I was enthralled the first time I saw Cirque du Soleil, forever ago when all that myth, glitter and spectacle was new to me. I still remember one specific moment clearly: I had the luck to be sitting very near the stage, and at the end of the performance, the acrobat who had rolled around the stage in a huge hoop — something I'd never seen before — noted my elated clapping and mouthed the words "Thank you." "No, no," I mouthed back. "Thank you." I don't know why this exchange remains more vivid than the rest of the evening's swaying, dancing, tightroping, trapezing, leaping and flying, but I think it was the realization that this god of muscle and grace was just a guy — and a rather... More >>>