Cirque de Soleil Loves the Beatles

The Cirque de Soleil puts on fantastic shows. Burt and I saw them here in Seattle several years ago. The costumes, music, acrobatics and humor were incredible. We have also seen several of their shows on TV. They are always innovating and exploring new territory. Recently, they seem to be taking over Las Vegas with more and more resident shows being created at big Casinos. One of their new Vegas shows called Love features acrobatics and dance performed to a medley of Beatle songs.

George Harrison was friend of one of the founders of the Cirque and the idea for the show grew out of their friendship. They created the show in 2006 as a joint venture between the Cirque and Apple Corps Ltd, founded by the Beatles. 130 Beatles songs have been combined and blended to make the sound track created by George Martin who produced most of the Beatle albums. The show is a loose retelling of the story of the Beatles from their early days to their break up. Many of the people featured in the Beatle songs are realized as stage characters including Sgt. Pepper, Eleanor Rigby, Lady Madonna, etc.

The Mirage Hotel built a custom 2,000 seat theater to house the show. Two big projections screens show images to support the stage performance and thousands of speakers provide amazing sound.

The show opens with a building blend of several songs and then launches into Get Back on a set of a fragmented World War II cityscape all presided over by Sgt. Pepper as conductor. Dancing and wirework abound as the tone and lighting changes to the accompaniment of Glass Onion. Octopus Garden features florescent flags, umbrellas and dangling sea creatures in blue light to simulate an underwater scene. Within You and Without You has dancers drawing out billowing fabric over the audience. The undulating shroud rises into the air. During A Day in the life, a bizarre dream sequence unfolds around a young child in a bed. A Volkswagen hit his mother who rises on a wire rig as the car explodes with each body piece being carried by a different dancer. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (reprise) closes the show by filling the stage with dancers in a circus extravaganza.   

If you are a Beatles fan, you will hear new arrangements of their songs accompanied with fantastic stage interpretations that will give you a fresh perspective on old favorites. If you are not a Beatles fan, after this introduction to their music, you soon will be. If you can’t make the Vegas show, get the sound track album!