Cirque Du Soleil - Delirium

Last night we went to see Delirium, the latest extravaganza from Cirque du Soleil to hit these shores. Previous gawpings at the Soleil people have been at the Royal Albert Hall but this was at the O2 Arena (aka The Dome) with half the arena screened off to present an elongated stage fit for the Soleil shenanigans. It looked odd, a huge stage with equally huge video walls either side, but it all spelled spectacular in any language! It's a Soleil 'live music' stage show rather their usual in-the-round circus shows, so it was a different creature to what I've seen before, but enjoyable and eye boggling nonetheless.

I've got no idea what it's about but the title says it all, really. The central character is attached to a balloon, umbilical-like, that floats over the stage for much of the show and at one point he says, 'thank god this is a dream' which is a subtle hint if we haven't got it yet! A couple fof times it reminded be of a big music show, like a Madonna gig, with a central singer doing their stuff while the video walls bombard us with images.

There were the usual comic characters speaking imaginary languages, with a lad on stilts wandering round and probably being a motif for something. I liked the four acrobats who piled on top of each other in various ways with astonishing strength and skill and the two lad aerialists who spun around on wires, coming together and separating while the singers and dancers moved down below them. There was also a girl hula-hoopist who made the hoops blur as they spun round in ever quicker movements. I also liked the mermaid singer who swam above the stage alongside the man-with-the-balloon using movements of her hips to propel her forward (ok, she was on a wire but that's what it looked like). And at the end the dancers all brought out enormous balloons to bounce around in the audience, something that Slava does in his 'Snowshow' (witnessed at Wimbledon a couple of years ago).

Those Soleil people certainly know how to craft and deliver a marvellous show! And they've got the merchandising down to a fine art too.