Come together: Cirque du Fab Four

FOR a glimpse at the kind of creative back-and-forth it takes to build a Cirque du Soleil show, look at what seems like a relatively easy decision: whether to use “Yesterday� in the troupe’s Beatles-themed show, “Love,� opening this month at the Mirage. You go with it, right?

“We agonized for ages over whether we should put ‘Yesterday’ in or not,� says George Martin, the Fab Four’s legendary producer, who is involved in “Love.� “On the one hand, people would get offended if it weren’t in there. On the other hand, it has been heard so much we shouldn’t put it in. There was that argument.�

“This is not ‘the best of the Beatles,’ � explains Cirque mastermind Guy Laliberte, the onetime street juggler who has overseen the group’s growth into an entertainment juggernaut. “This is where we are going to surprise people.�

“I am not going to tell you if it is in or not,� Martin says of the song.

“At this point, there is a little moment of it,� Laliberte offers. “We use some songs for transition.�

All of that for “a little moment.� Now, consider that “Love� uses 130 Beatles songs.

For some, the more startling number might be five. That’s how many permanent Cirque productions the Strip will host once “Love� is up and running. It sounds like too many, but Laliberte isn’t worried about saturation. “This is a totally distinct show from every other show we are doing because of the Beatles,� he says, sitting near a bank of slot machines outside the new “Love� theater. He nods his bald head enthusiastically as he speaks. “It carries the biggest entertainment name in the world.�

By having to build around an existing soundtrack, Laliberte considers “Love� a break from Cirque’s nouveau-circus tradition. But besides being slightly more focused on choreography than acrobatics, a brief press preview of some numbers offered little that will surprise Cirque fans. Think clowns and gymnasts swirling to “Lady Madonna� and “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.�

Eschewing a plot as found in “Mamma Mia!� and “We Will Rock You,� according to Laliberte, “Love� presents narrative elements without hanging the songs onto a specific story. “This is trying to create a visual environment that is a direct link with the lyrics of the songs. It is not a play in the sense of ‘Phantom.’ We create a story line with each of the songs of the Beatles. So we look at all the lyrics and put them in a certain order where it carries on through a story.�

In short: “Love� looks to be a Cirque show with a Beatles soundtrack instead of the mix of New Age and world music the troupe favors in its other shows here (“Mystere,� “O,� “Zumanity� and “Ka�). This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as the aesthetics of Cirque and the Beatles are closer than most would imagine. Particularly, the band’s more psychedelic music seems a natural fit for the acrobats landing in Cirque’s surrealistic pillow. Also, Cirque and the Beatles celebrate creativity and humanity in equal measure.

And Laliberte sees “Love� as a true collaboration between his troupe and the Beatles. In fact, this will be the first authorized theatrical work to use the Beatles’ recorded legacy. Laliberte says the show was born out of his friendship with guitarist George Harrison, and the two had talked at length about the show before his death in 2001. Cirque du Soleil has also consulted surviving band members Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr on every aspect of the show. Even Yoko Ono provided invaluable insight, according to Laliberte.

“Yoko was giving us some very important cues on some aspect of John [Lennon]. She had confidences the other boys didn’t have from John. This is the closest that anyone could dream to working with the Beatles.�

Finally, there is the presence of Martin who, along with his son Giles Martin, has taken responsibility for the soundtrack. The most obvious advantage of the 2,013-seat custom theater built by the Mirage for “Love� is the sound system. It features a speaker in every seat and the music comes through with as sterling a quality as any Beatles fan could hope for.

In addition to his expertise, Martin also has a unique understanding of the special expectations Beatles fans will bring to “Love� -- as the producer from the band’s early days until 1969, he made many contributions to the group’s landmark recordings.

Less engaging than the music is “Love’s� reliance on psychedelic clothes, colors and dancing styles that dated far more swiftly than the Beatles. I wish Cirque had fully resisted period costumes and anything that recalls the look of the musical “Hair.� Still, boomers are so caught up in their generation’s relationship to the Beatles that this taste of the ‘60s may be inevitable.

Of course, there is only one Beatles, and after “Love� it would seem to be the end of new Cirque shows opening here. But Laliberte says that is not the case.

“The airport is built for 60 million visitors; at this point there is only 39 million. We are in the middle of the entertainment capital of the world. This is a growing city, and we are betting that entertainment will be at the center of this activity. If I could put my hand in 10 or 12 theaters here I could come up with distinctive shows.�

Such as? “Elvis,� Laliberte says. He won’t say when or at what resort, but he says it is a done deal. “What is nice about Elvis is this was his city. We are preparing the return of Elvis.�

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