Paranormal Circus shocks the Topeka community

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photo by Alyssa Storm

Tricks and Chill: Topeka welcomes the Cirque Italia paranormal circus. Thursday, Sept. 30- Sunday, Oct. 3 visitors were taken to another world through the circus.

Circus company Cirque Italia performed its Paranormal Cirque show under the big tent on south Topeka Blvd., Thursday night, Sept. 30, 2021.

It was the Topeka premiere on this stay for their midwest tour. They were set up and staked in at Heartland Motorsports Park for four days, until Sunday Oct. 3, 2021.

Benjamin Holland, who performs flexibility stunts, has been with Cirque Italia for two years.

“Everybody is just kind of like normal people during the day. And then it’s showtime and everybody goes in and makes some circus magic,” said Holland.

The show indeed featured incomprehensible magic tricks, acrobats and a nun character who reprises the role of a traditional circus clown in the crowd-sourced improv comedy segment.

“I really loved the costumes and the makeup,” said Justise Mongold, an audience memebr who attended the event. “And the magic acts, they threw me for a loop.”

The various acrobats leaped upon revolving wheels, did tandem gymnastics and even spun around suspended by one’s own hair.

“The music was really booming and I could actually feel the vibrations,” said Aiden Thornton who took in the acrobats.

Each show began and resumed with an ominous, oscillating airhorn. And throughout the tent that allowed access to audience members and offered concessions and souvenirs to purchase while shrieks of horror surrounded as performers playfully freaked out passing visitors.

While the death-defying stunts dazzled spectator’s eyes, the sensational sounds and atmosphere brought by Cirque Italia were classic circus as the audience sat on wooden bleachers appreciable of the crowds’ momentum lining the circular performance space.

Edited by: Simran Shrestha, Kyle Manthe