Killer San Francisco Tiger: Blame the Victim?

In what is being reported as the first death to a U.S. zoo patron at the hands of an animal in decades, local officials are now raising the possibility that the victims may have provoked Titania into escaping the zoo confounds in order to chase them down in an act of violent revenge. One young man is dead, two others injured.The same tiger, a 4-year-old Siberian, last year caused injury to her keeper and the zoo was faulted and fined by the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health. This time around, ending up in a zoo eatery, she was shot dead by arriving police officers.According to the Washington Post, “The San Francisco Zoo's director of animal care and conservation, Robert Jenkins, said he had no idea how the tiger, which weighed...

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John Ringling North II to the World: Let There Be More Circus ... New Productions, New Acts & Tigers Promise a New K-M Look in ‘08 ...

Contrary to blogging rumors elsewhere that John Ringling North II is out of the biz after a year helming Kelly-Miller, the nephew of John Ringling North is actively at work crafting a whole new show for the 2008 season. For the first time in years, Kelly-Miller will tour a cat act. In an e-mail to Showbiz David, North writes:“I am still in the circus business, and, yes, we had a good season. We did have a truck burn up, but no one was hurt. We returned safely to Hugo after closing in Ardmore’North tells me, “We have 3 new production numbers and a lot of new acts.” He plans to be in Hugo come January to discuss staging details with his manager, Jim Royal. John Moss, whose services North evidently values, returns as ringmaster and performance...

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This One’s for the Very Much Alive Judy Finelli

She directed the Pickle Family Circus for a few seasons in the late 80s. In 1989, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. For many heroic years since, Judy has faced her illness with evident dignity, courage and resolve. And somehow somewhere I gained a sense that she had passed on. Not so. Of the many errors I have made over the years in my books — and I’ve made my fair share — reporting about “the late Judy Finelli” is surely the worst. In fact, she has just witnessed me fall off a very high high wire...Judy called me yesterday ("David, this is Judy calling you from the grave..."), having heard from a reviewer with an advance copy of my book Fall of the Big Top, officially due out in February, asking Judy if she is still alive. Indeed, the valiant Judy is still very much alive,...

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Live Streaming from Sage, Somwhere Out There...

Hey, is this Showbiz David?Yeah, is that you, Sage. Where have you been?All over the lot, man. Look, things are going wild in the rumor mill. I'm out here mid America, and have I got an earful. Did you hear about ...Sage? Sage?...going all the way out to...Sage?(phone connection lo...

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Why Can’t L.A. Produce a Hit Broadway Musical?

Los Angeles Theatre Critics Toss Bouquets at Turkeys! That’s One Reason Why. You Want Others? The New York opening this week at the Public Theatre of Henry David Hwang’s new play Yellow Face to mixed notices --- some scathing and a negative from the New York Times --- is but another example of the great divide between the critics of Los Angeles and those of New York. Yellow Face tried out last spring in L.A. at the Mark Taper Forum to generally glowing reviews, which surprised me because I saw a very flawed work in need of major rethinking and rewriting. Although Yellow Face is not a musical, it’s journey from L.A. acclaim to N.Y. disdain is typical of what happens to new musicals that are born where stars are born and fade away ingloriously under the punishing lights of Forty Second Street.Interesting...

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The Barkers Who Lure Us In ... the Stars Who Lure Us Back

Circuses resort to all manner of hype and discount, pr and free tix blitz to lure us into their tents. Never an easy task. What we see, once seduced, may make us want to return ... Were it not for a newspaper discount coupon that gave my mother the will, she might never have taken my sister and me to see King Bros Circus when it came to Santa Rosa, and I would never have seen the great Truzzi — although I must rely on the word of others, for I recall so little about his act, I was so young then and so much more taken with a teeterboard display (new to my eyes) and with a group of acrobats running down a long ramp and somersaulting over a mountain of elephants.Less than a year later, fresh out of Luther Burbank elementary school one afternoon,...

