World Circus

Circus is a very important part of culture.

It's entertainment. It's an art.

I come from a circus family.

That's my life.

I've performed in the circus since I was 7.

32 years. Gypsy lifestyle.

Circus now -- it's a way of thinking, make the impossible real.

Monte Carlo definitely is the highest, prestigious contest

within the circus community.

It's essentially the academy awards of the circus arts.

To get the golden clown, you have to be exceptional.

We only take, really, the best of the best.

First, of course, yes, when we was very small, we didn't

know how to do the makeup, and

my mom always used to do the makeup for us.

But then when we was 14, 15, we always start to do ourselves.

Ah. Let's go.

When you don't hear them, that's not the best sign, you know?

Maybe you open the door, and nobody comes.

I'm the Porter.

So we throw him, and then, after, we catch him.

They're risking their life, giving joy to the audience.

That is a very pure notion that

I don't believe exists too many places in this world.

Whoo!

Three hours till the show.

Ah. Three hours.

Mika -- name of the chicken on the veranda for Tonga.

I just hope that an animal act wins.

Since we was kids, me and my

sister -- we start to perform in the circus.

In the beginning, it's a bit scary.

It was when I was small, but now

not anymore 'cause we fly all the time.

First we would study in the circus school for four years and

then we finish and my dad take us in his act.

My favorite part is beginning when we start to run,

and hopefully nobody confused.

We have five new members.

Four of them are from China, and one of them from Kyrgyzstan.

It's not far from Kazakhstan.

So, we hope we can do success with them.

David! David!

Hello, darling.

There are my good girls.

Since I can remember, we've had lions and tigers in our home,

when the mothers didn't have

enough milk for the baby lions and tigers.

So, we always had big cats around us.

At 19, I left England with my lion act.

I had eight lionesses.

I decided to go to Belgium,

France, Italy, Spain, and now I'm here in Germany.

Oh! Look at that!

Look at that big belly, huh?

He's weighing about 350 kilos.

Pounds -- what's that -- pounds, 2.2 pounds to a kilo?

700 pounds? Is that right?

Steak.

Good girl. See the claws?

They all have their claws, so they get their claws out.

I'm not teasing them.

They're just telling me to go away.

That's their feeding time now,

so you have to respect them for that.

I'm not scared of the lions.

I respect them.

I know what they can do.

I know they're the perfect killing machine.

They can break an antelope's neck with one blow of their paw.

So, I know I don't have a chance with the lions, but I don't

really think like that when I walk in the cage.

I think more if all the lights go out or if I bang my head on a

prop because I'm moving so fast and I knock myself out.

Of course, then it's very dangerous because you actually

end up maybe scaring the lion,

and if a lion is scared, they will attack.

That's their first defense.

But the worst thing that ever happened to me was not an

attack -- because if it was an attack, I wouldn't be talking to

you now -- was, I go up the pyramid at the end of my act and

I slipped and land on the lion.

I shocked him because I actually slipped on the pyramid and hit

with my shoulder in the side of my lion.

So, as he turned around, his big tooth here -- he turned around

and basically headbutted me, but with his tooth.

So, it sliced the side of my face open.

And that was a really close call.

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.

I start my career, 1977, in Moscow circus.

The first, I start on trampoline, but I was looking

something weird, they would say, something -- unusual things.

I was kind of inventor for this discipline.

And now I am really happy father.

I have three boys.

One of them is a Porter.

The middle one is a red man, what they call a red man.

It's an actor.

And the smallest one is Nikita.

I'm 15 years old.

I've been touring with cirque for basically all my life.

I was born on cirque.

We had one trick when my

flyer hold Nikita and rotate in the air.

Of course, Nikita growing up, and he is almost my height now.

Three years ago, Nikita learned how to be flyer.

Basically in the morning, I go to school.

After school, usually I have training.

After that, put on makeup, costume, and go do the show.

After the show, basically just go home and go to bed right away

and then the next morning just

wake up and go to school and same thing over and over.

Of course when you start in the beginning, it's scary because

it's something new, but you

start out simple, just doing simple jumps.

You slowly progress so that you

gain experience, and you're not scared as much.

It was always a dream for me to work with animals.

So, straight after military

service, I went to Germany, in an attraction park, just

cleaning for fish buckets in a dolphinarium.

He's really an actor.

He's unbelievable, this animal.

He speaks even English, huh?

Smile!

I worked as a secretary and then I met Roland and I fell in

love with him and the sea lions

and exchanged my writing machine for a fish bucket.

That's Joe.

It's cold. It's cold.

They prefer a little bit warmer, yeah.

Monte Carlo weather in the winter is perfect.

I grew up working in new York city, doing a couple

of musicals as a child role.

And when I got to 18, I needed to find a new job, so I went to

circus school, and the best

thing that I found out of it was being a clown.

I've been doing clown work for 18 years.

So, everything that's come about from the beginning till now is

something I can draw up on to create with.

I have a good opportunity right

now to be involved in the circus/variety community here

and establish myself and make a name.

So, I'm taking advantage of it while I have the opportunity

'cause it might not come around again.

I'm using the time to work out some ideas of how a routine that

I want to present in Monte Carlo should go.

No. No. No. No.

Friends of mine have been there and spoke about it and said it's

a good networking place for business, so -- I have no idea

because I've never been there.

Set it upon myself to be good

enough to be invited to Monte Carlo.

So, this is the end of a really long dream and a lot of work.

Clowns have been around for a lot longer than the circus has.

Let's just go back to the middle ages.

There was the village fool.

And who was the village fool?

He was deformed, he was a hunchback, or he was a midget.

But he was a cherished person.

It's a person who went to the king and said, "you're an idiot

for this reason," and made the king laugh, but made him think

about why and spoke the voice of the common people.

And they were important characters in history for that.

The circus -- the history is quite new, but the art that are

in the circus started before the circus.

The circus begins in 1768, in London.

Philip Astley brings together

circus arts into a circular arena for the first time.

He opens a riding school and featured trick riding and all

sorts of interesting acrobatics that drew crows.

And a new art form was born out of many ancient traditions.

There's one fundamental thing

about the circus -- it's its geometry.

It's done in a circle.

A ring that met the physics

of a human being and a horse, 42 feet in diameter.

It brings you to the very beginning of humanity, you know,

with the fire and the group around the fire.

The first circus comes to the United States in 1793.

Things really begin to change in 1825, when a showman decided to

show under a canvas tent.

Just a few years later, he decided to attach a menagerie tent.

This period between 1870-1920 is often referred to as the golden

age of the American circus.

These huge circuses had parades.

They had people and animals from

around the world rumbling across America.

Circus brought the world to people's doorsteps.

A community that might have a regular population of 5,000

people all of a sudden would

have 20,000 people in town for that day.

All of this giantism really contrasts dramatically the

smaller, permanent, one-ring circus buildings of Europe.

When you look at the end of the 19th century in France, there

were more permanent circus

buildings than, actually, permanent theaters.

And circus was considered a noble art form.

...that celebrates individual skill, individual artistry.

But in the age of the three-ring, two-stage American