Circe Du Soleil

Cirque du Soleil opens on Wednesday

MANILA, Philippines — BDO Unibank, Inc. will co-present the staging of Cirque du Soleil’s Varekai in the country that will run from June 22 to July 24, 2011.

“BDO and Cirque du Soleil share common denominators -- creativity, strength and flexibility. We provide the best products and services to our clients, and Cirque always gives the audience the best performance there is. The combination is indeed a great fit,” the Bank said.

Valued Bank clients will get the chance to enjoy the top-notch show during the “Special BDO Night.”

And throughout Varekai’s month-long run, special door prizes will be exclusively given to BDO customers.

Each show is a fusion of circus styles from around the world, with its own central theme and storyline. Over the years it has expanded, going from one show to 19 shows in over 271 cities on every continent except Antarctica.

For its Manila show, Cirque du Soleil will amaze the audience with Varekai (pronounced ver-ay-kie which means wherever in the Romany language of the gypsies), a captivating story that tells the adventures of a young man who descended from the sky into the world searching for a place or realm called Varekai.

The Philippines is the third Asian country to host the show, following Taipei and Seoul.

Cirque du Soleil's new 'Iris' blooms in Hollywood | Crave - CNET

HOLLYWOOD, Calif.--The cast of "Iris," Cirque du Soleil's new movie-themed show at the famed Kodak Theatre here, took the stage Thursday to preview the upcoming production's mix of elite acrobatics, audio visual technology, and live music and dance for a select crew of press, corporate reps, and local government officials.

Cirque artists performed 20 minutes of the massive stage production--Cirque's 27th to date--for the eager crowd. When " Iris " opens later this year, it will settle into the Kodak Theatre as a permanent attraction, stepping aside whenever the Academy Awards or other shows require the space.

After opening comments from Cirque executives, the audience enjoyed what could prove to be the opening of the finished production. Performers filled the stage in mini-vignettes highlighting the invention of cinema and the earliest days of Hollywood. A human kinescope danced amid aspiring starlets, blue-collar crew workers, silent film stars, and well-dressed executives.

Technological magic merged with the human elements. Independently animated and radio-controlled "creatures" like studio lights and cameras danced with their human counterparts. The opening number climaxed with an aerial act of two male rigging dancers literally flying about and bouncing off the walls of the Kodak Theatre.

Imagery captured during the invention of black-and-white moving pictures played in loops projected around the stage set against the backdrop of a soundtrack by film composer Danny Elfman. The final clip, a classic gangster mini-movie, gave way to Cirque's high-tech visual trickery when its characters stepped "through" the screen and emerged onstage. A cops-and-robbers chase atop the rooftops of New York along a row of trampolines topped off the show.

The lighting for "Iris" relies on modern techniques of projecting imagery against translucent fabrics and periodically mixing stark light and shadows to transform the stage area into the illusion of a two-dimensional moving image. The exact tools being used are top secret and likely will remain so as the show rolls out, but the sheer size of the set pieces and the proliferation of technology hints at the massive amount of machinery hidden backstage.

While most of the production remains under wraps, the short demo already showed that the same massive, animated stage and set piece movements from former Cirque shows are once again in play. Using automated positioning systems, the set pieces for the large installed Cirque shows are monitored and will cease moving immediately if the piece is off by as little as millimeters. Such systems protect the Cirque performers, no matter how many tons a set piece weighs.

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