On & Off Broadway

'Paramour'

Review by Elyse Trevers

Posted

If you’ve never seen a Cirque de Soleil show, you are in for something awesome. The acrobats make the stunts look so easy that the audience doesn’t realize how difficult they are. Established in the 1980s, Cirque incorporates circus styles from around the world and each show has its own central theme and storyline. Like its performers, Cirque is constantly trying to create something new and different.

The latest show is Paramour, its first ever show made for Broadway and that’s where Cirque du Soleil falters. Paramour at the Lyric Theatre is a take-off on the old Busby Berkeley musicals featuring lavish production numbers with a thin story line. A movie director, AJ (Jeremy Kushnier), discovers Indigo, a new protégé (Ruby Lewis), and builds his film “Paramour” around her. Predictably, a romantic triangle develops when Indigo falls in love with young composer Joey (Ryan Vona).

The music, written specifically for this production by composers Guy Dubuc and Marc Lessard (who go by Bob and Bill), is trite and forgettable and the plot line is mundane. It isn’t easy to write a good Broadway musical and it’s even more difficult when the show is really just the backdrop for the true stars, the circus performers. Sometimes it is hard to focus on the story during Paramour and the audience becomes distracted by action onstage.


During the cabaret scene, there’s so much activity all around Indigo that it’s hard to appreciate how good a voice Lewis has. Later when AJ is filming scenes from Calamity Jane, there are so many stunts onstage that I didn’t know where to look first. Paramour is like a show with ADHD.

Fortunately, all action stops during the ‘filming’ of the Cleopatra number, as the amazing Atherton Twins take the stage and to the air. The audience gasps as the two fly overhead. We fear for their safety and our own, hoping they stay aloft.

One should applaud the creators of Cirque who are constantly trying to present the extraordinary skills of the acrobats in new and different ways. Yet the reality is that creating a successful Broadway musical is a yeoman’s task. Some shows close after a few short weeks; many of them will close without making a profit.

A word of advice to the producers of Cirque du Soleil: stick to what you do best. Your acrobatics are thrilling but leave the Broadway musicals to the big boys.