Cirque du Soleil big top erected at Stampede Park
Posted Aug 28, 2011 4:10 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
It took over 100 men and women to get a new attraction up at Stampede Park, and it will be up for a while.
With the tent of Cirque du Soleil’s show ‘Ovo’ now up, crews are prepping for opening night on Sept. 7th.
Of the 100 or so workers it took to get the ‘Grand Chapiteau’ standing, many consisted of Calgary’s own.
The show’s company manager, Rob Naumann, said they often get help from local crews when they tour and he couldn’t be happier with the city’s group.
“The workers here have been very good, which is nice and unfortunately, we don’t always get the quality that we have here.”
“It’s also nice for us at Cirque to kind of give back to the community a bit, if we have 100,000 people to buy tickets, we’re also trying to boost the local economy by giving jobs to up to 150 local workers.”
The crew put up the tent in a clockwise motion, standing and fastening up large poles in around two minutes.
The tent will accommodate over 2,600 people and Naumann says they’re expecting the same big crowds they had for last year’s production, ‘Kooza.’
