All Hail Caesar!

Teatro ZinZanni presents Hail Caesar!, opening May 12th and running through August 28th, 2011 in the magical Seattle spiegeltent. Hail Caesar! stars the irrepressible entertainer Frank Ferrante as Caesar and acclaimed aerialist Dreya Weber as Cleo, Queen of the Nile, and is Teatro ZinZanni’s zany take on the love story between two of history’s most famous lovers. Hail Caesar! features a hilarious and captivating international cast including juggler Joel Salom; hand-balancer Elena Borodina; trapeze artists Ssens Duo; the exceptionally talented juggler and rola-bola artist Bernard Hazen, and the operatic talents of Juliana Rambaldi and Victor Benedetti.

Music, laughter, romance and desire ensue when a resurrected Cleopatra sets her sights on a fast-talking, wise-cracking chef named Caesar. Don’t miss this colossal epic that proves that not all great couples meet online–sometimes they meet at Teatro ZinZanni. Does Cleopatra’s love for Caesar win out in the end? To find out, join the performers of Teatro ZinZanni for Hail Caesar!, a risqué romp through Egyptian history complete with Love, Chaos and… Dinner!

Clown Crash-Course Final Performance

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What happens when you put 35 kids between the ages of 5 and 8 into a 100 year-old spiegeltent and leave a legendary Quebequois clown in charge? Magic!

Camp ZinZanni, presented by Tree Top, is just hitting the half-way mark for 2010′s summer sessions and we’ve already seen kids clowning, juggling, miming, swinging, singing, balancing, teetering, pratt falling, slapsticking, acting, ribbon dancing, stacking, conjuring and growing. During our second week of Clown Crash-Course we even saw a kid lose his first tooth on stage!

Still want to get in on some circus fun? There are just a couple of remaining spots in our “Objects in Motion + Clowning” workshop which focuses on juggling, object manipulation and sleight-of-hand. The course starts Monday, July 26 and runs through Saturday, July 31. Visit campzinzanni.org for more information and the enrollment form.

Markus Delivers the News

On Monday, March 1, Markus Kunz, Teatro ZinZanni’s Director of Education and Managing Director, took a stroll across Seattle Center to visit our friends in the KOMO Newsroom. After settling into the busy newsroom, he spoke on behalf of Camp ZinZanni with KOMO 1000 reporter Corwin Haeck for a piece to be aired at a later date. Markus entertained Corwin with conversation about clowning and circus, and the latest news about Teatro ZinZanni’s education program.

Camp ZinZanni is now enrolling for Summer 2010 in Seattle, and for the first time, in San Francisco as well!

Seattle Times features Camp ZinZanni

The Sunday, August 9 edition of the Seattle Times, featured a whopping color photo of Camp ZinZanni’s kids and staff working on a pyramid-building routine on the front page. The article, titled “Seattle Arts Groups Get Creative to Attract Younger Generations,” also included our friends at Seattle Opera, Seattle Art Museum and On The Boards.

Read the article here.

Let’s Get Physical!

Camp ZinZanni’s second session, “Let’s Get Physical” got under way yesterday in Teatro ZinZanni’s spiegeltent. Campers are learning the fine arts of clowning, slapstick, mime and movement under the direction of Dolorèze Léonard and Noah Moore with Teatro ZinZanni’s tumblers Les Petits Frères and comedian Frank Ferrante. “Let’s Get Physical” wraps up Saturday, July 18 with a free performance in the tent at 222 Mercer Street in Seattle’s Lower Queen Anne neighborhood.

Slapstick and Pratfalls are the name of the game at Camp ZinZanni.

Ooooh... Made you look!

Mickael Bajazet of Les Petits Frères leads campers in a lesson on pratfalls.

Now THAT is a good looking group of campers!

Camp ZinZanni Week One Comes To An End

Campers from “Do the Loco-Motion” put the finishing touches on their performance this afternoon and are ready for tomorrow’s show. Stop by the tent at noon on Saturday, July 11, 2009 for a free performance by our campers.

Camp ZinZanni Begins!

