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

0:04 Hello, everybody. Thanks for joining The Green Room. Today, our guest is the Executive Artistic Director of Circus Bella, and her name is Abigail Munn. She's been on the show many times. Welcome, Abigail. Thanks so much. Excited to be here. No, I'm glad you're here too. Yeah. So you have another show for us. I know there's always another show coming. What is it like twice a year you do it twice a year now so that's that's it's great um so our upcoming show is called aha and aha and um, it's about laughter and.

0:44 And kind of resilience through laughter is which is what the circus is about anyway so yes, it's not low-hanging or it's low-hanging fruit for us but it's just it's a beautiful show and we really leaned into, some kind of a new way of working with the clowns we have Tristan Cunningham who's an amazing, actress clown human in her own right and we brought in Michelle Matlock who's another amazing clown to come and coach the whole company and work with the whole company with their characters and all of that for the show so that's been, it's been a slightly different than normal rehearsal process for us all which has been really fun so we'll see that shows up in the ring is that because it's focusing on comedy, because it's focusing on comedy and i also have worked with michelle, over the years with the with clown work clowning and wanted we actually got a grabote grant to do this show and so i was like what could i do with a little bit of extra how can we make this show better so we, brought her in actually to work with the whole company.

1:52 Through the rehearsal process and actually coach us through the transition and have an outside, you know, I, I'm in this so thick, I can't see anything else. So it's really great to have instead of outside eyes, fresh thoughts, new ideas, on the same thing we've been working on for over years and years and years. So it's pretty great to have her there. Was it hard to sort of let go of the reins a little bit and have somebody else? You know, I actually think it was fantastic. It was great. Yeah. And I, I, you know, I think you work with people who you trust so much. So I felt like, I think we have similar tastes in general. So I felt like a similar tastes and instincts about circus and about the ring, except she just has so much experience that I don't have and, and, and also just a brain that I don't have and eyes that I don't have.

2:42 So it was just great to have, have her there working with us. So are you still the ringmaster? I'm still the ringmaster of the show. And then this summer I'm setting myself up to be completely upstaged because I have a co I'm co ringmastering with juicy Gentile, who is 10 years old. So she was in the summer show last year and we had this idea that she could be she was kind of turned out to be the boss and what if she was really the boss and so we have we have she's bringing that i'm really out you know never perform with children or animals and so i'm breaking the rule, well and she's fantastic and yeah unless they're talented children or animals, yeah yeah so she's so yeah we've made her a little ringmaster costume and everything so it'll be oh yeah yeah.

3:32 Yeah that'll be fun to see was she in the show that i went to last that was, when was it she was in our last few months ago oh no she wasn't in the winter tent show that was ilsa we if there's a child around we put them in the ring that was the wire walker's daughter that was in the show oh yes i remember yeah, but juicy was probably backstage actually during the time so we because we have, You know, it's kind of part of our show is sort of a family feeling. So there's kids around. Well, that's an interesting name, Juicy. Yeah, Juicypina. Oh, okay. Yeah. She goes by Juicy. Yeah, she goes by Juicy with a G. Yeah, great. So what are some of your, well, I shouldn't say favorite, but what are some of the acts that we could see this year?

4:18 I know they're all my favorites. But this summer, we are really excited to have, Chloe Summers-Wallier from, and she's actually been in the Club Fugazi cast up until now. And then she's coming over to work with Circus Bella. She's doing hula hoops. Oh, a different hula hoop person? Different hula hooper. Natasha will be back, in the winter, but because we've been trying to do different clowns in the summer and the winter, it's all about the clowns all the time. And Natasha's, so we had an opening for Hulu Hooper. And this is another artist who I've always wanted to work with. And it's fantastic and really different than Natasha, which was fun to have different energy, just different skills, different, all of that. So it's, it'll be, it'll be fun to see something.

5:05 She's got this disco number that's pretty awesome. And for some reason I love hula hoopers. Hula hoopers are great. I think this could be because I can't even do it. I can't, you know, I can't hula hoop either. You can't. I don't know how to hula hoop. Everyone in my family can do it. They go in the backyard. I can do a lot of things, but one thing I cannot do is hula hoop. I just can't get it. They just stand there like it's nothing. And like in their sleeve and I can't even get it to go around once. I know. I know. So. It just looks impossible. It's really fun. So. So then when they have like 30 of them going at one time. Yeah. And if they're heavy too. So that's. I know. The good ones are heavy, right? The good ones are heavy. So. Yeah. Yeah. Wow.

