Alegría—A Dream Shaw
Last night, I felt blessed to have an opportunity to watch the show, Alegría. I had never seen something that was so beautiful and powerful. For that, I have to give thanks to both Suzie Gagnon and Newhouse for the opportunity they gave me to enjoy the magical time.
A few days earlier, I saw the poster of the artist, musician and Cirque du Soleil performer Suzie Gagnon. As a TRF student, I was attracted by the poster’s introduction and went the event.
What Mrs. Gagnon brought was the film version of Alegría, which was actually a stage show that included acrobatics, operas and many other performances. I have seen many stage shows in the theater as well as live shows on television, but this time was so different.
While watching such a big show like Alegría in theater, an audience can only watch from one angle. However, by shooting and editing, people could make it into a movie and let audiences enjoy a totally different adventure. Although we might miss some corners of the big stage, but editing allowed us to see the most interesting and amazing parts. There was a scene of two acrobats doing tricks on two separate swings. The close up shot made me see clearly how elegant the acrobat’s moves were.
This event, not only taught me the importance of editing, but also lighting. For a stage show, lighting is crucial. Lighting tells audiences which part they should pay attention to. Lighting also decorates the stage to set the tone of a show. In Alegría, all the lighting was meticulously elaborated. Although the Alegría we saw last night was shot more than ten years ago and the technology could not compare to what we have now, the film was flawless.
To shoot a movie like this, the staffs had to do a lot of preparation. In order to capture the best moments, they had to anticipate every move that might happen on the stage so that they could set the camera at the optimal position. It was very hard since they only got one chance to shoot the film.
After the movie, Suzie told us her stories with Cirque du Soleil.
Every time the circus went to a place to perform shows, it would stay there for months. To the performers and staffs, the troupe was more like a big family than a company. The troupe traveled internationally to amaze people all around the world. Sometimes people would bring their own families with them. They fit in the local’s culture, communicated with local people and let their children go to local schools. When I was hearing about the stories of Suzie and the troupe, I was so excited. I love storytelling because it can make me experience other’s life.
I learned a lot from this “storyteller” events. It was great to learn from different culture and hear the speech of people from other countries. More importantly, I watched a superb film!