A few slips, trip in Cirque's 'Banana Shpeel'
Cirque du Soleil's "Banana Shpeel" earns praise for taking the more intimate circus arts and placing them center stage at the Chicago Theatre.
In stadiums like Hoffman Estate's Sears Centre Arena or the Grand Chapiteau outside the United Center (where Cirque usually resides when it plays Chicago), the show's aerialists, tightrope walkers and teeterboard performers tend to overshadow their earthbound counterparts.
Not this time. Writer/director David Shiner's vaudeville-inspired incarnation showcases acrobats, contortionists, dancers and jugglers, whose performances reflect the breathtakingly lovely displays of grace and strength for which Cirque shows are renowned. The specialty acts dazzle. The extraordinary acrobat Dima Shine seemingly defies gravity during his moody, mesmerizing hand-balancing routine. Foot juggler Vanessa Alvarez makes art out of her unique talent, and acrobat/dancer/gymnasts Jeff Retzlanff and Kelsey Wiens deliver beautifully Cirque's de rigueur pas de deux.
Jean-Francois Cote and Scott Price have composed an imminently listenable score ranging from music hall to hot jazz to dreamy Eastern European gypsy-pop, performed by a swinging, onstage band. Then there are the razor-sharp, Broadway-style dance numbers, exuberantly choreographed by Jared Grimes and performed by a tireless, talented, young ensemble featuring the dynamic brother-sister tap duo of Joseph and Josette Wiggan.
The performers, including underused vocalist Alexis Sims and the skilled clown quintet of Daniel Passer, Wayne Wilson, Gordon White, Claudio Carneiro and Patrick de Valette, are ready for February's New York opening.
The show, however, is not.
While narrative has never been a Cirque du Soleil forte, the failure to achieve a cohesive storyline is especially evident in the cobbled-together "Banana Shpeel," which jettisoned its previously announced characters and romantic subplot about a month before Chicago's world premiere. OK, Cirque du Soleil doesn't need a boy-meets-girl love story to propel it. But this show needs more than what Shiner gives us, which is ill-defined characters, overlong comic bits, copious spit-takes and a surfeit of shtick that gets in the way of what could have been an amusing magic act. Instead, it's an incomprehensible mess.
Inexplicably, Shiner fails to fully exploit an idea he introduces early on, one which could easily unify a show that bills itself as a new twist on vaudeville. "Banana Shpeel" opens with blustering producer Marty Schmelky (Arlington Heights native Jerry Kernion who looks like Oz's Wizard and dresses in the colors of money) auditioning acts for his show. The rejects - White's elderly mime, Carneiro's Brazilian cassanova and de Valette's oddball dancer - take off running, prompting a madcap chase by Schmelky's associates (Passer and Wilson). That sets up an obvious lunatics-taking-over-the-asylum premise - incorporating the trio as ersatz emcees - that Shiner fails to exploit.
The seeds are there, but it may not be possible for Shiner and company to get "Banana Shpeel" to blossom here, or in New York, without some serious pruning and cultivating.
"Banana Shpeel"
Rating ★ ★ ½
Location: Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State St., Chicago. (800) 745-3000 or cirquedusoleil.com
Showtimes: 2 and 8 p.m. Wednesdays; 8 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays; noon, 4 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 1 and 5 p.m. Sundays through Sunday, Jan. 3
Running time: About two hours with intermission
Tickets: $23-$90
Parking: Nearby garages
Rating: For teens and adults. Contains adult humor.