The Dior Dancers

Further investigations in the bygone night-club era

In our investigations of the bygone nightclub era, we hope our followers remember the unveiling of the miraculous Charlivels from our vaults. In the current times of spandex vestuary, canned new-age music and skilled understudies from the athletic world, we are pleasant to remember once again the era when acrobatics, music and theatrics werea blend of pure art. The Dior Dancers, a prestigious variety act lived between 1958 and 1963, was the master example. They inherited the aesthetic of the remote “apache dance” (a specialty you’ll soon face on this blog) with the vocabulary of “adagio” acrobatic dance. Dior Dancers was produced by Bob Ganjou, who made famous the act of Ganjou Brothers (between late 20s and 1947), and starred his wife Merian Ganjou.

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Dior Dancers starred in the British variety circuit, and in the opening show of Las Vegas Tropicana Hotel with the “Folies Bergeres” French imported production, where they starred for two years.

For you today, a selection of the lobby pictures of Merian and her boys, and their 1960 tv appearance in ‘Sunday Night at the London Palladium’ hosted by Bruce Forsyth.

Please, take the necessary 9 minutes to enjoy the act. Appreciate the drama and pre-Actor’s Studio innocence in interpretation; the quality and timing of the musical selection and the quality of the live band; be amazed at the ease of skills that nobody in this world is likely supposed to see anymore, forever.

"The World's Great Magician"

An adieu to Carl Ballantine (1922-2009)

As Orson Welles wisely stated: "every magician is the greatest magician in the world".
The Great Ballantine (born Meyer Kessler) presented himself as such at the beginning at his act. Just to follow seven minutes of the worst possible exits for a magician's act. And in doing that, he consecrated a star on the stages of dying vaudeville and rising television: the rubber chicken.
As a zen priest, he dedicated 60 years of his life doing every day the same act: until his fictionary character sculpted himself on his face, body and voice, becoming more believable than truth. Until every smile and laugh from the audience became a sure-fire turning point of a little piece of art through the minimalist craft of the repetition in front of the most unpredictable audiences. Of his generation, only giants as Mac Ronay and George Carl can be compared to him.



When a magicians passes away, a wand is traditionally broken by colleagues on his grave.
What is broken here is not just the prestige of a glorious magic wand. It is also another link to an era and style of perfection in performing arts that never will be back again.

Battling Magicians

"FISM" in Beijng

The venerable ancient art of magic is still alive: yesterday in Beijing ended the FISM, the world magic championship. Few events in the world are as surreal as witnessing, every three years, hundred of the most unpredictable magic acts from the five continents, for an audience of thousand of other magicians. It is an experience spanning from the most grotesque parochial flavour to few sublime exemple of a great art.

This year's Grand Prix of magic was awarded to magician Soma from Hungary.
Next FISM will be in Blackpool, UK, July 2012.

Here is Soma's winning act:

Torp's Flea Circus

Tivoli park in Copenhagen stands as one of the last paradises of novelties and wonders. One of its main attractions in the 50s was Mrs.Torpe's flea circus. This being probably one of the last genuine shows of this kind as intended in the last two centuries, and today resting in obscure memorabilia.
The show was founded by William Torp in England in the 20s, probably inspired by some companies of the early 1900. After touring Egypt (poster above), M.me Else Torp established a permanent show at Tivoli in 1952, to sadly close it in 1956 "for lack of performers". It was replaced by a mouse show, it seems. Her son later toured with a similar show in a special trailer through the Usa coast to coast.
We are happy to offer you today a magnificent documentary film about Torpe's flea circus in his golden years at Copenhagen' s Tivoli park.

(photo courtesy from Torp's family website)

The obscures origins of "manualism"

With a tribute to the unique art of John Twomey.

It seems that all started in 1933, when a farmer named Cecill Dill traveled from Traverse City, Michigan, to Universal Studios in Hollywood to record his singular skill in a newsreel.

