$5 Big Show Garden Tickets ... 25% Cirque du Soleil Vegas Discounts ... The Year of Ringling? The Year of Cole? The Season is On!

Ringling is now in New York, feted with a welcome notice from the The New York Times, profiled in depth about its recent court appearances and high-profit margins despite the down times. This new edition I find intriguing, what with the big elephant escape act, more magic, and lots of other circusy stuff ... You can, if you’re lucky, grab a five dollar ticket with a special coupon, and, once inside, spend the money you saved on the sky-high concession prices. But good news! According to Big Show boss, Kenneth Feld, the concession charges are the same as last year. Oh, boy, I can still nab a designer snow cone for $12.00. Does this not demonstrate the redemptive power of popcorn and lemonade on even our mightiest midway? ... “We are the Wall Mart of the entertainment business, affordable to...

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Friday Flashes: Ringling Canvas over Coney? ... Kelly-Miller Tigers & Clowns Deliver Socko Payoffs ... Mud Show Apologists Try My Patience ...

Here comes talk once more of a big top labeled Ringling, this time linked to fading tattered old Coney Island, where kids can still ride one of the best roller coasters that ever was. In my extreme youth, I loved the monster. Seems that the Feld machine is negotiating, kind of, and the hurdles hit upon concern concession rights. Oh, how Hugo apt! (Thanks a ton, Don Canvas Covington, for keeping me up on this one). ... And where might Big Bertha rise again? Over the recently finally once and for all put out of its glitzy misery Astroland. I hated that title from the get go. I remember as a wee boy being swept up into the sky on the Wonder Wheel and dropping down back to earth on the big parachutes ... My grandma, who made girdles for Brooklyn...

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Three-Ring Speculator: Has Binder Cloned Himself? Is Feld Telling the Truth? Can Copeland Survive Coloring Book Duty?

Ring Number One: In the latest issue of Spectacle, there is a telling interview conducted by Ernest Albrecht with outgoing Big Apple Circus director Paul Binder and his protege in waiting, Guillaume Dufresnoy. Intentional or not, it produces a rather bland portrait of the new BAC top man. Dufresnoy, in fact, appears so determined not to bust the Binder book that I have to wonder if the power still resides with the founding ringmaster, whose exit never made sense to me. Mr. B. lends a clear impression that he is not going gently into any night. “I will be working directly with the board of directors on special projects and new projects.” Sure, Paul, and keeping your options open for a rescue return — just in case your protege buddie fails to...

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Broadway’s Latest Bid for Golden Age Respectability: Revivals of West Side Story and Guys and Dolls May Fail to Redeem a Bleak Season ...

With the arrival of Guys and Dolls and West Side Story, my story line going in was to have been "Great White Way proves why it ruled the world of musical theatre in the fifties."Drop that one. Guys and Dolls didn't revive very well, just opening to reviews that, upon quick perusal, do not look good at all.West Side Story is still safely in previews, dancing towards a March 19 opening night. Best of all — theoretically speaking — Arthur Laurents, who wrote the original libretto, is directing. Hopefully, he will not deconstruct a masterpiece as can be the case when directors, anxious to prove how relevant they still can be at the age of 90, tamper with original materials and render them botched up resurrections. They’re talking a lot about honoring...

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Fri. Nite L’Amyxery: Kelly-Miller’s 4 Shows-A-Day Blitz ... Feld's Troubling Testimony ... . Peanuts and Clowns, and a Word for Irving J. Polack ...

Spring is tenting up all over, on grassy lots (sometimes) and weeds, and in ominous courtrooms ... Covington Connected, I’m looking with sad concern at an AP report of Kenneth Feld’s candor in a courtroom, answering charges of alleged bull-hook abuse. Aside from the Big Man’s affectionate deference to those audience-pleasing elephants (he claims they are "the mainstay" of the circus), I was surprised to hear him concede, under cross examination, that, according to the story, “the company has no policy to make sure he’s personally aware of abuse investigations.” He also admitted having reprimanded an employee back in 1994 for using a “hot shot” (electric prod), but keeping the guy on the pachyderm payroll. Men who can control the bulls are hard tome come by, said he under oath. Let’s let this...

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