The end of an American Icon and a part of history
The lights went up on the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circus on Sunday evening to reveal 14 lions and tigers sitting in a circle, surrounding a man in a sparkling suit. It was a sight too implausible to seem real yet such an iconic piece of Americana that it was impossible to believe the show would not go on.
After 146 years, Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey is closing for good, responding to a prolonged slump in ticket sales that has rendered the business unsustainable, according to its operator, Feld Entertainment. On Sunday, the circus glittered, thundered and awed beneath the booms and klieg lights of Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum. That there was no tent over the final show, no striped eaves from which the daring young man on the flying trapeze could hang, felt fitting. The big top was packed up, this time forever.
Autumn Luciano stood outside, ticket in hand. “It feels a little like a funeral today, but I’m trying not to mourn it in a sad way,” said Ms. Luciano, 33, a pinup photographer who had flown in from Lansing, Mich., to see the last show. “Circus is all about being happy.”
She pulled up her sleeve to reveal a tattoo of a circus tent on her wrist. Without circuses, “we lose the ability to go and see that humans can do anything,” she said. “You go to the circus and see human beings doing insane things, but the truth is, we all have the ability to do crazy things.”
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The world is losing “a place of wonder,” he said at an event a few days before the final performances. All around him, performers with thick makeup and saddened faces spoke to reporters about the circus’s demise. “It’s the last safe space,” he said. “It’s the last pure form of entertainment there is.”
“To this day, the final performance with the elephants is the hardest performance I have ever had to go through,” she said. “I had to say goodbye to elephants I’d been with since they were born. They were part of my family.”
“You can cry,” Mr. Iverson said, “after the curtain closes.”
As the show finally ended, the backstage crew members, the animal handlers, the performers’ small children and even the train engineers joined the performers on the arena floor, standing with the costumed dancers. They sang a round of “Auld Lang Syne.”
But before that, the people in the crowd rose to their feet for a prolonged ovation. The ringmaster cheered back at them, “You mean the circus isn’t antiquated?” The crowd roared. “You mean you love the circus?” he said. The noise was deafening.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/21/nyregion/ringling-brothers-circus-takes-final-bow.htmlA farewell and a victory to PETA
Meanwhile the attempt to remove horses from tourism and fine dining and making them a historical footnote continues.
http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/videos-prompt-renewed-calls-to-ban-horse-drawn-carriages-in-quebec-1.3423659http://www.ctvnews.ca/business/horse-meat-reaction-blown-out-of-proportion-toronto-chef-1.3411411