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Australia’s Anti-Circus is Right at Home in Berkeley

Holiday Look Backs, this from 2007Circus Review: Circus Oz at Zellerbach Hall,Berkeley, Saturday, 2 p.m., December 1. $26 to $48I think it’s time for me and the anti-circus to part company. A no-fault divorce on principle alone. This is hardly a circus. This is a subversive and sometimes very funny stage show referencing circus acts in the act of deconstructing them, same way it takes glee in tearing down sexual norms and old-hat morality. We are not in a ring. We are in a moody underground night club for disgruntled losers somewhere on the outskirts of a world gone half-mad. Could it be that the Aussies behind this operation suffer the guilt of their own Nevil Shute having novelized the end of the world in his nuclear war tale, On The Beach?...

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Sunday Morning, Looking Back: Loosening up, Cirque du Soleil Flirts with the Power of True Circus

This first appeared on November 30, 2007. If Blogger stats don't lie, it is by far the most viewed page on this blog.Circus Review: KoozaSan Francisco, November 19 at 4 p.m. $55.00 to $210.00 top.To follow the phenomenal success of Cirque du Soleil is to wonder how long it can last and what changes it might be willing to make in the years ahead to stay in the black. The good news here is that Kooza, Guy Laliberte’s latest touring show, takes a few giant leaps backwards in time to a more authentic big top experience. May we say goodbye for good, Corteo? I can’t recall a previous edition of Cirque as powerful as this one is in its redemptive second half.Getting there takes a little time and patience. The gorgeous tent itself remains a temple...

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17% Jump in Carson & Barnes Biz Sparked by "Innovative News Ads" and Free Tix Blitz ...

71-year old Carson & Barnes is riding high on a big boost in attendance this year, at least by 17% as of 2 months ago, and as high as 20%, says the tenter's new Sarasota-based marketing manager, Harry Dubsky.How the magic? Short of giving away his trade secrets, Dubsky credits the dramatic upswing in customer turnout to the mass saturation of free tickets to a lot of different sources and inventive newspaper advertising. "We work with the sponsors a lot," he says. "We did not goof off."Has Barbara Byrd found her Art Concello? Her Douglas Lyon? Dubsky makes clear that his efforts were only part of the mix, that everybody played a part ...And that's a nice message given the struggles that all American circuses are facing to pull in profitable...

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The Glory That Was Minnelli ... The Genius That Was Allen ...

On Film ForeverVincente Minnelli’s Bandwagon makes color look as beautiful as black and white. This has to be, sorry Gene Kelly, my favorite movie musical. Fabulous Schwartz & Dietz songs from start to finish. Superb comedy from Jack Buchanan, as theatrical a performer as ever there was. Effortless perfection from Astaire and Charisse, their “Dancing in the Dark” a masterpiece of controlled choreography second only, in my opinion, to Gene Kelly’s signature song and dance exhuberation in Singing in the Rain.Director Minnelli (among his credits, Father of the Bride, Gigi) turned his masterfully-paced Bandwagon into pure cinematic gold. We are not watching a movie. We are inhabiting it. Surrounded, encased and embraced at every frame by the...

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Performing Circus Animals Are A-Okay, says Brit Government Study ... Nelly Unpacks Her Trunk and "Decides to Stay" ...

Good News for real big tops around the globeA promising Brit study, detailed in Circusnews.com, has concluded that circus animals are "kept in adequate conditions."Writes the Guardian, "the result will delight the four British circuses out of 27 that still use animals in their acts."Concluded the investigating group, according to the London Telegraph, "There was 'little evidence' that the welfare of animals kept in traveling circuses was any better or worse than that of animals kept in other captive environments."Currently, a total of only 47 animals appear under Brit big tops. Among them, a kangaroo and 4 reindeer, tigers and lions and camels, 6 snakes -- and only one elephant, touring but retired from the ring.Ironically, the study was commissioned by Ministers at the Dept. for Environment,...

