PLATTSBURGH — Sunday and Monday deadlines loom Sunday and Monday for Circus Smirkus at the 34th-annual Mayor's Cup Regatta & Festival here.
"Frontpage Follies: Big Top Big News!" is this year's theme chosen for the Vermont-based award-winning, international, traveling-youth circus.
"Every year, we do a theme or story," said Marialisa Calta, Circus Smirkus public relations specialist. "We've done 'Pinocchio' and 'Alice in Wonderland.' Last year was 'The Great Outdoors.' This year, it's 'Frontpage Follies.' It's a circus-style take on news gathering. We have paparazzi clowns, juggling paper boys."
Aerialists will perform on colorful newsprint-like fabric.
"We have Wacky Weatherman, who is our emcee, and high-wire investigative reporters," Calta said. "The theme carries through. It's in almost every act. We have battling TV anchors doing acrobatics."
Circus Smirkus is a one-ring circus with no animals.
"We're the only youth circus to travel with a big-top tent," Calta said. "It's a real circus. We have a tent that goes up and down every two days. It's a very magical space. We have a composer that does original music. It's not canned crapola."
A Montreal costumer designs the costumes. The youth's entrance and finale are choreographed by a Broadway choreographer.
"They were here three weeks. Coaches from all over the world — Switzerland, Morocco, Canada, New Zealand and United States. This will make you want to run away (to the circus). It's not just goofy kids tumbling around. They're professional acts with a youthful exuberance. It's a really special event," she said.
"Smirko" Sam Ferlo, 14, joins his fellow troupers in stone-age print-journalism antics. A resident of Rome, Ferlo is a clown and a juggler. He started his clown studies at the tender age of 3 watching "Laurel and Hardy" and "The Three Stooges" videos. He learned to juggle and balance from his late father, Ted, a five-year veteran of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus.
On Sunday and Monday, Ferlo clowns in a variety of sketches. He likes to travel and make people laugh.
"I like theater," he said. "I juggle, and I do stilts. I learned it here (stilts). It's fun. The hardest part is balancing yourself."
This year's 29 troupers range in age from 10 to 18 and hail from 14 states as well as New Zealand. Their skills include juggling, wire-walking, clowning, acrobatics, aerials and unicycle. Troupers also perform on the diabolo, trapeze, cradle, Spanish web and lyra.
"In 2000, the Disney Channel did a 15-part series on us," Calta said. "It gave us a lot of exposure. Kids and parents that saw it remember it. There's a new documentary about us called 'Circus Dreams.' We played for president (George Bush) and Barbara Bush last year. We have a lot of great exposure."
Circus Smirkus runs an overnight summer circus-arts camp in Lyndon Center, Vt., that is open to all youths. To be selected for a Big Top Tour, youths send in a video of themselves and are invited or rejected to audition live in Greensboro, Vt. Once they audition live, they are selected, or not, to go on tour.
"We have worked with performers from 28 different countries and 10 Native American tribes," Calta said. "It's sort of an amazing deal."
Clown, acrobat, aerialist and wire walker are the many hats of Zoe Ruth Sisson Silberblatt, 18. Training in gymnastics since the age of 3, she advanced to Level 10, the highest competitive level.
"I decided I wanted to experiment with the creative side of physical performance," said Silberblatt, who lives in Pittsburgh, Pa. "I mostly did aerial rope and auditioned for Circus Smirkus and became a clown and learned a lot of new skills."
She performs on the Chinese pole in "Frontpage Follies."
"It's a free-standing pole we climb up," Silberblatt said. "You do strength-based skills. It takes a lot of muscle to do anything cool on Chinese pole. I'm also in the trampoline act, a lot of flipping and bouncing. I do acrobatics in the opening and finale of the show. I'm part of almost all the pyramids in the show. I'm on people's shoulders, and I have people on my shoulders and lift people up."
Email Robin Caudell at: rcaudell@pressrepublican.com
