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Quidam

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Creations


Quidam


Création

Concepteurs
Scénographie
Musique
Personages

Expérience

Prologue
German Wheel
Marelle
Diabolo
Dans l'Air
Aerial Contortion
Hula Hoop (John)
Skipping Ropes
Aerial Hoops
Entr'acte (Égaré)
Handbalancing
Darts (John)
Spanish Webs
Coatrack (John)
Statue
Banquine
Epilogue

Réserve
Juggling
Dance Trapeze


Retiré
Aerial Strap (Solo)
Manipulation
Hoops
Aerial Strap (Duo)
Cyr Wheel
Cloud Swing
Trapeze Duplex
Diabolos

Odyssey

Itinéraire
Visuals
Audio/Visual
Features

 
Visual
Quidam...
A nameless passerby, a solitary figure
lingering on a street corner,
a person rushing past, a
person who lives lost amidst the crowd
in an all-too-anonymous society.

Quidam (pronounced key-dahm) marks a turning point in Cirque du Soleil's history. Unlike the troupe's previous shows, Quidam does not take spectators to an imaginary realm of fanciful, larger-than-life characters. Rather, it is an examination of our own world - inhabited by real people with real-life concerns. In the words of its director, Franco Dragone: "We wanted this production to be more human. Like preceding productions, Quidam conveys emotion, but it is more raw and intense, more dramatic, and more personal too. Quidam highlights our frailties and our anguish in the face of the new millennium that lies before us. It also underlines differences, conveying positive feelings and resentment and confronting our dreams with our nightmares."

Quidam emanated from a concern about growing alienation and loneliness in a world that, ironically, is devising ever-more ingenious ways of keeping people in touch with one another. The show depicts human suffering, but at the same time celebrates life. Quidam is about rediscovery - about giving new meaning to the mundane. As such it is more thoroughly scripted than Cirque's previous shows. Quidam integrates performance and theatricality to a greater extent than ever before, drawing on the emotional relationships between the performers within the troupe. The color range is restrained, and the costumes have a carefully plucked raffishness about them. The idea is to underline the anonymity of mass society — "It could be anyone, anybody," the show's programme observes. "Someone coming, going, living in our anonymous society. A member of the crowd, one of the silent majority. One who cries out, sings and dreams within us all." — and to frame the circus acts as momentary explosions of beauty that defy the lifelessness of a grey and fraying world.

In this world, the one who cries out is Zoë, a young girl who fumes because, as she is constantly ignored by her parents, believes she's seen everything there is to see, experienced all there is to experience. For her, the world has lost all meaning. Her anger, sharp and unforgiving, shatters her reality and soon she finds herself in the universe of Quidam. Here she is not alone; she is accompanied by the playful companion (Karl/Fritz/Target) and a more enigmatic personage (John/Mark) who will attempt to seduce her with the marvelous, the unsettling, and the terrifying.

 
Premiere: Apr.23.1996 (BigTop)
Dec.11.2010 (Arena)
Type: Touring
Finale: Nov.21.2010 (Bigtop)
Feb.26.2016 (Arena)
 

Creative Team


Guide
Guy Laliberté
Director
Franco Dragone
Creation
Gilles Ste-Croix
Choreographer
Debra Brown
Composer
Benoit Jutras
  Set Designer
Michel Crête
Lighting Designer
Luc Lafortune
Sound Designer
François Bergeron
Costume Designer
Dominique Lemieux
Makeup Designer
Nathalie Gagné
 

Audio/Visual


 

Interviews


MARK WARD
Dancer, Performer

"A Career Backwards"
Keith Johnson, 2011

BENOIT JUTRAS
Composer

"Making Time Stop"
Keith Johnson, 2011

OLIVER "BJ" GENTEN
Percussionist

"BJ, Live from Japan!"
"An Evenings Chat with BJ"
Ricky Russo, 2004


Cirque Corner