THE BALLOON MAN

Friday, April 20, 2012

A Balancing Act in the Story of Aerialists

‘The Show Must Go On’ Looks at The Flying Wallendas

The Flying Wallendas, rehearsing for a tour in 2010, are the subject of “The Show Must Go On” by Paula Froehle.

By JOHN ANDERSON

from: The New York Times

Published: April 19, 2012

WHEN Paula Froehle started making her circus movie, she knew she’d be working without a net. But she didn’t know there would be an elephant in the room.

“The Show Must Go On,” which has its premiere April 20 at the Sarasota Film Festival, is Ms. Froehle’s documentary on the Flying Wallendas, the aerial act led by Tino Wallenda-Zoppe, a grandson of Karl Wallenda, who headed the family’s high-wire dynasty from the 1920s till his death in 1978. The Wallendas were renowned for their seven-person pyramid — 25 feet above the ground — and for their grace under pressure.

“One time, in South America, there was an earthquake while they were on the wire, and they stayed up,” Mr. Wallenda-Zoppe said of the original Wallendas. “In Fort Worth the lights went off for several seconds, which is an eternity when you’re up there. And when the lights came back, they were still doing the seven.”

The Flying Wallendas in a performance in 2010.

But the Wallendas also became synonymous with tragedy: In 1962, during a performance in Detroit, the pyramid collapsed, killing two family members and leaving a third paralyzed. The routine was abandoned for years, until a younger generation recreated it in a 1978 made-for-TV movie, “The Great Wallendas.”

“It was about the family and the fall of the seven,” Mr. Wallenda-Zoppe said by phone while en route to his chiropractor in Sarasota, Fla. “All the grandkids did that.”

But the sense of family that long bound the Wallendas, who revived the pyramid in 2001, has disintegrated, to the point that there are now Flying Wallendas, Great Wallendas and World Famous Wallendas. Some factions in this very extended family talk to each other, some do not.