Super Saltimbanco
Nov 19th, 2008 by Capsun
I’m a bit late writing on this after so many others have covered it. However, just to clarify, I’m talking about Saltimbanco the Cirque du Soleil show, not the Chicken Saltimbocca that you eat. For great local reviews, please check out Nathan Kam or Ryan Ozawa’s blogs. Thanks also to them both for pointing me to a $20 discount that allowed me to buy nosebleed seats at the Blaisdell Arena for only $20. Normally it’s $40. I got a steal!: $108 for four tickets (Ticketmaster tacks on a fee). Don’t worry, once the show started, and there were empty seats, we moved over to the better, more expensive seats.
I thoroughly enjoyed the show! And that’s saying a lot. I’m usually not a big fan of live shows, preferring a new episode of Jeopardy!, a rerun of The West Wing, or a nice period piece over a stage show. Consider this:
- I’ve seen Cats – on Broadway! I spent almost $200 to see it in it’s final month and got pretty good seats. But all I remember about the show was “The Music of the Night”…oh wait, that’s from Phantom of the Opera. Seriously, I only remember the song “Memory” (Memoryyy. All alooone in the moonlight…)
- I’ve seen off-Broadway shows in New York City. They were cheaper, so I didn’t mind that I didn’t like nor “get” them.
- I saw Stomp when it came to Hawaii – and it’s loud. Boring! I actually fell asleep during parts of it.
- In general, I really don’t like musicals – The Sound of Music is a movie I thoroughly despise!
So while I don’t usually like this kind of show, I really liked Saltimbanco. I think the main reason is that, in the end, it’s actually a circus show. And who doesn’t like the circus? (No political jokes here.) I enjoyed the second half more than the first – it had more circus-type performances. Many of them leave me astounded that the human body can do these things without causing serious injury to the performer.
This wonderful experience with Saltimbanco has convinced me to see one of Cirque’s Las Vegas shows next time I’m there. And now I may even see Ulalena on Maui. If you missed Saltimbanco, you can wait for the next show to come here or go see one while you travel. Although, keep in mind that a few of my friends thought this local production was better than the ones they’ve seen in Vegas.
Mahalo!
Update: If you are my friend on Facebook, pictures that correspond to this post are available in my “Saltimbanco” album.
Pagan! How could you NOT like the Sound of Music?!!!!
I tried to look for you when your show ended but there was way too much people leaving. I enjoyed Saltimbanco too! I’ve seen O and Mystere in Vegas and I thought this one was just as good in terms of performance, the only difference is that they do not have the benefit of a technical stage since its a moving show. I’m not sure when they’ll be back in our neighborhood… it might be a few years… From what I could gather, Saltimbanco is one of the oldest traveling Cirque du Soleil shows and I assume they do a full circuit around cities. I don’t remember the last time they were even here in Hawaii.
Were you watching it that day, too? Or helping Maryknoll? Too bad, maybe another time.
Thanks for letting me tag along. It was a blast! I couldn’t believe how fast time flew though, especially that first hour. This was my first time to any Cirque show and I really hope to see more.
I was there for the five pm show, the last one. We had some fun audience. They went along with the show when they were grabbing people up on stage.
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