Big Apple Circus 2022, “Dream Big”

Big Apple Circus is performing in Manhattan in Lincoln Center now until January 1st.
This year there are three good news items:

1. Nik Wallenda, the owner and proprietor, is the finale act.
2. There is plenty of comedy, surprises, international acts, variety and a healthy dose of “circus thrill.”
3. IJA award winner Gena Shvartsman Cristiani is the featured juggler.

The circus starts with a parade spectacle, and each artist doing a couple of teaser stunts. Then right into the first act, Elle Huber on trapeze and singing vocals.

The Ringmaster, Alan Silva, returned from last year, announces the next act Veranica and her trained dogs. The ring explodes into a plethora of cuteness with poodles at her beck and call. The best bit was the “quick-change artist” which sees the star poodle in a red dress jumping through a hoop and coming out on the other side in a blue dress.

Silva announces the next act saying, “No circus is complete without a juggler!” As if that isn’t enough to convince you, out comes the enthralling Gina, in a unique costume she designed herself, performing her flawless act.

Gena Shvartsman Cristiani lives in Sarasota FL, with her husband and son. She is a full-time professional juggler and also designs and sells her own theatrical costumes to circus and theater performers. She begins her act with her signature hat-spinning routine, spinning one and two hats on sticks as she dances and does acrobatic stunts.
Next she performs with 3 to 5 clubs focusing on her love of pirouettes and head balancing tricks, down to many variations of kickups. Next a terrific ball with head-bounce routine together with two hula hoops. She then balances the ball on her head and does a split. She also does a forward acrobatic walk over with three clubs with one up. She finishes with continuous three club 3-up 360s. The audience was on their feet.

Gena has a star-quality that makes her wondrous to look at, even when she’s not executing a knock-out juggling feat. Gena’s mother Victoria had a gymnastics background and competed in national competitions in Russia. Victoria Cherva was born in Chechnia. After a knee injury, Victoria joined the circus and met Gena’s father the great Eugene Shvartsman who trains circus artists in New York. They met in the circus ring over a rigging dispute, his bareback riding while juggling act interfered with her aerial rigging. The two argued over the equipment, fell in love, and had Gena.

Gena is inspired by the new styles of juggling. She is expanding her costume business and has a costume design production studio. Her husband is a seventh generation circus performer from the Cristiani family of Italy. He is originally from Las Vegas. He manages theaters in Florida. Gena loves all facets of the plastic and performing arts. She paints, and draws creative characters in glorious costumes, some of which she later creates in reality for her clientele. She co-owns with her mother-in-law Mara Cristiani, a cake design company called “Center Ring Cakes.”

Next on the agenda is, from Japan, TenBa the magician. He eats a sculpture balloon, then swallows 20 razor blades. Is this appropriate for a family show with an audience packed with children? Maybe not but then again razor blades are largely obsolete and not commonly found around the house. He then swallows a newspaper, takes a drink and does the whole thing again backwards, pulling paper and obsolete razors out of his mouth and finally out comes the balloon.

Rokardy from Cuba appears and does equabralistics. He does handstands on an asymmetrical ladder and builds a remarkable tower of hand-supports.

Next up is Axel Perez who is the nephew of Rokardy. He jumps rope on a rola bola and builds a three story tower. He also switches the cylinder for a basketball and ends with a five cylinder stack. It was a solid execution of a standard act with the innovation of performing the entirety on an eight-foot high platform.

Perfectly timed circus photo by the author

Back from last year is Irina Akimova. She juggles three hula hoops in a high shower pattern, then spins and hulas up to 7 hoops.

Alan Silva the Ringmaster takes this opportunity to do his own act high above on aerial silks.

For the finale act, circus owner proprietor Nik Wallenda brings on The Wallenda Family and performs with his family troop.

The Wallendas go back seven generations to the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1780.

A number of Wallendas have fallen to injury or death over the course of two centuries and the remaining members are still performing extremely dangerous stunts with no net including the 7 man pyramid. Nik’s 70-year-old courageous mother Delilah joins in despite having endured a hip replacement.

Nik holds 11 world records including the highest 8-person pyramid on wire, highest and longest bicycle ride, the first person to walk across Niagara Falls, first person across The Grand Canyon (broadcast to 178 countries), highest incline, and highest blindfolded wire walks.

In 1947 the legendary Karl Wallenda premiered the 7-person (three level) pyramid. The family performed it for 14 years but in 1962 at a performance in Detroit the pyramid collapsed and several performers were killed. The act was retired until 1999 when it was reborn, with Nik as the youngest member of the troop at the time.

Nik’s wife, Erendira Vasques Wallenda, is an eighth generation performer on her mother’s side, a member of the Astons of Australia, the 3rd oldest circus family in the world. On her father’s side she is a member of the Vasques family, seventh generation from Mexico, who were known as the first to perform the quadruple summersault on the flying trapeze.

This year they perform with bicycle, chair, and two-girl inverted split pyramid.

Between acts, skill clown Johnny Rockett gets the audience singing and the kids screaming. He does a number of comedic stunts including his signature act on 15-foot-high sway pole.

Also between acts was a short introduction to each routine in the form of an interview with the artist appearing on a screen. This was a nontraditional innovation to an otherwise traditional circus format consisting of Big Top Tent, one ring stage, and clown shtick between acts.

In all there were ten acts, five that returned from last year and five that were new.

Nik strikes a balance between the old school and the new, and Gena juggles family and career!