Aha! Circus Bella’s Laugh-Out-Loud Summer Spectacle with Abigail Munn

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Hello, everybody. Thanks for joining The Green Room. Today, our guest is the

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Executive Artistic Director of Circus Bella, and her name is Abigail Munn.

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She's been on the show many times. Welcome, Abigail.

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Thanks so much. Excited to be here. No, I'm glad you're here too. Yeah.

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So you have another show for us. I know there's always another show coming.

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What is it like twice a year you do it twice a year now so that's that's it's

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great um so our upcoming show is called aha and aha and um,

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it's about laughter and.

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And kind of resilience through laughter is which is what the circus is about anyway so yes,

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it's not low-hanging or it's low-hanging fruit for us but it's just it's a beautiful

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show and we really leaned into,

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some kind of a new way of working with the clowns we have Tristan Cunningham who's an amazing,

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actress clown human in her own right and we brought in Michelle Matlock who's

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another amazing clown to come and coach the whole company and work with the

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whole company with their characters and all of that for the show so that's been,

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it's been a slightly different than normal rehearsal process for us all which

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has been really fun so we'll see that shows up in the ring is that because it's focusing on comedy,

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because it's focusing on comedy and i also have worked with michelle,

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over the years with the with clown work clowning and wanted we actually got

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a grabote grant to do this show and so i was like what could i do with a little

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bit of extra how can we make this show better so we,

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brought her in actually to work with the whole company.

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Through the rehearsal process and actually coach us through the transition and

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have an outside, you know, I, I'm in this so thick, I can't see anything else.

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So it's really great to have instead of outside eyes, fresh thoughts, new ideas,

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on the same thing we've been working on for over years and years and years.

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So it's pretty great to have her there.

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Was it hard to sort of let go of the reins a little bit and have somebody else?

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You know, I actually think it was fantastic. It was great. Yeah.

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And I, I, you know, I think you work with people who you trust so much.

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So I felt like, I think we have similar tastes in general.

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So I felt like a similar tastes and instincts about circus and about the ring,

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except she just has so much experience that I don't have and,

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and, and also just a brain that I don't have and eyes that I don't have.

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So it was just great to have, have her there working with us.

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So are you still the ringmaster?

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I'm still the ringmaster of the show. And then this summer I'm setting myself

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up to be completely upstaged because I have a co I'm co ringmastering with juicy

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Gentile, who is 10 years old.

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So she was in the summer show last year and we had this idea that she could

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be she was kind of turned out to be the boss and what if she was really the

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boss and so we have we have she's bringing that i'm really out you know never

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perform with children or animals and so i'm breaking the rule,

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well and she's fantastic and yeah unless they're talented children or animals,

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yeah yeah so she's so yeah we've made

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her a little ringmaster costume and everything so it'll be oh yeah yeah.

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Yeah that'll be fun to see was she in the show that i went to last that was,

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when was it she was in our last few months ago oh no she wasn't in the winter

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tent show that was ilsa we if there's a child around we put them in the ring

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that was the wire walker's daughter that was in the show oh yes i remember yeah,

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but juicy was probably backstage actually during the time so we because we have,

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You know, it's kind of part of our show is sort of a family feeling. So there's kids around.

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Well, that's an interesting name, Juicy. Yeah, Juicypina.

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Oh, okay. Yeah. She goes by Juicy. Yeah, she goes by Juicy with a G. Yeah, great.

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So what are some of your, well, I shouldn't say favorite, but what are some

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of the acts that we could see this year?

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I know they're all my favorites. But this summer, we are really excited to have,

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Chloe Summers-Wallier from, and she's actually been in the Club Fugazi cast up until now.

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And then she's coming over to work with Circus Bella. She's doing hula hoops.

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Oh, a different hula hoop person? Different hula hooper. Natasha will be back,

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in the winter, but because we've been trying to do different clowns in the summer

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and the winter, it's all about the clowns all the time.

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And Natasha's, so we had an opening for Hulu Hooper. And this is another artist

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who I've always wanted to work with. And it's fantastic and really different

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than Natasha, which was fun to have different energy,

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just different skills, different, all of that. So it's, it'll be,

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it'll be fun to see something.

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She's got this disco number that's pretty awesome. And for some reason I love hula hoopers.

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Hula hoopers are great. I think this could be because I can't even do it.

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I can't, you know, I can't hula hoop either. You can't. I don't know how to hula hoop.

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Everyone in my family can do it. They go in the backyard. I can do a lot of

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things, but one thing I cannot do is hula hoop.

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I just can't get it. They just stand there like it's nothing.

