I went to see Circus Mondao's new show Gypsy last night, in a tent next to a football stadium in Doncaster. Formed in 2006, it’s a relatively new touring circus far removed from the dazzling big-top thrills of the likes of Moscow State Circus. In a way, it’s a throwback to the traditional circuses of yesteryear: small-scale set ups, touring an amiable show to a family crowd. Bippo the clown is a young, bouncing August; juggler Ben Coles makes up in charm for some cack-handed moments and the only performer whose skills are of the kind that put your heart in your mouth is Miss Carolina, on slow trapeze and corde lisse. The Mondao people come from old-school circus families, work damned hard, and even if it’s the kind of circus where people sometimes drop things, it offers a night of slightly shambolic sawdust and sparkle that means you leave with a twinkle in your eye.
For all its sweetness, Mondao is also old-fashioned in a way that causes controversy: it is one of seven touring circuses in the UK to use animals in their acts. On the opening night, when we visited, a small crowd of nicely-spoken, well-meaning activists from The Captive Animals’ Protection Society were very courteously asking people to boycott the show. According to Circus Mondao, they hadn’t been inside and had a look at the animals and the conditions in which they’re kept. This is a shame: the CAPS people might have found their prejudices challenged.
Rather than needing protection from their owners, Mondao’s animals shine with health and contentment. In the ring, beyond some formation dressage the most taxing thing any of them is asked to do is put their front legs on a lightly raised platform. They’re fed nibbles and petted throughout: in fact, the whole set up is more like a petting zoo than a display of tricks. Mondao’s way is to proudly parade its menagerie – which includes llamas, zebras and a Bactrian camel – and beyond that, the circus demands very little of them. After the show, the audience is invited to visit the animals and their trainers in their quarters. The RSCPA is also invited, although the animal rights organisation has no legal right to inspect circus animals. From yesterday’s evidence, you’d think they’d be hard-pressed to find anything to object to.
The circus would not have come into being if it weren’t for performing animals. Philip Astley, who founded what was to become the circus in the late 18th century, was an ex-army stunt rider whose tented displays of daredevil horsemanship became the UK’s first circus show. In The Circus Book (a fascinating 1940s compendium of snippets of British circus history), there are many testimonies from both circus folk and observers not just of the love of the performers for their beasts, but to the way the animals were treated as they deserved to be: as the stars of the show. There are also many references to the fact that cowing and terrifying animals doesn’t succeed in training them to show off for a crowd. More recently, Nell Gifford’s Josser – an account of her life working with horses in British touring circuses – makes plain the bond between the showmen and women and the animals they work with.
Circus has irrevocably altered thanks to the changing attitudes of audiences towards performing animals. The days when a parade of elephants would trumpet the arrival of a circus into town are gone forever. Now, the emphasis is on the skill of the human acts, and for many people that is as it should be. Cruelty to animals is unarguably abhorrent and unacceptable. But perhaps it is unfair to see cruelty to animals where it doesn’t exist – and without looking at what is actually happening before making emotional judgements. The animal activists are well-intentioned but Circus Mondao is one place where their concern looks as if it’s misplaced.