Mr.Dill claimed to play “Yankee Doodle Dandy” in a unheard form: by squeezing air thru his hands. He said to have started mastering his instrument by 1914.

Strangely, no traces seems to survive of this art during the golden age of vaudeville, music-hall and early TV. We have to wait the 70s and the arrival of John Twomey, who in 1974 took as a storm the millions of Americans watching Johnny Carson’s show, with his electryfying rendition of “Stars and Stripes Forever”. It is to Mr.Twomey that seems credited the definition of “manualist”, a term that now dignifies and indicates a profession still rare but today relatively practiced in some outskirts of the musical constellation.

Today we offers you the sight of Mr.Dill’s first performance ever of manualism, and an excerpt of the legendary Twomey’s act on Carson’s. But expect more to come in future.

A lesson in showmanship

Eric Brenn, or the mastering of porcelaine for entertainment purpose

Plate spinning is one of the most widely replied standards in showbiz, from small country circuses to far-east night club. But the act itself is an insidious and marvellous machine for thrill, timing, skills, comedy, audience involvement and all that makes great an act.
It is a lesson for the eternal adagio: no matter what you does in front of footlight, yourself is what really matters. Personality will always be the eternal secret.
Now, is difficult to find in the history a man better than Eric Brenn to make of this specialty a masterpiece of pure art.
Here is Eric Brenn in action at Ed Sullivan's in 1969:

The Man with X-Ray eyes

Kuda Bux, from India, was an unique act in the last century of inusual performances. He was able to read and write while wrapped as a mummy, or even drive a car. But he needed glasses to read his newspaper in normal conditions.





Half of the fascination of his internationally admired act was the ritual of meticolously obscuring his wiew with gauzes and napkins.
A deliciously mysterious blend of Esp, exotica, bondage, masochism, with a flavour of night-club fashion and a twist of sci-fi atmosphere, Kuda Bux was a sort of horror movie hero. It can be witnessed in the video below: even if not of the best quality, the relic preserves the entirety of his act.

Gifts from the Insects

One of the very first post subjects of our blog was the amazing Insects Circus, that we discovered few years ago on London's south bank (just few steps away from Astley's circus birthplace).



Later, two of the most succesful features of the blog were Koringa the reptiles' queen and Hadji Hali, regurgitator extraordinaire.
Now, Mark Copeland, Insect Circus Impresario, sends us two interesting findings about our two icons. We offer them to you readers, being also an opportunity for stimulating your curiosity to revive those past marvels, searching into our blog for: insect circus, koringa, hadji ali.

Dear Raffaele,

Having discovered your wonderful Novelties pages through an Insect
Circus google alert some time ago, I've been a big fan of your blog.
Thanks for including my museum amongst your wonders!

I thought you might be interested in the two attached pictures from my
collection.  The Koringa poster is not in great condition but is quite
rare. Also the photo is not wonderful as it is framed and difficult to
photograph as it's behind glass. It is from the Reco Bros Irish tour
of 1946. The other picture is a flyer for Hadji Ali when he performed
in London in 1936. I believe he died sometime that year...?

Looking forward to more of your Novelties as they appear,

All the best,

Mark.

Mark Copeland
Creative Director
The Insect Circus

Holidays on G-String

We imagine our initiated readers, being periodically exposed to our past bizarreries, often complaining the nowadays loss of inusual acts, strange performances, unthinkable talents.
Gone seems the times when words such daring, sexy, mysterious, hilarious, devastating were the brilliant faces reflecting the magic of a same, surreal perfectly cut diamond.
We saved for the holidays one of those pearls.
So we can introduce you to Miss Amy-G, the lady in the picture above. She is not an oddity of the past but a marvel of the presents. She lives with us.
Enjoy her unique talent on the video below.