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MIDWAY FLASH ... MIDWAY FLASH ... Cirque du Soleil to Kodak Theatre Hollywood for 10-year Run

Just announced in today's L.A. Times. More to follow about a Hollywood themed show to be created by Cirque du Soleil for the Kodak on Hollywood and Hyland. Slated to open in 2010.[AP photo, from left: The Innocent, the L.A. Mayor and Cirque's Guy Lalibe...

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Ranking the Circus Websites – A Walk Down the Cyber Midway

From Showbiz David Consumer Courts DivisionHow Appealing Are They? How Easy to Use?Joining me for this round of reviewing is “Honorable Judge Kathy,”my sister in Omaha, and Doug, a San Francisco-based technical writer, bicyclist, and yogi, who has created some basic websites of his own. Both bring unique and useful outsider points of view. We reviewed 10 sites, rating each on six key elements: 1 — Immediate first impression at the opening page; 2 — visuals (video or photos) of the acts/show; 3 -– general feedback from press reviews and/or customers; 4 — route information; 5 — ease of purchasing tickets on-line; and 6 — last impression: overall appeal of the site and ease of navigating through it.We each made a reasonable effort to find and rate each of the elements — short of embarking on...

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Fires and Falls ... Wintuk Out of Luck? ... New Cole A Go for '08 ... Carson & Barnes Bucks Slowbiz Trends ... PETA to the Rescue???

BIG TOP BITS ARE COMING AT YOU! ...The fight to circus goes on, through mud and slush and pickets and red tape, and the best of them take it. We’re thinking John Pugh, fearless owner of New Cole, who circuses on despite perennial rumors to the contrary. Sarasota calls every five years — “I think this will be the last season for Cole” Oh? When I interviewed John in 2005, he seemed perfectly happy even struggling to keep his show on the road. Some circus producers do not give up. John retired the bulls one season, reprieved them the next, listening to his customers say go for it ... And I say go for it, too, John! ... On the other hand, THIS is ominous: New Cole (you know, Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. for many years) did NOT offer a program magazine in 2007, a first. That bothers me ... Neither did...

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Sunday Morning, Looking Back: Rediscovering the San Francisco of My Youth

This first appeared on November 3, 2007From the clanging jerky rumble of a cable car ride, San Francisco is perfectly itself: Beautiful and Vain. Quaint. Festive. Bohemian. Dangerous. An aging madam desperate to be loved. Nothing connects me more vividly to the city of my boyhood than to experience it from one of these little iron icons rattling halfway to the stars ... Many years ago when I took a night class in drawing at the Academy of Art College somewhere up on Nob Hill, I would jump aboard a cable car to get there, and the dramatic journey up and down hills past grand arches and stately Victorian mansions through sharp clean ocean air made me feel like I had finally arrived, even though I never really arrived.. ... In the lobby of an...

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Fall of Circus Ginnett Blamed on "Stupidest Regulations" Dooming Brit Big Tops

In a Covington Flash comes news that Britain's Circus Ginnett, run by the Austin Family, with a performing history in European rings reaching back over two hundred years, has folded its tent for good. The reason: Costly and time-consuming new licensing government regulations as well as pending bans on "some animals in circuses." Said Liza Austin, co operator with her husband Mike, to The London Daily Telegraph, "It just isn't worth it anymore. We're going to France and Italy to find work. They are more appreciative of circuses there." And how ironic is that? The circus as we know it was founded in London! Tis also true, kids, that for well over a century, a Brit version of PETA has been at work, out to liberate the menagerie back to the jungle. They may prevail yet... A pair of Ginnett brothers...

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Wild Elephants and Cursed Eateries: Chaos and Calamity from India to Barabooooooo....

