This ginormous spectacle transports you back to the time where the biggest excitement for children was when the travelling circus came to town. With animals featuring as life-size marionettes, these beautiful puppets caused screeches of delight from the children as they cheered on the jovial elephant, good-looking giraffe and mighty lion.
With its life-size animal marionettes, this show is undoubtedly a visual spectacle
And there is no question that these puppets steal the show. From a tap-dancing giraffe to a terrifying lion, these puppeteers have mastered the art of majestically bringing these marionettes to life before our very eyes. One cannot help but become captivated by their vast size and graceful movements, meaning even us bigger kids cannot help but become enthralled.
However, what struggled to bring this show to life were the performers themselves. Outside of these beautiful contraptions, there was nothing impressive or engaging to be seen. The actors are outperformed by the marionettes and this causes their stunts to become lifeless. For example, the performance of the strongman pretending to lift very heavy weights failed to gain any momentum or reaction from the audience as this outdated figure was uninteresting compared to the surroundings. The ringmaster didn’t help matters either as he himself seemed to be a little all over the place, making the show seem scattered as he struggled to implement the enthusiasm from the audience needed to make this a more entertaining show.
With its life-size animal marionettes, this show is undoubtedly a visual spectacle. However, their reliance on these contraptions to entertain causes them to neglect the rest of the performance making you feel a little short-changed.