The theatre was designed by the architect Jacques Ignace Hittorff and was opened by Emperor Napoleon III on 11 December 1852 as the Cirque Napoléon. It was renamed Cirque d'Hiver in 1870.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec repeatedly found inspiration in rehearsals and performances at the Cirque d'hiver; Georges Seurat also used the circus as inspiration.
The Bouglione family took over the Cirque d'Hiver in 1934.
The building is a twenty-sided polygon and has a tented roof.
There is a live orchestra and lots of scantily clad cheerleader/dancers.
The circus was two hours long and there was a little bit of everything. There were trained tigers, performing daschunds, and one woman whose whole act was propelling herself up and down a pole in different ways. She is probably the strongest person on earth and it is impossible to describe her act. She was tiny, but her back held more muscles than my entire body. There was a cross-bow expert and knife-thrower who, of course, was from the good US of A. A couple of different acrobat acts, a group of contortionists, a guy who could hula hoop about twenty hoops all over his body, jugglers, a horse and pony act, and lots of clowns....
I was very glad everyone hit their mark.
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| A little bit of something for everyone |
You all are so busy. It's an inspiration.
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