Circus not all clowning around

Clown Ivan Vargas with the Gold Edition of "Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Presents Super Circus Heroes," coming Aug. 14 to Verizon Arena.
Clown Ivan Vargas with the Gold Edition of "Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Presents Super Circus Heroes," coming Aug. 14 to Verizon Arena.

Day in, day out, there's always some clown on the phone. It's part of the job around here.

Except last week, it really was some clown -- Ivan Vargas, one of the stars of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Presents "Super Circus Heroes," the latest version of the Greatest Show on Earth, arriving Thursday and continuing through the weekend at North Little Rock's Verizon Arena.

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Presents “Super Circus Heroes”

7 p.m. Thursday-Friday; 11 a.m., 3 and 7 p.m. Saturday; and 1 and 5 p.m. Sunday, North Little Rock Verizon Arena. All-Access Preshow, an hour before each show, is free to all ticket holders.

Tickets: $10-$60 plus possible handling fees

(501) 975-9000

ringling.com; ticketmaster.com

Vargas, whose circus pedigree goes back six paternal and five maternal generations, is touring for the first time with the show's one-ring Gold Edition.

He has also traveled, in his time (he just finished his fourth tour in the circus' "Built to Amaze" show) with the larger, three-ring Blue and Red versions of the circus that park in larger cities, including recent stops in Anaheim, Calif., and Dallas.

"So far as I know, I'm the only performer who's worked in all three units in one calendar year, which was last year," says Vargas with a touch of pride. "I jumped from Blue to Red to Gold.

"They're different shows -- Blue is 'Legends,' right now, Red is 'Built to Amaze."' But "we're all one big, giant family, working for the same company."

Speaking of family, Vargas met the woman who is now his wife, an acrobat, through the circus.

"I met her about five years ago, almost six now; she came from Ukraine with her acrobatic troupe," he says. They were both on the circus' Red unit at the time; for a couple of years, they moved back and forth between Ringling Bros. and other shows.

"Right now she's in Las Vegas working at Circus Circus," Vargas says. "We're trying to see what she can do to come back here so we can be together again for the next tour."

Vargas' parents, Alejandro ("Alex") and Lolis, stayed with the circus after their Flying Vargas troupe disbanded. Alex began working with the animals; Lolis moved to the wardrobe department. Ivan got his childhood education at the Ringling Bros. traveling school.

"Both my parents did flying trapeze; that was their main act," he says. "I grew up doing that stuff: acrobatics, the trampoline, the teeter board, the trapeze. I started performing on Ringling Bros. with an acrobatic troupe, not my family, but another.

"I did a couple different things until I realized that I liked making people laugh, that I wanted to connect with people more, just hang out, talk to them. In my world, the person who does that the most is the clown."

So five years ago, for the circus' 139th Edition, he auditioned to become a member of the Ringling Bros. Clown Alley.

"My [specialty] is acrobatics -- I do falls really well," he explains. "Slapstick is one of my highlights. That's how I auditioned as well -- learn first how to fall. I showed them how I can do these things, take certain hits without getting hurt.

"In general, all clowns need to learn multiple skills; that's actually one of the tough things about being a clown. You can dedicate yourself to one thing, but you have to have a bunch of other things in your back pocket.

"When I became a clown, I had no idea what it was to actually be a clown. I thought, like everybody else, that you just slap on some makeup and act goofy, but there's an art to it."

For this show, Vargas emerges from the alley and becomes one of the stars of the show.

"Instead of just being general clowns in the mix, myself and my clown partner, Andrew, are the Super Circus Hero trainers," he says. "We're the ones who've trained all the performers. And we help ringmaster [David Shipman] move the story along."

Primarily, they take charge of award-winning Italian clown Davis Vassallo, making his American and Ringling Bros. debut as "Mr. Boredom." "We have to turn him into a clown, but we have to find his super power first. Throughout the show, he's trying new things," Vargas says.

"It was actually a bit of a challenge for me; I'm used to being part of such a large group. Normally on one unit we have 12 to 13 clowns; we each have our special abilities, but we have to work together." In other words, fit into same tiny car? "Yes, I guess you can say it that way," he says with a smile you can hear over the phone.

Vargas also has a personal thing for superheroes, which makes this show an almost perfect fit for him.

"I was super excited when I first heard about it," he says. "When I first signed on to the show, they weren't sure of the name yet -- something about superheroes, but that was enough for me.

"I grew up reading comic books" -- he still does. "I'm a movie fanatic. My favorite genre is the comic book thing that's going on right now.

"My favorite superhero growing up was Spider-Man, just because of his acrobatic skills and his wittiness and the way he would make the reader laugh."

Furthermore, the kinds of things he'd see in superhero comics he could easily transfer to his own milieu: "I would see all these things, but in the circus." His parents flew through the air. The Strong Man was just like the Hulk. "To a kid, even a kid in the circus, that's amazing. To me, I saw it on the page, and thought, 'These things are possible.'"

"It all came together really well" in the show, he says. "It's not just fantasy superheroes -- like the ringmaster says in the show, it's real-life superheroes, it's just the super things that they do.

"That's the important thing about the circus, any circus -- even if it's just the two or three hours in the arena with us, we want to take you to another place so you're having fun, you're comfortable, you're enjoying yourself. It's very interactive. That's how we are superheroes: We can save you from your everyday."

Style on 08/12/2014

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