Happy Holidays

The Charlivels

The golden days of the night-club era

Before the plethora of Eastern acrobats, wannabe magicians and outdated post-burlesque divas, the origins of the night-clubs were studded by outstanding showstoppers.
One of the very first of them, by the late '40s, was the "Charlivels" act. Valentino, Juanito and Charlie jr. (sons of the legendary clown Charlie Rivel), helped to open the way to variety acts in such places as Latin Quarter in New York, Ciro's at Hollywood and the very early Las Vegas lounges, without forgetting to grace european temples as Medrano, London's Talk of the Town, Copenhagen's Schumann, etc.
Here they are, in a tv show from the 60s (we posted the video in 2 parts).

But what they did in their act? Well, just everything.

See by yourself.

!!!!...CIRCOPEDIA....!!!!!

We've been missing for awhile, being quite busy at the moment.
This not being a vulgar excuse to abandon you or to uderestimate your appetite for memorabilia.

Waiting for our comeback here, you can highly entertain yourself with the ultimate online divertissement for the serious and competent circus history amateur:

www.circopedia.org


It is a project made possible by the grace of Big Apple Circus. It is curated by historian extraordinaire Dominique Jando, with some participation by ours.
You will be treated with an incessantly-growing cornucopia of texts, video, images and much more.
We hope you will enjoy our work. And your feedback will be highly appreciated.

Elvis mokko

The art of surprising and impress the spectator always falls in predictable categories: magicians, clowns, fakirs, hypnotists, etc.
Our readers knows how much we enjoys to ignore those genres, searching for performers whose art doesn't leave us other possibilities than to avoid the taxonomy.
Today we invite you to make the knowledge of Elvis Mokko, from Mozambico (probably the only novelty act ever from this remote country). He was a regular feature of european night-clubs in the 70s, then turning to theme park and events in Germany.
What he does?
See by yourself from this performance in Cirque d'Hiver, Paris, from the late 70s.

Capitan Wall Gallery

We will never give up to swim into the past in search of one of our most beloved obsessions: crocodile hypnotizers.
Our analyst is still investigating about the reasons of this fascination of ours, that we sincerely hope you endure to appreciate.
Today is the turn of one of the most distinguished heroes in the field at the turn of last century: Capitan Wall. Unfortunately, moving footage doesn't seem to exist.

Of Clothes and Men

The forgotten and unique art of Gerard Sety

Quick-change artists have been a beloved feature of vaudeville, circuses and music-hall stages.
If two Italians must be credited to make of this a true art form worldwide (Leopoldo Fregoli in last century, pictured below, and Arturo Brachetti those days), other singular variations have been around.

Quick-change modern pioneer, Leopoldo fregoli (1900 ca.)

Among obscure rapidity skill of victorian impersonation, oriental mask transformers, papier-maché parodists, Russian walking fashion shows, some singular gem emerges.
One of those was Gerard Sety from France. Mr.Sety, who left this world in 1998, was a French movie actor whose dozens of popular film appearances are credited. But his non-screen identity was tied to an umbelievable cabaret stage act in which he completely revolved the concept of quick-change: in fact it is proper to classify it as a slow-change performer. His 10-minute piece, performed in any language, became in the crescendo an hallucynant masterpiece of pure dadaism.
We had somewhere a version of the act in his integrity, likely the last time in his life he performed it in TV. Even if in Italian language, we are sure that is perfectly enjoyable in his universal crazyness.
Ladies and gentleman, please admire the only and unique slow-change act in the history: Gerard Sety.

The King of Pickpockets (again)

Finally, the full act of Borra

In a realm crowded of crowns, filled with princes, lords and queens, as is the showbusiness world of obscure specialties, we recently twice illustrated as one and only was the sovereign of the artistic appropriation of others' valued properties.
We twice unhearted images of the late Borra, promising more wonders to come. And today you can discover in all his magnificence, his complete act. Crowned with another small gallery of the publicity he was heralded with (and, please, gently remarks the delicious Knie circus poster in which Borra attempts to steals a letter).
We also wish to remember that today Charly Borra, the son of the master, is still touring the planet exhalting the remarkable art of his progenitor (awebsite of him seems forthcoming).

