Cirque Mother of Africa: Bending over backwards

Seemingly impossible feats are performed amidst a backdrop of African sights and sounds. Photo / Supplied

Winston Ruddle, creator of Cirque Mother Africa, has searched the continent looking for the most heart-stopping acts to be found.

Seemingly impossible feats are performed amidst a backdrop of African sights and sounds, in Winston Ruddle's travelling circus.

[Ruddle] still travels around searching for standout performers. He found the most incredible contortionist he has seen in his life on the street. The word circus, or cirque in French, no longer conjures up images of caged animals and gypsies. The Canadian conglomerate Cirque Du Soleil introduced audiences to inticately choreographed, elaborately costumed performances with whizz-bang light-shows.

Cirque Mother Africa, which is unrelated to Soleil franchise or the other "cirques" that have been to New Zealand in recent years, features death-defying stunts against the music, costumes and colours of the continent.

"We transport the people to Africa, mentally and visually," says the show's creator and director Winston Ruddle.

He formed the circus seven years ago, with the dream of taking an all-African show to the world, which he did for the first time four years ago.

Each year he refreshes the acts, music, choreography and performers. The current line-up features 40 performers from nine different African countries from Egypt to South Africa.

This year he is most excited about the Icarus Games, a juggling act where two artists juggle people with their feet - he claims those performers break Guinness world records every night.

There's the highwire, the unicycle, the hula-hoop and contortionists audiences would expect of any other circus but without the leotards, as these performers are in traditional African costumes, adapted only slightly to allow them to perform the stunts.

Another nail-biting act is the Rola-Rola, where acrobats balance on a platform that is balanced on a wheel. Ruddle used to specialise in this, back in the day, as well as the highwire. These days, he says he is too old to perform but he did for more than a decade, touring Australia as part of the famous Silvers Circus and eventually working in a Surfers Paradise casino.

After earning a healthy wage there, he decided to return to Africa to give something back to his people. Joined by his girlfriend, a Mongolian contortionist he met in Australia, he set up an acrobatics school in Tanzania.

At first, Ruddle had to convince performers to sign up for his classes. He would tour the continent looking for talent on the street, in nightclubs, wherever he could find them.

Now that the circus has taken off they come to him, but he still regularly travels around searching for standout performers. He found the most incredible contortionist he has seen in his life - who is performing in the New Zealand show - on the street. "I consider him the most flexible man in the whole world," he says.

Ruddle got into acrobatics after performing breakdance on the street during the 1980s.

"Then everyone said, 'hey what are you doing? Breakdancing is out of fashion'," he recalls. In the end he ran away with a circus that just happened to be in town. It was an easy transition from breakdance to acrobatics, as it called for upper and lower body strength, as well as the mindset to put your limbs and life on the line.

"You have to be physically fit, you really do. Well, that's why it's called 'break' dance, because you can break yourself. A lot of people have died from breakdance," he claims. Looking at the acts, he's gathered around him, he's not exactly out of danger yet ...

LOWDOWN

* Who: Winston Ruddle

* What: Created Cirque Mother Africa

* When and Where: SkyCity Theatre, from Tuesday 14 until Saturday 18 September.

-TimeOut