"Viva Elvis!" - Cirque de Soleil's latest show

Cafe Society
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In previews at Aria, Las Vegas. Saw the show Monday night. Second row. I can’t go back to flying coach! The seats for the big spenders are actually big couches. Very comfortable. Excellent sight lines throughout the theater, of course.

The Good

The band - tight, personable, and they can really wail when necessary. “Burnin’ Love” freaking rocks! Very good arrangement.

Cirque - when they aren’t trying to be a Broadway show, they are pretty damn good. Especially the trampoline set.

The “Bossa Nova Baby” Baby - excellent dancer, and could really move.

The Adequate

The rest of the dancers - needs work, guys. Which is what previews are for, of course. At least there were some females who looked like they were eating regularly, and weren’t model-thin. Fast costume changes, and fairly interesting outfits.

The rope guys - practice, practice, practice. At least you saved yourselves when you fucked up.

The sets - “Jailhouse Rock” needs to be re-done. There needs to be a central Elvis figure there somewhere. It’s a classic image, and you skipped it! Dump the shoe from the first number. It’s stupid. The super-hero set, OTOH, was awesome.

The Bad

The singers - shoot all of your soloists, except maybe the blonde in the sparkles at the end of the show.

Col. Parker - rethink this, guys. He may be a central figure in the Elvis story, but he was a crook, faker and kept Elvis from ever reaching his true potential. Having him as the MC is just…wrong, and everybody knows it.

With the exception of the “Ring” piece, the aerial work was silly at best.

Overall it was a good show, with potential to be a great one. Has anybody else here seen it yet?

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silenus, thanks for the review!

I think you have seen quite a few, if not all, of the Cirque shows - how would you rank this one as to, for instance, “O” and “LOVE”?

Not being a huge Elvis fan, I am not sure when, or if, I will see this - but good to hear what you had to say so when family and friends visit who ARE Elvis fans, I can let them know what is in store.

BTW, how much were the tickets - if it is not rude to ask?

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Not rude at all - $132 each, plus all the Ticketron fees. Nosebleed seats are a lot cheaper, of course. But a couple of the numbers are designed for those folks and aren’t that impressive from the floor. We definitely want to see it again, after they get all the bugs worked out.

We’ve seen a few of the Cirque shows. The wife ranks them:

  1. “Love”
  2. “Ka”
  3. “Viva Elvis!” (provisional rating, pending debugging)
  4. “O”
  5. “Mystere”

We haven’t seen “La Reve” or “Zumanity” yet. But all the shows are worth the money.