Boxing Kangaroos

And a special opponent


In the realm of the anthropomorphic circus mythology, the boxing kangaroo represents without any doubt one of the primal icons. The direct opposition between man and beast, framed in the world of sports and leisures, assures to the savage creature the potential of a victory, under the fair eyes of a genuine federal referee.
A small gallery of emblematic boxing kangoroos from various eras, finishing with a filmed witness of one of those fights, with a very distinguished defiant.

Distinctly Deep Throaths

A disappearing race of female swallowing marvels and his hopefully renaissance

As our social ecosystem is deeply changing and revolving, several are the disapperaring forms of life as the most peculiar ways of earnig life itself. One of those in dangerous extinction is the sword swallowing practice. If the masculine tradition can still count few dozens of exponents scarcely scattered around the globe, the gentle sex representants seems nowadays much rare.

In the last century, sideshow platforms, variety stages and modest village squares pullulated of this most sexier emanation of burlesque, where the puritan observer, while enjoyng the thrill of the feat, could safely imagine the most forbidden variations on those ladies whose throats housed every size of iron weapon in multiple numbers and shapes, as well as neon tubes, chair legs, scissors spoons etcetera etcetera. Then, with politically correctness of the fairground and his live entertainments, toward the end of last century more reserved variations on the deep throat imagery excited in the most confortable way the imagery of the adult in private silver screen consumptions.

Today’s pleasant renaissance of burlesque and sideshow culture is inspiring a rebirth of ladies talented in modern mouth miracles. The actual leader of the movement, according our modest judgment, resides in England and is Miss Amy Saunders, aka Miss Behave. She is an immensely talented performer, the most perfect cabaret guest, chanteuse and comedienne, and of course gifted in oral oddities.

We leave you today with a gallery of past braveries (a series of portraits selected and graciously stolen from wonderful www.swordswallow.com), to finish with a clip of Amy accomplishing a singular Guinness record.

And now the clip. Well, Guinnes Record. We agree on how vulgar is to suggest the discovery of an artist with a television game appearance, and we wished to offer you a more theatrical piece from Miss Behave's repertory. The even infinite resources of the "net" don't allow us, and we hope you soon see her live in her most appropriately decadent atmosphere.

An angel of another century

Lottie Brunn and the era of shomanship

Another great performer left this world in the last few days. Lottie Brunn was one of the last witness of last century's great shomanship, when mastering an act was a mysterious formula of tantalizing talent, erotic elegance, raucous rythm. And of all the remaining ingredients to make you believe that the performer was part of another world, the ambassador of a kingdom invented to exhilarate you in a happy evening, to then turn into a gentle ghost to wake you the following morning in a regenerate state of grace, to face the ordinary world.
That was Mrs. Brunn, now in the realm of the legend where her brother Francis was waiting before.
They were in a class before stylized rainbow lycras, elaborate face paintings and sophisticated aseptic soundtracks. They were in a class when performing was a matter of personality, smiles, continuous seduction, masterful interaction with a live swing band, and a concept of costumes as going to a court ball twice daily.
Lottie and Francis are now perhaps doing the same up there, very far in the sky, in the same world where this class can last forever: the class of Borra the king of pickpockets; or the gentleman magician Channing Pollock; of the elegant chaotic George Carl; the absurd but aristocratic dancing Doll Family of midgets; the lord of horsemanship Albert Schumann, or Count Basie and his band. An array of smiles, subtle touches of shomanship, white ties, silk dresses, personal lobby photos polished as new shoes, feats of acrobatics or legerdemain presented with the lightness of a joke, to distracted night-club audiences mesmerized for seven long minutes when the world and all is cold wars seemed to stop.
What a century it was. What performers they were.

