Review- The Elephant in the Room- Udderbelly
18-1-16
By: Cindy Kim
The Elephant in The Room is described as a “fusion of world-class circus, film noir and physical theatre." This styled physical act performed by Cirque le Roux seems to be a sober affair, but is instead energizing and exciting.
The Elephant in the Room maintains an elegant aesthetic of a nineteenth century smoking lounge, if it were viewed through a monochrome filter. The black and white set consists entirely of various shades of off-white furniture, and patterned wallpaper, giving the audience the illusion of a movie-esque film aided by the ingenious use of projection to show the credits before the performance had even truly started.
It was in this kind of atmospheric set up that Cirque de Roux executed all of their feats with immense poise and a natural kind of effort. And of course, it wasn’t only the physical feats which I felt made this performance amazing. There were rotating intervals of comprehensible speech, gibberish, snippets of French, and silence throughout the performance, applied where appropriate for the situation. The vocalization may have come secondary to the showmanship of the physical acts, but they were complimentary to the performance all the same. However, there were some issues with the sound balance for the music, as it was simply too loud at some points.
The acrobatics were very well integrated into the narrative of the performance as stylized violence switched seamlessly into swings and lifts, and not to mention the slapstick gags. I heard a few children giggling at the sight of a man being slapped in the face by a door, but these moments were few and far between. The Elephant in the Room was rife with symbolism that even I wasn’t quite fully able to understand, as so much of the meaning is imparted through the physicality of the performers, so I’m not sure how much those children took away from this, but they seemed to enjoy it.
The slapstick also turned to serious atmospheric drama and slower paced acrobatics, especially nearing the conclusion of the performance. The performers showed their diverse abilities through some more technical modern pop beats in the acts for variety, and it was a different tone which was welcomed. There were some enchanting set piece changes introduced new elements in perfectly timed intervals to keep the interest of the audience; the highlight and conclusion to the show being the giant pole brought in running the entire height of the tent. All in all, an enchanting experience I would love to see a second time.
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