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And like in their sleeve and I can't even get it to go around once. I know. I know. So.

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It just looks impossible. It's really fun. So. So then when they have like 30

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of them going at one time. Yeah.

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And if they're heavy too. So that's. I know. The good ones are heavy,

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right? The good ones are heavy. So. Yeah. Yeah. Wow.

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So. So what else do we get to see? Without giving too much away.

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I'm not going to give too much away, but we have Garrett Allen is returning

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to our company after a couple of years and he's doing he's the one that stacks

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all the chairs on top of each other oh my god yeah so that's fun and exciting

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and then yeah and then we have Tony and Mia from the winter show are doing

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their hand-to-hand act so that's two people oh right

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so and then then we have a lot of our you know,

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resident company yeah elise is as a contour is our contortionist and that's

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just in cunningham is our clown we already talked about that and then mia fan

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is going to be debuting an arrow aerial act with the show which is she's she's the flyer with tony,

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and she's lovely and then we also have our our interns page and collie and they

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have a duo juggling act and they're they're,

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what we've been doing in the summer is really creating that show i mean it's

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all about the youth and the next generation of circus artists so this is they're

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they're making their debut in the ring this summer which is really fun with

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the duo juggling there so,

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are you gonna have any of the people like hanging from the,

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what do you like the the ropes or whatever and doing all the gymnastics up high

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up well so mia what mia will be doing gymnastics on the ropes in the air quarterly

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say is the way we say it fancy way we say what is it called Cordelice.

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Cordelice.

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Or rope I love that It's amazing,

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And you have such great crowds too Oh it's so fun It's such like It's,

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such a happening It's like not only Is it a beautiful show But it's just this,

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really fun Community experience and everyone comes out and has their picnics

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and enjoys the show together.

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I love it. And where is it happening?

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All over. So if you should go to circusballad.org, you can get our full schedule.

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But we'll be doing a preview on Wednesday in Defremory Park.

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And then we go down to Laguna Beach for a little preview part two.

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And then our big world premiere opening is at Yerba Buena Gardens at the end

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of June. And then we go kind of from there at different parks of the weekend.

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So you have to truck everything down to Los Angeles. Yeah, it's too far. It's too far.

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And there's always traffic. We always get stuck in Friday traffic.

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But yeah, we will all drive down to Los Angeles on Friday afternoon, which is...

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Yeah. Wow. Tell me about the music this year.

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The music? Oh, the music sounds great. The band is amazing. So this year, we are...

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I mean, it's kind of what we've always done, but we're writing,

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we're playing some of Rob. For those of you who don't know, Rob,

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our band leader and my collaborator of so many years, passed away almost exactly a year ago.

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But the band plays on. And so we'll be playing some of his music.

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We pulled some really cool stuff out of the archives that no one's heard in a long time.

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And then Ian, who's been our trumpet player forever, has written some new music for the show.

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And also rearrange some of the, you know, it's sort of what we've always done

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is you write it. We write a few new pieces of music and then we arrange other things to fit other.

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So Ian's just done a great job doing that. And then also I think our drummer,

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Michael, who's also, you know, the two people have been part of the band forever

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and ever and ever are really kind of stepping up with some, you know, Michael is just on it.

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Every time somebody falls down, Michael's ready to...

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Make it emphasize make a noise i uh the,

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the band just really adds a lot to the performance i love oh it does it's well

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they're part of our you know it's part of our identity as a company you know

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i always think about those first couple years people are like abby,

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the band why do you have a band it's so expensive it's just like what are you

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doing having a band you should just play a cd because it was so long ago we played cds and,

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but now like our band is part of our identity of a company and what we do what

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we want to do you know even if you don't like circus so much you could close

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your eyes and have a great concert you know so um,

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yeah yeah well i don't see how anybody couldn't like your circus yeah but but

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i'm saying you know once again the music stands alone wanted to do that.

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What is the fee for watching this year? Oh, this is the best thing.

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Summer shows are completely free. Free?

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Are you out of your mind? I am completely out of my mind.

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How does she do it? We don't know. Magic. But,

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Yeah. So the shows are free. So all you have to do is look on our schedule,

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pick the best date for you, grab your inner child and come to the circus. Yeah.

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And let me say, it's a lot of fun. I've been to so many of these and I thoroughly enjoy it every time.

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And so if people want to get more information, do they go to your website?

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Yeah, go to our website, circusbella.org.

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We're on Instagram and Facebook, those places too. So,

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um, yeah, great. All right. Well, thanks for being here, Abigail.

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Thanks for having me. I once again, always a pleasure.

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Oh, same here. Have a great day. Okay. You too.