Review: Ghost Light: Between Fall and Flight

Superstition has it that ghost lights – the single bulb left to illuminate a theatre after it closes for the night – also light the way for any drifting spirits to give their own, shadowy performances. This extraordinary performance from Quebec City circus company Machine de Cirque is too poetic to explicitly tell that story, and instead uses it to throw an eerie veil over the superhuman feats of acrobatic duo Maxim Laurin and Guillaume Larouche.

Using only the teeterboard (aka an acrobatic seesaw), Ghost Light is a hymn to partnership. Laurin and Larouche push and pull, give and take, propelling each other skyward. Their bodies seem to linger in the air, uncannily still. But for one to go up, the other must come down, and this show is more about falling than flying. The first time Larouche crashes onto the mat, he lies like the chalk outline of a tragedy… before leaping back to his feet. The duo turns these falls into an expertly clowned slapstick routine, until that eerie, disquieting feeling drifts back in. Both performance art and splashy Big Top routine, this ambitious show combines heart-in-mouth tricks with a quietly heartbreaking narrative about risking everything for the thrill of applause.