Cirque du Soleil is doing something it has never done in its 39-year history: hitting the ice.
We’re not talking the frozen tundra of the troupe’s native Quebec in January.
The ice rink, like the one beneath the floor at Tucson Arena that’s home to the Tucson Roadrunners and University of Arizona Wildcats hockey teams.
The company best known for its high-flying, adrenaline-rushing acrobatics is taking the show on the ice with its first-ever ice show, “Crystal,” coming to Tucson Arena on Thursday, Feb. 29-Sunday, March 3.
“It is crazy,” admits the show’s artistic director, Crystal Manich. “Look the very nature of what we do with Cirque du Soleil; it’s very impressive to people because it does seem very extreme.”
Expect to hear plenty of ohhhs and ahhhs when Cirque du Soleil brings its icy “Crystal” to Tucson.
Add ice into the formula, and you have a spectacle that will have children and adults alike oohing and aahing from the opening act to the grand finale.
“Audiences love this show. The message is universal, it’s comprehensible,” said Manich, who joined the show last fall. “People really connect to so many different aspects. And what’s great for me is to see how many kids come, and to see how kids audibly react to what’s going on. It’s really an incredible opportunity to have a show that is family friendly but it doesn’t pander at all. Kids get out of it what kids get out of it and adults get a deeper message.”
“Crystal” is a coming-of-age story about a girl struggling to understand her parents and friends and the world around her when she falls through a crack in the ice that deposits her into an underwater world. That’s where she meets her reflection, which gives her a writing implement to rewrite her story and create new adventures that help her find her voice.
Cirque du Soleil’s show “Crystal” launched in 2017. It has already has had more than 1,000 performances in 21 countries.
“It’s a coming-of-age story and it’s a very simple concept, but I really think that it’s one that a lot of people connect to,” said Manich. “We all can relate to that.”
This is a second round with Cirque du Soleil for Manich, a Puerto Rico-based director, writer and producer who works in film, stage and opera. She was with the company in 2009-10 as an assistant artistic director on “Quidom.”
Manich
“I decided to leave always knowing I would want to go back,” she said.
Fast-forward a baker’s dozen years when she was brought back as artistic director on “Crystal,” a show the company launched in 2017 that already has had more than 1,000 performances in 21 countries.
“I am so glad. I really love the company and I really love the work that I am doing,” said Manich, who made her feature film directing debut with Arizona Opera’s “The Copper Queen” in 2021.
In addition to being its first-ever ice show, “Crystal” also is the first time in its 40-plus shows that Cirque du Soleil has used video projections. Manich said images from 28 projectors will help “tell the story of the inner world of a character. The projections create emotion, and that goes with lighting as well.”
Narration from the titular character also moves the story along, the director added.
“It’s really beautifully written. It’s Crystal’s voice,” she said. “Crystal herself does not speak but you hear her voice all the time as she’s going through her journey. It is a really cool way to tell the story and it makes it really clear to the audience what’s going on.”
Then there’s the action, the twisting, twirling, flying through-the-air acrobatics that has defined all of Cirque du Soleil’s shows over the years.
Expect a snowball fight to break out during Cirque du Soleil’s “Crystal.”
In addition to its acrobats, the cast for “Crystal” features dozens of professional skaters, including a few Olympians, Manich said.
“The beautiful thing about this show is the combination of acrobats and skaters,” she said. “It’s a great combo because they learn from each other.“
The skaters hold skating lessons for the acrobats, who are all required to learn to skate if they can. Those who can’t skate are still part of the action on the ice, performing with shoes that have been outfitted with spikes to allow them to walk on ice.
Here are some other fun facts about “Crystal”:
Cirque du Soleil is combining ice skating and acrobatics in its new show, “Crystal.”
About the show
“Crystal” has hit 135 cities in 21 different countries since its launch in 2017 in Lafayette, Louisiana, before taking a two-year hiatus in 2020 courtesy the pandemic. To date, more than 2 million people have seen the show, which marked its 1,000 performance in Perth, Australia, last September.
About the shoes
Some of those acrobatic feats, such as banquine, where a group of three or four performers serve as the base for one or more flyers (the person who is lifted, tossed or otherwise airborne), are nearly impossible to do on skates. And wearing their shoes on the ice will result in slips and slides and who knows how many twisted ankles, torn ACLs and other disastrous injuries. Which is why the performers’ acrobatic shoes have been developed incorporating small metal spikes and crampons in the soles that make it easier to walk, slide, run, jump and do other crazy signature Cirque du Soleil moves on ice.
Crique du Soleil’s new show “Crystal” is about a girl who finds herself in an upside-down world beneath a frozen pond, where she discovers her inner strength.
By the numbers
97 — the number of people in the cast and crew; 44 of them are performers, from 25 countries speaking 23 languages
80 — the pairs of skates (hockey and toe pick); each artist wears as many as four pairs of shoes per performance
48 — loads of laundry by the wardrobe team before the show opens; the team will do another 10 to 12 loads daily through the run
15 — hours needed to set up the show; it takes four to five hours to break it down
8 — disciplines you’ll experience at the show in addition to ice skating and ice dancing: banquine, hand-to-hand, acro/tumbling, juggling, trapeze, poles, chair balancing and aerial straps all performed on the ice
What happened to ‘The Copper Queen’?
Manich made her Arizona debut directing Arizona Opera’s film “The Copper Queen.” The opera, which Arizona Opera commissioned, was supposed to have its staged world premiere in the 2020-21 season, but thanks to the pandemic, the company pivoted to film.
Manich already had signed on to direct the staged version so when they presented the idea of filming it instead, she was eagerly on board to make her feature film directing debut.
“It opened me up to different possibilities of storytelling through music,” said Manich, who won an Opera America commissioning grant for a work she and composer Laura Kaminsky are writing for Pittsburgh Opera; Manich is the librettist. “I wish I could do ‘Copper Queen’ all over again. It was one of the great joys of my life to do that project. And I’d like to do another filmed opera at some point. For me, the possibilities have opened up quite a bit since that experience.”
“The Copper Queen” was shown in Harkins Theaters throughout the state in 2021 and streamed on Arizona Opera’s website (azopera.org). The piece, written by composer Clint Borzoni and librettists John de los Santos, made its stage debut in June 2022 with Marble City Opera in Knoxville, Tennessee.
