Why Australians are at home in the circus ‘Olympics’
Cirque du Soleil has returned to Sydney with its best-in-the-world performers, reality-defying acrobatics and out-of-this-world sets — and two Aussie cast members. Read their stories.
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Nelson Smyles isn’t quite sure how he got to the top of his game.
From growing up in beachside Port Macquarie to touring the world with Cirque du Soleil, the
28-year-old is living the dream life as an acrobat and performer.
“It still blows my mind every day,” Smyles tells Sydney Weekend ahead of Cirque’s latest show, Luzia, opening at the Entertainment Quarter on November 24.
When Smyles claims not to be sure how he got here, it is not to say he hasn’t put in the work.
It has been years of hard slog and, even now, hours of training each day ahead of each show.
He began gymnastics training at just age four and springboard/platform diving at 10.
Jumping back almost a decade, when Smyles was 19, he found himself with a mate auditioning for the National Institute of Circus Arts (NICA) in Melbourne.
That is on average much older than other Cirque performers, who spend their entire childhood working up to the pinnacle that many would consider the Olympics of circus.
“At that point in my life, I had no idea what that school was, what a circus was, I had only seen one circus show. I’d only seen one Cirque du Soleil show,” he says.
“I was competitive when I was younger, but then I had this really big growth spurt and my body type wasn’t appropriate for competitive gymnastics anymore, so I started the parkour free running kind of scene, which is basically just going to a gym, eating it for an hour and a half until you get a trick.
“I did that for like four years, and then I went to something a little bit more structured.”
In a Cirque show, there are performers from all over the world.
The cast of Luzia, currently touring Australia, is 47-strong from some 26 countries, and speaking 19 different languages.
Some performers are taller, some short, others broad shouldered while others are very lean. So what is an appropriate Cirque gymnast body type?
“Well, normally a gymnast is something like 5’8” (176cm) and I’m 6’3” and 90kg, so it didn’t really suit me – so I think that’s something that I use to my advantage as well.”
Smyles, one of two Australians in the Luzia cast, is very fit. He’s just, in his own words, “long as all buggery”.
He is one of nine acrobats playing hummingbirds in Luzia, a Cirque show inspired by Mexican culture. Luzia is based on the words “luz”, Spanish for light, and “iluvia”, being rain.
What makes his part of Luzia special is that he and his fellow artists perform their acrobatics, diving through hoops, on two giant treadmills while the stage turns at the same time.
There were two Cirque du Soleil auditions during his time at NICA.
Smyles didn’t try for either.
“I didn’t have a lot of self-confidence when it came to the auditions,” he says.
“I didn’t have an act, I wasn’t too self-assured about myself, so I didn’t actually even do the auditions. But I had a very constant presence on social media so I would use Instagram and things like a diary to keep up my training.”
It is through Instagram that Cirque found Smyles.
“I got an email one day out of the blue saying, ‘Hey, do you want to come to Luzia next year?’”
Of course he said yes to the offer.
“It was wild,” he says, adding that he felt his luck was so good it felt like winning the lottery: “I bought a ticket after that, didn’t win but I got this instead.”
He signed with Cirque 11 weeks before finishing his circus degree at NICA.
Smyles’ co-stars are the best-of-the-best in the world, some even former champion athletes in various fields.
“It is mind blowing. It is a dream come true every day to be able to do this,” he says.
Life on the road with Luzia is very different to his childhood days in Port Macquarie.
As a kid, Smyles remembers teachers telling the Spider-Man obsessed high school boy constantly “to get off the ceiling”.
“I wasn’t really a surfer. I wasn’t much into cars. So I didn’t fit in too much while I was in Port Macquarie, so when I went down to Melbourne to the school (NICA), to be surrounded by like-minded people for really the first time in my life, it felt like home.”
While artists specialise in the Cirque shows, many have broad skills that carry across different disciplines. Smyles, for example, is understudy to the clown in Luzia.
“In the circus community, a lot of people will be able to do a lot of different specialties as well. So, I can do a little bit of juggling. Everyone on the team kind of has a bit of a repertoire like that.”
Luzia is Cirque du Soleil’s 38th original production and it is 25 years since the legendary company first brought a show here.
The show heavily, and in an extraordinary way, incorporates water into the staging.
The travelling show takes 99 containers and 124 people around the world, with the performance taking place under a Big Top circus tent, a set up process which takes seven days and 6000 hours of work.
Countless Aussies have starred in other Cirque shows over the years. And with two of the 47 Luzia performers coming from Australia, you could say we punch above our weight when it comes to circus skills, just as we do in Hollywood and on the global music charts.
Luzia also stars Helena Merten, 29, originally from the Gold Coast and a former high diver who placed second at the 2017 Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series in the women’s 20 metre.
Merten and Smyles have been travelling with Luzia around the world since 2017.
“Australian circus is fantastic, we do some really good stuff on an international level,” Smyles says. “Australians are really good at group acrobatics – hoop diving is coming up as well, which is kind of cool to see.”
Merten says: “Everything is growing since I have been in gymnastics and growing up in that sport. Being back here in Australia has really opened my eyes to how many circus avenues you can go down to progress and get in to Cirque du Soleil.
“Even just the attitude of Australians, the way that we work and the flexibility that we have, and our open mindedness, it really opens up many doors for us in a way.”
To Merten, Australian performers are known for their versatility.
“We are pretty well rounded people, coming from circus, so you learn a bunch of different disciplines, not just being very focused in a sport. But we also have many sportspeople up the top as soloists.”
Smyles has never had a backup plan outside of Cirque.
He likes teaching and returns to NICA when possible. As a kid he dreamt of being a palaeontologist.
“Gosh, science is hard,” he says.
“Stunts is another thing – I was always very good at falling and hitting the ground, that’s actually my specialty. Maybe down the track, one day I will get into that but I am very happy here at Cirque.”
For longevity in acrobatics, it is important to look after your body. Smyles dedicates three hours additional training each day.
“I’m also a massive fan of the character stuff as well, so when my knees kind of don’t want to do as much, I’ll turn towards more of the character work I think.”
Food consumption is obviously also important. Backstage at the production site is fully catered with a team of chefs working on nutritional meals around the clock.
“It is so easy to keep fit here,” he says.
“Someone’s always training something or the gym is right next to where I do my make-up. And on the heavier days, like three-show days and the seven-show weekends, it’s essentially free cardio what we’re doing on stage so it is a very easy environment to stay fit.”
Luzia plays under the Big Top at Sydney’s Entertainment Quarter from November 24. Tickets on sale now at cirquedusoleil.com/Luzia
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