Donkey on Ice

The unusual comedy art of Karl Kossmayer and his mule (with a new discovery)

One of the most intense circus experiences of my childhood was the act of the “unrideable mules”: in wich a good dozen of spectators is invited to win a prize if able to complete a ring circle on the back of the savage quadrupede, catastrophically ending with the impossible attempts of a quiet but tenacious old man. Later, you could have spent weeks puzzling if he was a genuine spectator or some kind of strange performer.

For me, the image of the little old gentleman, approaching the ring with his program in the hands, pursued by his wife and finishing to lost his pants, was a shock. A contrast between the greatest humor and a feel of unease; a masterpiece on the border between fiction and reality, completely played on the separation line between the shadowy space of the audience and the bright territory of the performer. Was this man from the circus? Nobody could really answer in front of the immense showmanship of Karl Kossmayer. A perfect illusion in which, long before Wharol, everybody was promised five minutes of celebrity. And, slowly during the act, this little character carried to the ring a perfect history of an universal retired middle-class type, life-dominated by his wife’s discipline, and wasting in few second all his life’s boring dignity to reach the impossible world of the clowns.

This was great drama, revolutioning the roles of the theatre far before the avant-gardes. An actor impersonating a spectator who wants to be an actor, without declaring to be acting… Pirandello was nothing, compared to Kossmayer.

Karl Kossmayer (1917-2000), from a great trainers family, started his act in 1928, and with it toured the globe, generating imitators all around the world. His sister Julie impersonated perfectly “the wife”. Starring with the best jugglers, acrobats, clowns, trainers of his time, his act was so strong on the audience that the only place to put it was mostly to close the program.

The act was filmed by the great Jacques Tati as part of his circus movie “Parade”, in 1974 (mostly of the movie critics are still thinking that this perfect act was a Tati’s idea).

And now, our little discovery.
In fact, we have found also an unusual clip. Kossmayer toured briefly in Usa with Holiday on Ice of 1960. That’s it.
They used to put for few minutes a carpeted circus ring on the ice and display the mule act. And the comedy effect was emphasized immensely when Karl repeatly covered on ice the distance between his loge seat and the circus ring, with a masterful catalog of falls and trips. Unfortunately, his American success was short, because, for safety issue, audience members were discouraged to test their skills with the “dangerous” mule. The homeland of rodeos was starting to be politically correct also for the masters of European circus artistry.

I became friend with Karl in his last years, always sharing wonderful times visiting the Monte Carlo Festival.

Today we wants to divulgate his art to the new generations of the world, with a double tribute: his act in the traditional version, from the mentioned Tati movie; and our discovered excerpt of the way he did it on Holiday on Ice, from a forgotten Ed Sullivan special.

Little Tich and Loie Fuller

The pioneer of clown and the ancestor of dance

We already paied our tribute to Litlle Tich, presenting the irresistible film of his "long boots" act, the first recorded comic movie (filmed in 1900) and, according to Jacques Tati "the root of everything is basic in the art of the comic film".
In times of pionnerism in everything (we are around year 1900), Tich had another illustrious contemporary walking the stages: Miss Loie Fuller, who with his "danse serpentine" revolutioned the concept itself of ballet. The fast, modern dynamism of her variety specialty, with elaborated light effects, was captured in various way: the poster art of Chéret, the early photographers, the study on motion of Tolouse-Lautrec itself and finally a certain Mr.Louis Lumiére who was experimenting on the moving image. In fact, Miss Fuller's act was filmed and hand colored as early as 1898.


Then, the encounter.

Miss Fuller was a star. And Little Tich was the king of parody. They even happened to share the same Folies-Bergères stage. So was almost natural for the great little comic to add in his repertory his version of the Fuller's serpentine dance. And, as for the "big boot", this act too was filmed for the posterity even is less known and very short. It is preserved in some movie archives. According our vocation for wonderous novelties, we searched, find it and posted on youtube.

Now, in the following video windows, please compare the two stars: Loie Fuller's original movie by Lumiére of 1898, and the Little Tich's genial version of 1900.