The Magic of Cavalia

By Paula Parisi February 1, 2011

Cavalia has returned to Southern California. In the five years since the Canadian troupe touched down in Irvine, the size of the production has nearly doubled, and the act has been expanded with double the number of horses, which creator Normand Latourelle says makes for “double the magic” in a show for audiences of all ages.

Sylvia Zerbini’s herd of nine Arabians performing at liberty is unique to Cavalia. A fifth-generation performer, Zerbini uses the most subtle of directions to communicate with her horses, half of them stallions.

Their somewhat spontaneous performance—as they wander onto the stage, curiously exploring their playground and each other, moving from rest to play and circling the stage—is lightning in a bottle, a captured natural phenomenon inspiring awe, appreciation and mystery.

Galloping, prancing, whirling about in unison and, in the case of the human component of the show, gliding through the air—the performers of Cavalia are like an undulating sea of enchantment conjured up in a 110-foot-tall white tent in downtown Burbank.

The structure itself spans more than 26,000 square feet, to accommodate a 160-foot-wide stage that accommodates the series of themed acts that constitute the show. There are segments featuring aerial acrobatics, balletic dance, Roman trick riding and outright spectacle along the lines of something you’d expect to see onstage in Las Vegas. No surprise there. Latourelle was one of the founders of Cirque du Soleil, which he left in 1985, wanting to spend more time raising his young family and coming up with a new show of his own, one that would be significantly different from what he’d done in the past.

Though he says he is “not a horse person,” and insists that the totality of what he knew about the animals constituted what could be gleaned by standing “500 feet away from one in a field,” he was taken with the way one of the animals seemed to completely captivate the audience as a bit player in a local show he’d produced in Quebec.

Thus, Cavalia was born. Latourelle feels it is best summed up not as an equine extravaganza but “a celebration of life.” He says one of the most difficult aspects of putting the show together was getting the horses used to having people fly in the air above their heads. “We had the acrobats regularly giving them carrots, so they came to view the whole thing as flying carrots,” he explains, sharing a bit of wrangling wisdom.

On Jan. 20, its second night in Los Angeles, Cavalia hosted a fund-raiser for the Larry King Cardiac Foundation, which provides funding for life-saving treatment for individuals who, due to limited means or no insurance, would otherwise be unable to receive treatment and care.

Two lives that have been saved specifically as a result of Cavalia are the horses Rocky and Roucao, rescued Mustang colts who are the first horses onstage each night. But every one of Cavalia’s 49 horses is a treasure in itself, and the sheer variety of breeds spans the world: Paints, Criollos and Quarter Horses featured in Roman and trick riding; Andalusians and Lusitanos in carousel and dressage; Percherons and Comptois in vaulting. The horses range from 8 months to 19 years in age, and they are all either geldings or stallions. The stallions, Latourelle concedes, are “more difficult to train than geldings or mares, but are far more spirited performers.”

The variety of the horses is a wonderful complement to the show’s array of multi-media special effects. Water appears and disappears on stage, produced by a water curtain and drained away as if by magic. Autumn leaves fall from the sky, and later in the show, snow drifts down on stage as the air grows chill. Complex projections re-create onstage the caves of Lascaux, a Roman coliseum, a Renaissance courtyard, the forest and the desert.

Some serious backstage magic permits the audience to enjoy the show without being aware of the massive amount of equipment required to produce it. Cavalia arrived in Burbank in a convoy of 80 semi-trailers. (The tent alone weighs 100,000 pounds, requiring seven trucks.)

Cavalia combines the natural with the mechanical to create a unique entertainment environment. Latourelle sums up: “My passion in life is to make people dream.”

Cavalia: A Magical Encounter Between Horse and Human will be held under the White Big Top in Downtown Burbank at 777 North Front Street. For show dates and reservations, call 1-866-999-8111 or visit http://www.cavalia.net.

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