Cirque du Soleil: A delicate balance Saturday May 19, 2007 
Cirque-du-Soleil 
BBC
#20. Guy LaLiberte (47) 
Cirque du Soleil founder named top entrepreneur
All you need is love It's been a dizzying 20 years since a former fire-eater named Guy Laliberte founded the Cirque du Soleil and took it to the bright lights of Las Vegas.
Today, the Cirque is a $1-billion colossus - a global empire of 3,500 people that can spend as much as $165 million staging a new show, while touring simultaneously in Latin America, Asia, Europe and North America.
But in a business that depends on creativity for its success, size of that kind can pose its own problems.
How does the organization manage to keep its creative fire?
Lyn Heward, a former president of the creative content division and a current executive producer with the Cirque, recently co-authored a book about the company - The Spark.
In a recent interview, she talked about how the little circus that became a corporate giant still manages to nurture the spirit at the heart of its success.
As the company has spread to three main bases of operation - Montreal, Las Vegas and Amsterdam - it has been forced to rethink how it operates.
With more activities going on at the same time, too many demands were being put on corporate services like marketing, merchandising, finance and human resources.
Employees began to complain that mounting red tape was hindering their artistry. "We restructured three years ago to accommodate that," Heward said.
Key people in corporate services were identified to handle requests from the creative teams and provide more rapid solutions to their needs.
With the globalization of its activities had come internal fears of too much growth. But that global reach provided creative advantages at the same time, Heward said.
After all, Cirque's great strength is its ability to develop material that resonates with audiences worldwide.
And the success in finding universal themes comes from the fact that the environment at the company has grown to become so multicultural, Heward said.
"The reality is that we have Russians, Chinese, Brazilians, Australians, Americans, Canadians all working on every single production."
With its global reach, the naming of a show has become especially important. It's a complex affair where a number of people contribute and "many dictionaries in many languages are used before the right name comes up."
To foster the creative spirit, the working environment is structured so that everyone has the opportunity to make a contribution.
"It starts with the essential belief from Guy Laliberte on down that people are by nature creative," Heward says.
"Even if a secretary applies for a job at Cirque, that secretary would like to become involved in a creative gesture.
Creativity is one thing in a show, it's another in marketing, it's another thing in merchandising, or even in finance," Heward says. "It's about finding new and innovative ways to do things."
The tone is set in the Montreal studio where new shows are conceived - a New Age building with walls askew. The ambience is "very metallic, very light," she says.
Open spaces with tables encourage employees to hold meetings and conversations in public spaces rather than being squirreled away in offices.
Overall, the company tries to ensure all employees feel connected to the final product on stage.
"We make sure employees regularly have an opportunity to see the results of their labour. When the artists are in training or when they are preparing a new show, we try to create occasions for employees to see the performers."
Developing the concept for a new show is not a top-down process. It starts with a team of 8 to 15 people who brainstorm ideas, Heward says.
"We don't ever start from a script." Initial concepts are fleshed out further by the team, which would typically include the director, the costume designer, the set designer, the musical lighting and sound directors.
Each department takes care of its own elements and they have freedom to propose changes or additions.
"The best idea wins."
phadekel@videotron.ca
Tuesday May 9, 2006 The Soleil Never Sets Cirque Du Soleil returns to New York, with angels, jugglers, rubber chickens and acrobats jumping on beds.
Sunday Apr 16, 2006 it 
Cirque du Soleil performs balancing act with CGI
Integrator takes over IT functions for Montreal-based entertainment company
2005
Apr 11, 2005 A Cirque in progress
Debut of new show encounters a host of `technical troubles' as Quebec celebrities smile politely
But the extravaganza will no doubt be substantially changed when it comes to Toronto, Star critic bets
The world premiere of a new show from Cirque du Soleil is always a dramatic event, but Thursday night's opening of Corteo added an unexpected and unwelcome touch of excitement to the mix.
Approximately a half hour into the show's first act, the action stopped, the house lights came on and a perplexed audience was told there would be a short interruption due to "technical troubles."
As the minutes dragged on, the celebrity-filled capacity crowd grew restless until, finally, there was another announcement.
Jazz, Cirque embrace in finaleAnniversary blowout a feast for the senses
JORDAN ZIVITZ The Gazette
Monday, July 12, 2004
An irate purist suggested in an e-mail to The Gazette last week that the Montreal International Jazz Festival's liberal definition of jazz - encompassing everything from blues-rock baddie George Thorogood to DJ culture - has turned the annual event into a circus.
Last night, at the festival's grand finale featuring Cirque du Soleil, he certainly had a point - although few people seemed to be complaining.
