Mundo Paralelo : Milford Haven

Mundo Paralelo : Milford Haven
***
National Theatre Wales’s latest production, Mundo Paralelo, is a ground-breaking collaboration with NoFitState circus company. This ambitious show sees the hectic high-wire acrobatics and the mind-bending magic of the circus transported from the high top to the auditorium.

Juggling, tigh rope walking, trapeze artists and magicians are no longer the preserve of sticky fingered, candy floss eating children in seaside resorts, but a mainstay of a constantly developing and evolving art-form. But can contemporary circus succeed in portraying real, well-rounded characters rather than mere caricatures? Does it have the emotional intensity to develop a narrative? Or is it merely a dazzling distraction with no real depth?

The production is visually stunning from start to end. As the curtain rises masked black figures on the stage and figures descending from the ceiling above the audience with fibre-optic lights covering their faces show a clear intent to move away from the cute and comfortable world of the traditional circus.

This is followed by further superb spectacles which stretch the stage to its limits: an acrobat hesitates before jumping from a window suspended from the ceiling, a trapeze artist flies higher and higher, and yet still higher, until its seems inevitable that she will collide with the very structure of the theatre and a juggler contorting in a maze of twists, turns and tricks.

The show sparkles as a host of trapdoors on the stage are used both cleverly and playfully to suggest a parallel world below. This is a world full of contrast between fragile beauty and cruel darkness. A world of bitter sweet courtship rituals between a playful acrobatic ladder performer and a stubborn, independent-minded rope artist. A world of sadness and disappointment where a magician struggles to charm the object of his affections despite his remarkable gift; turning water into glass globes, and making these globes disappear into thin air.

Mundo Paraleo’s appeal lies in its departure from our rose-tinted memories of the circus and its willingness to portray a darkness which is never far from the surface of its parallel world. Following an acrobatic argument between two sleek, almost shape-shifting twins, a curtain is pulled aside to reveal one lying dead with a knife in her back. Throughout the show a menacing, ring-master figure, controls the action on stage; acting as a puppeteer as the juggler does his bidding, violently pulling the high-wire to pieces as the acrobat displays her skills and forcing the trapeze artist to swing higher and higher.

The production attempts to distant itself from the old-fashioned end of the pier world of the circus by drawing the audience into its own wonderful parallel world. This is a complex, dark world far removed from that of the top- hat wearing ring master and dancing ponies. However, this fresh outlook on the circus is not completely engaging.

We are treated to a collection of snapshots of the parallel world, rather than a complete, well-rounded portrayal, with a structured narrative. The snapshots are undoubtedly well executed, but the lack of any real narrative cohesion or carefully crafted characters means that the production feels like little more than an accomplished circus performance, rather than a fully-fledged piece of theatre.