5:50 So. So what else do we get to see? Without giving too much away. I'm not going to give too much away, but we have Garrett Allen is returning to our company after a couple of years and he's doing he's the one that stacks all the chairs on top of each other oh my god yeah so that's fun and exciting and then yeah and then we have Tony and Mia from the winter show are doing their hand-to-hand act so that's two people oh right so and then then we have a lot of our you know, resident company yeah elise is as a contour is our contortionist and that's just in cunningham is our clown we already talked about that and then mia fan is going to be debuting an arrow aerial act with the show which is she's she's the flyer with tony, and she's lovely and then we also have our our interns page and collie and they have a duo juggling act and they're they're, what we've been doing in the summer is really creating that show i mean it's all about the youth and the next generation of circus artists so this is they're they're making their debut in the ring this summer which is really fun with the duo juggling there so, are you gonna have any of the people like hanging from the, what do you like the the ropes or whatever and doing all the gymnastics up high up well so mia what mia will be doing gymnastics on the ropes in the air quarterly say is the way we say it fancy way we say what is it called Cordelice.

7:11 Cordelice. Or rope I love that It's amazing, And you have such great crowds too Oh it's so fun It's such like It's, such a happening It's like not only Is it a beautiful show But it's just this, really fun Community experience and everyone comes out and has their picnics and enjoys the show together. I love it. And where is it happening? All over. So if you should go to circusballad.org, you can get our full schedule. But we'll be doing a preview on Wednesday in Defremory Park.

7:52 And then we go down to Laguna Beach for a little preview part two. And then our big world premiere opening is at Yerba Buena Gardens at the end of June. And then we go kind of from there at different parks of the weekend. So you have to truck everything down to Los Angeles. Yeah, it's too far. It's too far. And there's always traffic. We always get stuck in Friday traffic. But yeah, we will all drive down to Los Angeles on Friday afternoon, which is... Yeah. Wow. Tell me about the music this year. The music? Oh, the music sounds great. The band is amazing. So this year, we are... I mean, it's kind of what we've always done, but we're writing, we're playing some of Rob. For those of you who don't know, Rob, our band leader and my collaborator of so many years, passed away almost exactly a year ago.

8:44 But the band plays on. And so we'll be playing some of his music. We pulled some really cool stuff out of the archives that no one's heard in a long time. And then Ian, who's been our trumpet player forever, has written some new music for the show. And also rearrange some of the, you know, it's sort of what we've always done is you write it. We write a few new pieces of music and then we arrange other things to fit other. So Ian's just done a great job doing that. And then also I think our drummer, Michael, who's also, you know, the two people have been part of the band forever and ever and ever are really kind of stepping up with some, you know, Michael is just on it.

9:25 Every time somebody falls down, Michael's ready to... Make it emphasize make a noise i uh the, the band just really adds a lot to the performance i love oh it does it's well they're part of our you know it's part of our identity as a company you know i always think about those first couple years people are like abby, the band why do you have a band it's so expensive it's just like what are you doing having a band you should just play a cd because it was so long ago we played cds and, but now like our band is part of our identity of a company and what we do what we want to do you know even if you don't like circus so much you could close your eyes and have a great concert you know so um, yeah yeah well i don't see how anybody couldn't like your circus yeah but but i'm saying you know once again the music stands alone wanted to do that.

10:19 What is the fee for watching this year? Oh, this is the best thing. Summer shows are completely free. Free? Are you out of your mind? I am completely out of my mind. How does she do it? We don't know. Magic. But, Yeah. So the shows are free. So all you have to do is look on our schedule, pick the best date for you, grab your inner child and come to the circus. Yeah. 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. And so if people want to get more information, do they go to your website? Yeah, go to our website, circusbella.org. We're on Instagram and Facebook, those places too. So, um, yeah, great. All right. Well, thanks for being here, Abigail.

11:06 Thanks for having me. I once again, always a pleasure. Oh, same here. Have a great day. Okay. You too.