If you’re looking for an unpretentious, all ages holiday show for your family, get to Cirque Dreams Holidaze this weekend at the Curran Theatre. It’s a very short run – open for under a week – yet it’s the perfect solution for those who want to take their kids to a holiday show in San Francisco, but the Nutcracker may be too much for the kids to appreciate.
Cirque Holidaze is full of energy, bright colors, astonishing stunts, and music. The two hour performance moves fast, yet all stunts are stand alone, meaning that even the youngest kids will stay engaged. There are flipping gingerbread men, rope jumping reindeer, ice princesses with enough flexibility that they will motivate you to take up pilates.
My 11 year old and I tried to pick our favorite part of the performance, but couldn’t select just one. Most notable was the performer who balanced himself on an extremely precarious stack of tubes and cylinders, pushing himself to try a bigger and bigger stack. At the highest point, it took three tries for him to climb up and get his balance, and on each try, my daughter would put her head against my shoulder, a signed she was a little worried he would fail, and he did twice, both times cleanly landing on his feet, which made that third try and final success that much more exciting. As if the task wasn’t challenging enough, he was wearing a penguin costume!
Don’t hesitate to go – the show’s run ends this Sunday night. It’s a two hour performance with a 15 minute intermission, suitable for all ages. Tickets are available at the SHN website. This isn’t Cirque du Soleil, but the acts were as astonishing, and the ticket prices are lower.
Photo courtesy of SHN
