Corteo is currently playing at the Royal Farms Arena in Baltimore for just a few shows through Sunday, July 7, 2019 (before moving on to South Carolina, Florida, Texas, and Colorado over the summer). Buy tickets here.

We’re Cirque du Soleil nuts around here. That’s not a big surprise. Corteo is the 17th different performance we’ve seen, and we even had the privilege of touring the international headquarters in Montreal. (Check out our previous reviews of Crystal, Varekai, Paramour, Toruk: The First Flight, La Nouba, and Dralion + backstage tour!)

Cirque du Soleil built its name by being unique. Equal parts imaginative and experimental, audiences go to their shows expecting the unexpected. And Corteo, one of the company’s current touring arena shows, certainly delivers the unexpected.

If you’re unfamiliar, there are three main types of Cirque du Soleil shows: arena, bigtop, and resident. Arena shows – like Corteo – tour around the world and set up shop in large sporting/performance venues. Bigtop shows also travel, but they erect their own tents and scaffolding and everything. Finally, resident shows are those that stay put in one theater and have much more freedom to customize the theater to their specific needs. Most of these shows are in Las Vegas.

Corteo began its life as a bigtop show in 2005. After a decade beneath the grand chapiteau, the show took a hiatus in 2015 and was reinvented for arenas, where it began touring again in 2018.

The show is also unique in its setting. Rather than typical amphitheater-style seating or theater in the round, the stage is set between the audience on either side, has two curtains and four positions for live musicians (two on each side), and features action alternating between the two sides.

(Pictures in this post were taken during rehearsals and a backstage tour. They are not representative of what you’ll see on stage during the actual show.)

The current cast of Corteo includes 51 acrobats, musicians, singers, and actors from more than 20 different countries. And that’s not counting the technical crew, artisans, and everyone else required to put the show on.

It’s a much more involved process for bigtop shows to set up and tear down. So when Corteo was beneath a tent, it traveled with 80-90 tractor trailers and took a week to set up. By contrast, arena productions travel with “only” 20 trucks, set up in one day, and tear down in 3.5 hours.

But it still needs to support the same show and number of people. In addition to the props, costumes, and sets, touring shows also travel with everything required to make them as self-sufficient as possible. Backstage, you’ll find laundry facilities, a full costume department, a gym, and much more.

Venue and entourage size are just two differences between the two incarnations of Corteo. Most of the changes made to the show are technical and will never be noticed by the audience. And though the show itself remains largely the same, the new version of Corteo has added two acts – suspended pole and hoops.

Hoops (photo: Cirque du Soleil)

Suspended pole (photo: Cirque du Soleil)

I’ll be honest: touring shows will always pale in comparison to resident shows when it comes to special effects and theatrics, simply because they move between venues so often. However, that’s not to say they aren’t incredibly enjoyable. Because they are.

Some Cirque du Soleil shows are all about the artistry of jaw-dropping acrobatics, some focus on theatrical spectacle, and some put a heavier emphasis on acts that require more dexterity than strength.

For its part, Corteo lacks huge, impressive acrobatics routines that leave your jaw on the floor. There’s plenty of acrobatics on display, but the show feels more like a mashup of smaller, more personal performances and narrative-driven interludes.

Few Cirque du Soleil shows follow a coherent narrative. Rather, they play on a single motif or theme the reverberates throughout the costumes, set design, music, and performances. Corteo means “cortege” in Italian, and the show presents a festive parade as imagined by a clown. The show begins at a funeral, and straight away, the audience is plunged into a mysterious space between heaven and Earth.

That being said, don’t try to make too much sense of the storyline. Just take it all in and appreciate the visuals for the eye candy they are.

The clown pictures his own funeral taking place in a carnival atmosphere, watched over by quietly caring angels. Juxtaposing the large with the small, the ridiculous with the tragic and the magic of perfection with the charm of imperfection, the show highlights the strength and fragility of the clown, as well as his wisdom and kindness, to illustrate the portion of humanity that is within each of us.

Corteo has more of a carnival or traditional circus feel than many other Cirque du Soleil shows. Unique highlights include the chandeliers and the helium dance, in which one of the smallest performers literally flies above the audience while attached to gigantic balloons.

Chandeliers (photo: Cirque du Soleil)

Helium dance

If you’re in the Baltimore area this holiday weekend, you could do a lot worse than catching a performance of Corteo. If you’ve never seen a Cirque du Soleil show before, you’ll be blown away by the visual poetry on stage. And if you’re a Cirque du Soleil fanatic (like us), you’ll find several unique treats to remind you of just how amazing this company can be.

If you’re not in the mid-Atlantic or near Charm City, check out Corteo‘s schedule to see if it’s coming somewhere near you!

(Disclosure: We were guests of Cirque du Soleil for this performance. All opinions remain our own.)