. Here is every child’s dream come true: a pair of virtuoso clowns putting on a show that’s enormously messy, full of things that blow up and explode, with pratfalls and flame-throwing roller skates and fart jokes and action galore.
The kids at the premiere were screaming with laughter at the antics of Jonah Logan and Amy Gordon, two Canadian clowns of incredible range and energy, who open the show by arriving in the audience – climbing the wooden bleachers at the Fisher Pavilion, clambering over patrons and spilling their huge containers of popcorn and bottles of water everywhere. Waiting for a circus performance that cancels at the last minute, the two clowns go down to the stage to investigate the circus’ props, including a Combustible Canine, a rocket costume, the ukulele lade Hula Lula and a janitor’s cart with a life of it’s own.
With the stage awash in confetti and streamers and spilled popcorn a Seattle Center worker said it’s hard for them to clean up afterwards. “You have no idea,” she said, rolling her eyes, “but it’s absolutely worth it for such a great show.”

Theatrereviews.com (Edinburgh, Scotland)

May 31, 2003Forget opera, and to a large extent circus. This is the world of silent film slapstick: the central male character’s flat hat and deadpan expression recall Buster Keaton specifically.
There’s mayhem in the audience before things are properly underway as a young man and his girl edge along the front circle then stalls, scattering popcorn and squirting liquid all around. The promised show they’ve come to see, ‘Cirkus Inferno’ is cancelled, so they clamber on to a stage surrounded by posters for various genre films and proceed to create their worlds with a variety of physical near-accidents and disasters.
As always it’s the skill with which danger is made to appear inevitable, and then avoided by ingenuity or emergency action which makes this so scarifyingly sunny. Though real fear’s held well at bay by the performers’ sublimely confident expressions.
The show also celebrates the edgy confrontation between anarchy and order in life. Moment before popcorn and liquied are spraying wildly around, the audience has been given a No Eating or Drinking rule. A No Laughing rule wouldn’t survive half-a-minute with the circus on skates.
Cast: Paul Weir, Jonah Logan, Amy Gordon

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