''Paramour'' was
Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil (, ; "Circus of the Sun" or "Sun Circus") is a Canadian entertainment company and the largest contemporary circus producer in the world. Located in the inner-city area of Saint-Michel, it was founded in Baie-Saint-Paul on 16 Ju ...
's first resident
musical theatre show at the
Lyric Theatre on
Broadway
Broadway may refer to:
Theatre
* Broadway Theatre (disambiguation)
* Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
** Broadway (Manhattan), the street
**Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
,
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
. ''Paramour'' was themed to the "Golden age of
Hollywood" and followed the life of "a poet who is forced to choose between love and art". It had similar elements to Cirque du Soleil's retired
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
resident show in ''
Iris
Iris most often refers to:
*Iris (anatomy), part of the eye
*Iris (mythology), a Greek goddess
* ''Iris'' (plant), a genus of flowering plants
* Iris (color), an ambiguous color term
Iris or IRIS may also refer to:
Arts and media
Fictional ent ...
'' (which was also themed on cinema) written and created by
Philippe Decouflé
Philippe Decouflé (born October 22, 1961) is a French choreographer, dancer, mime artist, and theatre director. , and had a 38-person onstage cast with actress
Ruby Lewis
Ruby Lewis is an American actress and singer. Her work is largely based in musicals and television.
She is known for such television shows as ''Desperate Housewives'', '' Masters of Sex'', ''Girl Meets World'', and ''Rules of Engagement''.
Her ...
in the lead as Indigo.
[ ''Paramour'' began preview shows on April 16, 2016, with an official premiere on May 25, 2016.][ It closed exactly one year after its first preview show, on 16 April 2017.
During previews, ''Paramour'' got off to a strong start and grossed over $1 million in its first six shows.
The show was directed by French director-choreographer ]Philippe Decouflé
Philippe Decouflé (born October 22, 1961) is a French choreographer, dancer, mime artist, and theatre director. , who was also the director of the cinema
Cinema may refer to:
Film
* Cinematography, the art of motion-picture photography
* Film or movie, a series of still images that create the illusion of a moving image
** Film industry, the technological and commercial institutions of filmmaking
...
themed Cirque du Soleil show ''Iris
Iris most often refers to:
*Iris (anatomy), part of the eye
*Iris (mythology), a Greek goddess
* ''Iris'' (plant), a genus of flowering plants
* Iris (color), an ambiguous color term
Iris or IRIS may also refer to:
Arts and media
Fictional ent ...
''.[ The rest of the creative team was also the same as for ''Iris'' apart from the assistant directors, composer and sound designer. Scenes from ''Iris'', such as ]aerial straps
Straps, also known as aerial straps, are a type of aerial apparatus on which various feats of strength and flexibility may be performed, often in the context of a circus performance. It is a cotton or nylon web apparatus that looks like two suspen ...
performed by the Atherton twins (who also performed in ''Iris''), were incorporated into ''Paramour''.
The show closed on Broadway on 16 April 2017 after 31 previews and 366 performances. Despite average box office sales, Cirque was allegedly paid $23 million to terminate its contract early, in order to vacate the Lyric and allow for the necessary renovations for the show's successor, ''Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
''Harry Potter and the Cursed Child'' is a play written by Jack Thorne from an original story by J. K. Rowling, John Tiffany, and Thorne. Previews of the play began at the Palace Theatre, London, on 7 June 2016 as a two-part play, and it p ...
'' which had a sold out track record since opening on the West End.
''Paramour'' reopened in April 2019 in Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
, timezone1 = Central (CET)
, utc_offset1 = +1
, timezone1_DST = Central (CEST)
, utc_offset1_DST = +2
, postal ...
, Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
.
Music
The show's original Broadway cast recording was released on 16 Aug 2016, on digital format and on streaming services.
Track titles, as they appear in order on the official soundtrack, are:
# The Hollywood Wiz
# Ginger Top
# Something More
# AJ's Blues
# The Muse
# Serenade from a Window
# The Honeymoon Days of Fame
# Cleopatra
# Egyptian Gift
# Help a Girl Choose
# The Dream
# Revenge Fantasies
# Love Triangle
# Writer's Block
# Everything (The Lovers Theme)
# Nyc Rooftops
# Reel Love
# Everything (Reprise)
Critical reception
Charles Isherwood of ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' wrote "The athletic circus acts that are laced throughout the show provide the real entertainment, and make the surrounding book scenes and songs feel even more bogus and synthetic," and "There’s no denying the breathtaking magic of seeing bodies swim through the air with such apparent weightlessness
Weightlessness is the complete or near-complete absence of the sensation of weight. It is also termed zero gravity, zero G-force, or zero-G.
Weight is a measurement of the force on an object at rest in a relatively strong gravitational fie ...
. Too bad the musical surrounding them feels just as weightless, and far more forgettable."
Maren Wade of '' Las Vegas Weekly'' wrote "I think what made Paramour truly special was the unique element of the acrobatics in a more real-life setting. It felt like one minute I was watching a big Broadway show
Broadway theatre,Although ''theater'' is generally the spelling for this common noun in the United States (see American and British English spelling differences), 130 of the 144 extant and extinct Broadway venues use (used) the spelling ''Th ...
, but all of a sudden these crazy acrobatics would happen in scenes and scenarios where they were least expected," adding "I loved the show and would highly recommend it to anyone who is a Broadway and Cirque fan."
Rex Reed
Rex Taylor Reed (born October 2, 1938) is an American film critic, occasional actor, and television host. He writes the column "On the Town with Rex Reed" for '' The New York Observer''.
Early life
Reed was born on October 2, 1938, in Fort Wo ...
of '' New York Observer'' said "If your demands are not high and you don’t try to make too much sense of the wobbly so-called “plot,” there's a lot of skill on view here that is fun to watch. Paramour is a dream conceived by P. T. Barnum and revised by Bob Fosse
Robert Louis Fosse (; June 23, 1927 – September 23, 1987) was an American actor, choreographer, dancer, and film and stage director. He directed and choreographed musical works on stage and screen, including the stage musicals ''The Pajam ...
, and some of it works even better on a Broadway stage than in a tent."
References
{{Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil resident shows
2016 musicals
Broadway musicals