BIG APPLE CIRCUS IN STAMFORD, CT

Heat rises, and so does Big Top

Olivia Just, Correspondent Tuesday, July 6, 2010

STAMFORD -- During Tuesday's oppressive heat, crew members from the Big Apple Circus tugged at sections of the billowing blue and white Big Top tent like sailors teasing wind into a ship's canvas sails.
In Mill River Park, the five-hour process of raising the tent began at 8:30 a.m. and progressed in stages. The four sturdy steel interior masts and gold-starred cupola, which crowns the tent's 63 feet, were set up electronically, while the lower sections of the tent had to be put in place manually.
Members of the full-time, traveling crew labored in the tent's shade, pushing the 90 support poles into place, rolling the tarp that covered the ground, measuring the circumference of the ring area. The heat of the afternoon was trapped in the deceptively cool-blue interior of the tent, creating saunalike conditions. Everyone working or standing inside was drenched with sweat.
"It's tough manual labor on a nice cool, clear day," Joel Dein, director of communications for the Big Apple Circus, said as he watched the crew raise the tent poles. "It's like being inside a spa for five hours."

Temperatures across Stamford reached into the triple digits, according to Pat Standaert of the Stamford Museum & Nature Center. The crew members in the tent weren't the only ones suffering from the baking heat; outside, in a small striped pavilion near the big tent, a group of horses, trained for the show's equestrian act, stood idly, flicking their tails through the sticky air. Closer to the group of trailers parked around the tent, one lucky animal had his coffee-colored coat hosed with cool water by a trainer.


Extreme conditions are nothing new to the crew members of the Big Apple Circus, though that didn't make the weather any more bearable.
"We work in the heat, in the freezing cold, in the snow and the rain," said Tara Dragani, describing pitching the massive tent in downpours and shin-deep mud.
Dragani is one of two women on the crew, and she described her job as a "very rough life."
"For a girl like me, I have to work three times harder than everybody else, but I love it," she said. "Honestly, here, we're spoiled compared to other circuses."

During show times, the tent will be air-conditioned, meaning the 1,700 spectators seated in the bleachers won't suffer similar temperatures for the circus performances.
As the crew pushed the 16-foot support poles upward to raise the bottom of the tent, the gap between the dusty ground and vinyl tent yawned wider, and the bright white outdoors slid into view. A welcome breeze fanned across the interior as tentmaster Michael Leclair surveyed the work.
"Even in this heat, we did pretty good," he said.

The Big Apple Circus will run 26 performances of "Bello is Back!" in the big top tent from Friday to Sunday, July 25, at Mill River Park. For more information, visit http://www.bigapplecircus.org/.

Sultan Kumisbayev hoses down one of the horses used in his equuestrain act as the Big Apple Circus is set up in Mill River Park in Stamford, Conn. on Tuesday July 6, 2010. Photo: Kathleen O'Rourke / Stamford Advocate