Your showbiz scrambler features foundering tycoons, a 4-star Canadian Fiasco, Wild elephants on a tear, Cursed Kitchens and Creepy Organ Music ... And Away We Goooooooooooo! ...Disney Fights To Save More Disappearing Magic: ... Down there in the Magic Kingdom, the also-ran next-door California Adventure was a fizzle from the get-go. Burbank big shots plan to sink another 1.1 billion into the paltry park to make it more, well, more Disney. Adventure cost a billion to build; another million for post-opening extras that still failed to lure the Mickey Mouse masses ...Bad first impressions are hellishly hard to overcome .... Canadian Circus Bites the Sawdust: First reported by Circusnews.com, up at Niagara Falls, Ontario, the collapse of another...

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Fall of the Big Top Ranked #1 in Circus Books on Tower.Com

Not yet published, my next book, Fall of the Big Top: The Vanishing American Circus --- due out in late November -- now commands the top position on Tower.Com's list of circus books for sale. I've never been number one before, so I plan to enjoy the illusion while it lasts! http://www.tower.com/explore/books/cat102/2739....

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Friday Night Flip Flops: Trivia Teasers on Parade ...

Steroids in Spangles? You may have heard of a certain baseball player named Bonds, a big deal across the bay in ironically provincial San Francisco. His final at-bats at the ballpark were mourned like nothing I can recall since Big Bertha herself (aka: Ringling-Barnum – are you with us, Craig?) gave up the canvas ghost in Pittsburgh, PA back in 1956 ... Never mind that Mr. Bonds is likely a steroid cheat, which is a long run-in to my wondering aloud: Do Great Circus Stars juice up too? .... Let’s see, the majestic marvel in motion Miguel Vazquez, a rail thin flyer. Juggler Alex Chimal, quite compact ... Sylvia Zerbini, lithe and taut. I’d rue the day when we see hideously bulked up ring stars. Not Codona. Not Bello. Not the hoop divers from Asia aplenty ... Circus, stay fit!Tricks, that’s...

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Whirlwind Tumblers, Jugglers, Cats and Dogs Power a Padded and Slim Circus Vargas

Circus ReviewCulver City, California, Fox Hills Mall, October 6 at 2 p.m. $40.00 top.Entering the new Circus Vargas tent, I was struck by an enchantment I can’t recall feeling since I entered the Ringling-Barnum big top in 1955: a stunning image of blue canvas reaching skyward into a sublime darkness, silver cables in symmetrical arrangement, a quietness all around promising something magical and great.They have the setting. They have an inviting midway. Good reasonable ticket prices. They have a classy staff, a winning web site design, and they express a sincere intention to revive a circus whose heyday came and went over twenty years ago. All they need now is the show. They are, with regrets I have to report, not all the way there yet, and...

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Showbiz Showdown in Gotham — Little Tops Go to War ... Broadway’s Big Guns Test Troubled Tuners on Rocky Road ...Will South Pacific Soar Again?

What a lip-smacking good season looms ahead for surly sideliners like me ... A neat preview in the New York Times spills beans on two mega musicals failing to turn gush from out-of-town critics, both Broadway-bound shows flashing powerhouse names: Mel Brooks (The Producers) is back — or hacking back with his latest home-made tuner (in which he concocts his own tunes) — Young Frankenstein, now polishing his cakewalk out of town. The singing monster failed to ring every critic’s rattle in Seattle. Hmmmm. I wonder if Brooks, an amateurish tunesmith, is a one-score kind of guy? Brooks revived musical comedy. Question might be, can he revive vaudeville?Disney’s Drowning Mermaid? Trouble in kiddie land began when Tarzan flew to Broadway and got...

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COMING SOON! ... Rating the Circus Web Sites!

All new Rankings from Honorable Judge Kathy and Showbiz David ... See how the big tops are doing on the cyber midway!Judicial Update, October 7: Alternate Judge Doug of San Francisco has just joined the panel, so we now have the ideal threesome. Doug is reviewing the sites; once his ordinals are in, the Grand Final Tabulations will be made and post...

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Three Rings of This & That ...

