Imagine sitting in the front row at a circus and seeing an alligator weighing 100-150 kilos rushing right at you. The reptile is halfway across the barrier and its large head is resting on the shoes of a spectator speechless with fright. The tamer pretends not to notice anything, but he’s looking out of the corner of his eye, knowing just how far he can go. This unique act wouldn’t be as exciting without the opportunity to yank on the audience’s nerves. At some point the tamer “notices” what’s happening and rushes to the rescue. He taps some spots on the alligator’s jaw, passes his hands over it, and the reptile freezes in position. There are seven of these “sculptures” scattered around the arena. Three or four panting stage hands carry a rambunctious alligator into the ring and the tamer walks over and “charms” it. Is this taming or hypnosis? Judge for yourselves, says the world- famous French King of Alligators and Pythons Karah Khavaka. The answer to this question is a trade secret that has been guarded by an entire dynasty of circus performers. The act was originally staged by his grandfather and Karah inherited some of the reptiles from his father. Crocodiles can perform in the ring for up to eighty years. Mind you, not every reptile. Like humans, crocodiles come in all varieties, gifted and not so gifted. To spot reptiles with a “creative bent,” the tamer selects them when they are six months old. He puts them on a leash, like a dog, and plays with them, observing their conduct.
This exotic circus act from France is the main attraction of the new program of Ukraine’s National Circus. Of course, it’s not the only interesting one. A perennial act featuring bears on bicycles may not be a novelty, but as noted lion tamer and artistic director of the Kyiv Circus Volodymyr Shevchenko correctly points out, there are many old acts and tricks. True mastery depends on the ability to charm the audience. Viktor and Olga Kudryavtsev from the Moscow-based Yuri Nikulin Circus deserve their prestigious title “People’s Artistes of Russia.” Their bears are utterly charming, perhaps because the Kudryavtsevs call themselves trainers, not tamers. Their act ends very impressively with a bear driving the trainers in a mini-jeep around the ring.
There are many other interesting features in the new program, including a large team of teeterboard acrobats from Romania; a pair of young acrobats, who won the All-Ukraine Circus Festival’s first prize last September, and trapeze artists from Donetsk. The audience is invariably bewitched by a ballet-like act featuring regal llamas, which are notoriously difficult to tame, and their partners, a pack of equally artistic collies that are much easier to train.
The Kyiv Circus is now faced with the task of reviving its past glory. In the Soviet Union, three circuses — Kyiv, Moscow, and Leningrad — were the benchmark of circus art. Then the coordinating body, Soyuzgostsirk, ceased to exist, and creative and other types of contacts disappeared. There were problems with financing and developing programs that would meet the high standards of past decades. Except for the current program and the one that preceded it, the last time that foreign artists performed in Kyiv was almost twenty years ago.
