The Great Bombay Circus is in Coimbatore

The Great Bombay Circus is in Coimbatore. Catch daredevilry, juggling, acrobatic and trapeze acts as the clowns bring on the laughs 

Malayalam auteur K G George’s Mela (1980) and director Jayaraj Vijay’s Nair Pidicha Pulival (1958) were probably the earliest films in Malayalam about life in a circus. Both films, besides an emotional core and taut screenplay, recreated the awe and delight associated with watching a real time circus show, complete with a live orchestra belting out tunes to match the acts presented on stage.

A show at the Great Bombay Circus that returns to the city after six years, brings back those memories. The big tent is gleaming with decorative lights and and the corridor bears black-and-white photos of personalities like Lal Bahadur Shastri, EMS Namboodiripad, Indira Gandhi and MG Ramachandran visiting the circus. Once inside, music played on the speakers stops, a bell rings and the show takes off to a great start.

Flying trapeze is the first act. As the performer, grabs the trapeze bar from a high platform, swings and lets go of the bar which is caught by a fellow artiste on a second trapeze, the packed audience erupt in cheers. More tricks like spinning on the swinging trapeze follow and the crowd is delighted. “The audience response keeps us going,” says KM Sanjeev, who now runs the 102-year-old circus company adding that they performed in Chennai for over three-and-a-half months before the pandemic lockdowns. “Then, we went to Mysore, Thiruvananthapuram, Thrissur, and Kozhikode and it has been encouraging.”

The star attraction of the show is a six-member men’s team from Ethiopia, who won bronze medals at the World Competitions) jiving to Afro-beats, while performing jaw-dropping acrobatics, and juggling. The tight rope act sees the performer kick saucers, tea cups onto her head while balancing herself on a thin rope. The ‘tower basketball’ in which a performer slowly and painstakingly bounces a ball to the top of a pole attached to her feet — with the risk of having the ball quiver and  fall — makes the audience hold their breath.

“It takes hours of practice and patience to nail such acts, be it swinging on a trapeze, juggling, riding a unicycle, or ring dance. Strength, agility and perseverance matters,” explains Sanjeev.

All these aspects come to the fore when an eight-member team from Manipur takes over and presents some thrilling acts like spear balance on the chest and acrobatics. The fire dance show is visually stunning and has the dancers moving about to the beats of belly dance. The clowns have been with the circus for decades – and yes, it does show. Their slapstick manages to evoke laughs, especially from children.

Tracing their history, Sanjeev says when Baburao Kadam founded the Grand Bombay Circus in the 1920s in Sindh province (now in Pakistan). Around the time, in Kerala, Keeleri Kunhikannan, a martial artiste and gymnast set up his circus company at Thalassery. His nephew, KM Kunhikannan, merged his two circus troupes, Whiteway and Hind, with Grand Bombay Circus in 1947 and thus was born the Great Bombay Circus. Kunhikannan’s legacy was carried forward by his nephew KM Balagopal under whose leadership, it grew into the largest circus company in India today. When he died in 1993, his sons KM Sanjeev and Dileep Nath took over. “I was doing my schooling in Udhagamandalam and was planning to pursue Law but had to take over the circus following father’s sudden demise,” Sanjeev recalls adding that his 200-member team is ‘a village in a city’ with artistes drawn from India, Russia, and Nepal. “We gel like one big family. We have four kitchens catering to our food requirements.”