A cool Baraboo air over Oakland, and in New York that spells the beginning of a new circus season. Come November, three shows compete -- Big Apple, Cirque's Wintuk, and the new Get Your Circus On! at the Apollo Theatre. New Yorkers, you have choices! ... Back in Baraboo where the town nearly slips into a Brigadoon-like trance, late-blooming Ringlingphile Bob Dewel, who monitors my every word concerning the town’s most famous family, checks in with this about notoriously self-serving John Ringling, mentioned here in unflattering terms a while back: “Only John failed to show for the Al Ringling Theatre opening in 1915, with Al dying.” True to form, and how sad; I’ve sometimes wondered, was John the Yoko Ono of the group? (Beatles fans will understand.)...

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Circus Out of the Tent ... Buddha or a Snow Job?

Cirque du Yoga: Enter citizen Jamie Corydon, who reached her new inner self on a lyra at the Sandou Theatrical Circus School in Las Vegas, founded by two former Moscow Circus performers -- the brothers Sergei and Konstantin. Corydon fell in with some former Cirque performers who are associated with the school. They got her into a trapeze frame of mind and she felt reborn at a festival in Austria, “Is this the secret of the Cirque du Soleil artists —they are Yogi???” asks our dithering dame, Judy Dieli, who sent me the story. Claims Corydon, who teaches the art that gave her wings, “No way could I have done it without Yoga.” Ringling, a little Yoga for you, too? Or perhaps a few weeks off at the Church of Scientology?. Anything, I’d say, to get in touch with your inner spirit, what’s left of...

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Bandwagon’s Incessant Spell ...

Showbiz David from out of the pastA rush of memories down the track whenever I read a new Bandwagon... Circus Kirk —- the lead off story — I know a little about, having “interviewed” (my first with a tape recorder, I think) back in Clymer PA on 8/7/75 a few of the kids. A couple are quoted in my forthcoming Fall of the Big Top ... So many rings ago, and memory stirs them back onto muddy and grassy lots ... Clyde Beatty’s cage boy, Manuel “Junior” Ruffin, neatly profiled too, joined the show the same year I saw it in Santa Rosa, 1952 ... "Hoxie" Tucker, for whom Ruffin later worked (and whose nasty moods he suffered), once insulted me big time, and why? I took a break from press agenting for Sid Kellner’s James Bros. in 1969 to take in a Hoxie...

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Saturday Night Showbiz Take-Outs: Fighting Over the Fat Lady; A Dog and His Man; A Funeral for Laughs; A Backyard Lady Tells All ...

While we hover on the edge of ringless lots hoping not to see more tents tumble, let’s recall those five fabulous brothers from Baraboo who started out so united, and as time went on, splintered off into a million fractions that somehow miraculously held together. Here, for example, is a curve that could have felled weaker partners: The incredible nerve of John Ringling voiding a fat lady contract signed by Al for her to appear with Ringling, which Al and Charles ran —— so that greedy John could ink the same dame for Barnum & Bailey, which he and Otto ran. This juicy disclosure amazed me in Jerry Apps’ excellent tome, Ringlingville. The author, though, makes little dramatic uproar over such disturbing incidents, preferring I guess to hold up the glossy image of the Big Five forever in...

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... Page Proofs Coming ... Presses Humming ...

Could be today. Could be tomorrow. UPS will deliver page proofs for my book Fall of the Big Top; The Vanishing American Circus, and I will see it finally in print. That’s always a thrill — photo images on pages, type style selection, chapter headings. Here comes my LAST CHANCE to make any changes. Few will be made at this last-see point. A real regret is that since I won’t see Circus Vargas until after I examine, pass on and return the proofs to McFarland, there won’t be the chance I had hoped for to add a line or two about their current edition ... And what if it’s wonderful? Another spangled sliver from the ever changing big top waiting for somebody’s next book to capture it forever ...I try to root out redundant word usage (I can hear some...

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