This morning Teatro ZinZanni welcomed its first group of campers to Camp ZinZanni. Joined by instructors Dolorèze Léonard, Bernard Hazens and Noah Moore, campers for this week’s session will delve deep into Clowning and Juggling. For more information on Camp ZinZanni, visit http://zica.zinzanni.org.

Act Fast! There are still a few openings for 5-8 year olds in “Clown Crash-Course” which runs July 27-31.

Shirts and water bottles waiting for the first campers to arrive.

Markus Kunz, Director of Education and Managing Director of Teatro ZinZanni in Seattle, welcomes campers and parents into the spiegeltent.

Getting to know you... Campers and staff do a memory and movement activity to learn eachother's names.

Camp ZinZanni, Day 2

By Alison Sargent, Camp ZinZanni Counselor, Team Water

Since yesterday went so smoothly, today we decided to let the kids get physical, so we brought in Peter Pitofsky, “the human cartoon”, to smack the kids around a bit. It was hilarious to watch them learn slapstick as they knocked each other across the face, kicked each other in the pants, and rammed their heads into doors. The louder the smack and the cry of pain the better!

While this sounds like a camp counselor’s nightmare, it was just what we wanted at Camp Zinzanni. I’ve never seen kids look so happy after tripping over their own feet and running into a door. And over the course of their two hours working with Peter, their initial self-consciousness became replaced by a desire to make a fool of themselves and laugh about it – the most important lesson he taught them.

The kids also learned about the legacy of physical comedy of which they are becoming a part. They all agreed that clowns play an essential role in every society, and Markus and les Castors introduced us to Buster Keaton, W.C. Fields, Harold Lloyd and the Three Stooges, as well as the concepts of white, red and pink clowns.

While getting goofy today, everyone started to become more and more comfortable with each other, and I’m excited for tomorrow’s partner work to take their new friendships to the next step. Especially if that next step is as amusing as some of the steps – or trips – that I saw today.

Les Castors help Markus Kunz field questions about the role of the clown. Photo by Christopher Nelson.

Peter Pitofsky talks about his life in the circus. Photo by Christopher Nelson.

Campers enthusiastically volunteer to walk into a door during Peter Pitofsky’s workshop.

Another look…

by Stormy Edwards, Camp ZinZanni Coordinator

July 21, 2008 – Welcome to Camp ZinZanni!

On February 6th, 2008, an idea was born. That idea was put into the hands of a small group of people. Those people were given the task of making that idea grow.

Today, it bore its first fruit. And that fruit was amazing.

Final preparations for Teatro ZinZanni’s first summer camp began at about 7:30 this morning, with our camp staff and counselors. Campers began lining up outside the doors shortly after 8am and Sergiy Krutikov treated them to some accordion music while they waited.

From the moment the doors opened to the moment they closed at 3pm, it was a remarkable day, and definitely a learning process for us all.

There were a handful of highly skilled jugglers of all ages mixed into a group of absolute beginners. I spent the morning watching them work with Sergiy and with their counselors on a variety of instruments – balls, clubs, rings, and scarves. I enjoyed talking to the kids as they practiced, seeing what they had developed over the course of the morning. One entire group perfected a trick with two rings. Another moved on to passing clubs. The third group held some of the shortest and best ball jugglers in the tent. Kids who had never met become fast friends within the first hour.

It was incredible to watch.

And then we turned them on their heads. Literally. Once Doloreze Leonard took over in the afternoon, the kids were asked to perform, to be a stove, a giraffe, a lung. Some of the kids that were learning slowly in the juggling session became the masters of character creation. Some kids, too shy to perform on their own, became leaders within their group performances. The counselors all worked right alongside the kids, encouraging and proving by example that there is no such thing as too silly for the circus.

I cannot wait to see what these kids develop with Sergiy and Dolo this week, as jugglers, as characters, and as teammates.

Tomorrow, we throw Peter Pitofsky into the mix. I’m already giggling in anticipation of what these kids will do when the “Human Cartoon” arrives in their midst. Stay tuned…..