Circus Dynamite
Designed by Joseph Couturier – VegaElec XL3 Firing with 104 16-cue modules
With both the hottest evening (still around 30C at showtime) and largest audience of the season, the stage was set for an interesting debut by the French team. Based on the interview I conducted with Joseph, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect and was apprehensive that the narrative-laden soundtrack might prove to be too distracting or that the somewhat low cue count could mean a less interesting display than some this year.
The display started a few minutes late, though this turned out to be due to the tardiness of some audience members in taking their seats – the organizers requesting a delay to accommodate these people (and not for the first time this year). After the countdown, black sky and manic narration! Then a shell. I was fearful that the stage was set for a disappointing show.
My apprehensions were quickly dispelled, though, as the display progressed. Very creative use was made of the firing site with some very wide firing angles, especially for medium sized shells. This gave the appearance of a much larger display than was the actual case, but, from the audience point of view, was very satisfying. I’m not sure those outside of La Ronde would necessarily have been as satisfied, though.
The soundtrack was extremely well done – Joseph being a film editor was certainly using his talents here in putting together an audiovisual experience in a very creative way. I must admit that I didn’t understand all of the narration and therefore didn’t get all of the jokes, but I was able to appreciate many of them and found that the fireworks really complimented the story. Despite the low cue count, the link between the fireworks and the music was very strong and some creative effects were used, with line rockets being used – something which I’ve only seen a very few times in the past. The inverted T formation of ramp 5 was effectively exploited, though, from where I was say, the bengals actually burning under the water were not as dramatic as they would have been for those sitting higher in the grandstands.
Kudos to Joseph for including some direct references to such things as the involvement of Lotto Quebec, as numbers appeared across ramp 3 representing a draw … and then they just happened to form the date of the display! Other fun parts were the announcement of a grand finale and then only firing a single roman candle and a few shells, the sound track containing boos and cries for reimbursement before we got two real finales, interspersed with an odd Elvis track where he broke down into laughter.
At the end of the day, I was thoroughly entertained and the real finale was really well done. The capacity audience were thrilled and jumped to their feet to give the team a raucous standing ovation. I had a huge smile on my face and would not be surprised to see JCO on the podium. Definitely a different kind of display and a very bold one at that. Simon Turcotte-Langevin gives a very good description of all the humours elements used in his forum report.