The last of this year's three huge outdoor blowouts was a joint celebration for the jazz fest's 25th anniversary and Cirque du Soleil's 20th, and no expense was spared.
The General Motors stage at the corner of Ste. Catherine and Jeanne Mance Sts. was fitted with a halo of sun rays, and was joined by a catwalk to a smaller platform. Large screens were placed throughout the site for those who couldn't get a ringside seat.
The festival's preliminary crowd estimate last night placed attendance at a record 205,000. Many more than that had access to the performance through an almost-live broadcast on CBC and Radio-Canada (the telecast had a 15-minute delay).
This being Cirque du Soleil, the celebration - dubbed Soleil de minuit - had at least as much to do with theatre as it did with music.
The plot in a nutshell: A dreamer sends a message to artists throughout the world to celebrate a meeting between the sun and moon. It was a utilitarian concept, but served its purpose both as symbolism (sun = Cirque, moon = jazz) and as a framework for the participation of about 200 artists (roughly 130 circus performers and 60 musicians). Among those in the cast were homegrown cellist/singer Jorane and African icon Youssou N'Dour, who gave his own show at the festival Saturday.
Ste. Catherine St. essentially became part of the stage. Colours were projected onto the surrounding concrete canyons, a percussionist hammered out ominous soundscapes on the terrace of the Hyatt, and in the role of The Dreamer, actor Paul Ahmarani was perched on the roof of the Musee d'art contemporain.
The show started in earnest when Ahmarani dispatched The Dreamer's message via balloon - an example of Cirque du Soleil's ability to avoid unbearable pretension by steering toward childlike whimsy - cuing dozens of artists tOWN through passages to the stage. A vocalist, percussionists, dancers - it was sometimes hard to know where to look. The screens helped, translating the live show into a simultaneous broadcast.
Soleil de minuit certainly embraced the festival's wide range of programming. Within the first 20 minutes, we got tribal drumming, classical music courtesy of the I Musici ensemble, and loose-limbed zydeco. The union of the sun and moon wasn't always a perfect marriage - an acrobat doing tricks inside a human-size hamster treadmill is bound to upstage just about any musical act, and a troupe of fire-twirlers reduced the show's lunar component to a big-top soundtrack - but it was certainly a feast for the senses.
Perhaps more than any other jazz-fest blowout, with so much going on, it was a benefit to get a stageside perspective. By mid-afternoon, scores of people were already at the site, watching cast members rehearse. Louis d'Anjou had staked out a prime spot near the main stage and was planning to stay until showtime. "How often can you see something like this - especially for free?" the Outremont resident said.
Well, at least twice. Cirque du Soleil was responsible for the jazz festival's record outdoor gala in 1995, when about 200,000 people packed Ste. Catherine St.
Francois Duckett was another early arrival. Duckett often performs on the street as a clown, and came prepared: Putting on a glowing nose, flashing mouthpiece and antennae, he inflated balloons by the dozen and tossed them into the crowd.
Not everyone arrived early to get a prime seat by the stage. Stewart Ennis was wandering around the festival site early courting heatstroke, but planned to watch the show on a screen on Jeanne Mance St. Perhaps he wasn't counting on the crowd spilling off Ste. Catherine in massive numbers.
Organizers would not comment yesterday on the attendance at the festival; those figures are to be announced today. But with three massive outdoor galas instead of one this year, it's a good bet the numbers will be among the event's highest ever.
jzivitz@thegazette.canwest.com
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2004
Friday 27 Feb 2004 cbc
A Canadian to join the billionaires club for the first time was Guy Laliberte. The 44-year-old is the founder and CEO of the Montreal-based performance troupe Cirque du Soleil. The magazine says he's also worth $1.1 billion US.
2003
Sunday Nov 30, 2003 Cirque du Soleil takes tumble in San Francisco's gay politics
Montreal's politically correct, gender-bending Cirque du Soleil, publicly accused of job discrimination on the basis of HIV status by a recently fired acrobat, has fallen out of favour in San Francisco, the gay capital of the United States.
...In July, acrobat Matthew Cusick, 32, backed by a civil rights group called Lambda that specializes in gay, lesbian and HIV-related issues, filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission saying his confidentially divulged HIV status was used against him by the Cirque when it fired him in April. The case is pending.
On Nov. 20, protesters took to the streets outside the blue and yellow big top in San Francisco's Pac Bell Park, where the Cirque's Alegria show has been playing since Nov. 6, urging Cirque patrons to support Cusick.
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Fire Within a clip!  Cirque |
Saturday Jun 7, 2003 nyt
SLIDE SHOWCirque du Soleil
Pirates and other family fare couldn't bring enough tourists, so Las Vegas has gone back to its Sin City roots by Christinne Muschi.
