Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net’ on Prime Video, a doc about the world famous circus’s post-pandemic return to performance  (2024)

Without a Net, now streaming on Prime Video, takes us behind the scenes of O, Cirque du Soleil’s permanent show at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. In 2020, the pandemic shut the production down completely, and Cirque du Soleil itself went into bankruptcy. But 400 days later, it was time for the COVID “intermission” to end, and Without a Net follows O’s performers and technical staff as they prepare for the rebooted show’s return on a tight eight-week schedule. A company of nearly 100 strong – dancers, divers, swimmers, acrobats, clowns – and hundreds of staffers – 2000 costumes to clean – perfecting their craft in a purpose-built theater featuring a one-million gallon water tank. Oh, and lots of people flying around on wires. What could possibly go wrong?

CIRQUE DU SOLEIL – WITHOUT A NET: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Everybody bought crazy stuff during the pandemic, but for Cirque du Soleil trapeze artist Emma Garrovillo, purchasing a lollipop lyra and installing the device for aerial practice in her living room was the only way to stay sane. Without A Net profiles Cirque artists like Garrovillo, acrobat Amber Basgall, artistic swimmer Bill May, and dancer Rob Knowles as O ramps back up in 2021, from a full stop to full dress rehearsals in a matter of weeks. Their skill sets need to warm up, in practice their coaches urge them to lock back into the required mindset, and there is always the sense of inherent risk. “Sometimes I have to stop myself and realize, ‘OK, what you’re doing is actually really dangerous,’” Basgall says as she trains for an elaborate, high-flying acrobatic routine involving a boat seesawing in the space above O’s massive water stage. “But I love it. It’s zen for me.”

There’s no narration here, no sidelines into talking heads or experts in modern circus performance. Without a Net moves along steadily as it presents backstories for its profiled artists, many of whom were competitive athletes recruited into the ranks of Cirque du Soleil, and features them both at home in their personal lives and down at the theater, where practice sessions are often as rewarding as they are tense. (The company’s senior artistic director emerges as doc’s villain of sorts, always unhappy with the clarity of the company’s highly precise movements. Check out how he dresses down a clown for improvising a new sequence.) In workout clothes instead of their colorful stage makeup and elaborate costumes, the kind of – very – insane things these people do for a living – flying through the air to be caught by a partner, or holding their breath underwater while lifting another swimmer out of the big tank, all to specifically timed cues – becomes clear.

“Places please for clowns, human comets, musicians, and fluid effects. Emma is on the trapeze.” On the night of the show’s big return, there are nerves galore and determined faces underneath carefully-applied makeup. Will the pick point for Garrovillo’s personally-designed trapeze trick be effective? Will the bateau team work its representation of a sailing ship with the exact amount of momentum Basgall requires to execute her inverted leap from one set of hands to another? “Aquatics, send the divers to their places.” Everyone practiced enough or they didn’t. Either way, it’s go time at the circus.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of? Prime Video actually has an entire suite of Cirque du Soleil programming. Without a Net joins Flow, a 2023 documentary tribute to the artists of O, and there are also entire Cirque shows available to stream, like Worlds Away from 2012.

Performance Worth Watching: “Holy crap, I didn’t think I had it in me!” The artists profiled in Without a Net tend to be humble about their craft, just quietly dedicated to always getting better. And then you watch acrobat Amber Basgall – from a sitting position – ascend a rope in like three seconds, her legs remaining at ninety degrees the entire time. The strength levels and technical skill sets on display throughout the doc are regularly astonishing.

Memorable Dialogue: With only one week to go before the show’s return, senior artistic director Pierre Parisien still isn’t happy with cast rehearsals. “Now we are at the phase where we need to run it. Is it at the level it should be? No, not yet. Because for me, it’s not organic yet. And for that, they need to do it.”

Sex and Skin: Not really. Artistic swimmers in their suits, acrobats in form-fitting costumes, fire dancers not wearing shirts – Without a Net frames the artists at work with an appreciation of the human form.

Our Take: It’s Summer Olympics season, so individuals competing at a world-class level is once again a topic of conversation. And elite performance is also on display in Without a Net, a doc that’s at its best when it spends quality time with the artists of Cirque du Soleil as they push themselves to achieve ever higher levels of precision, power, and grace. In one interview, a diver explains how his discipline comes relatively easy to him after having done it thousands upon thousands of times. But that doesn’t diminish how crazy it is to see him drop like a bullet from high up in the rafters of the Bellagio’s O Theatre and pierce the surface of the million-gallon tank below. It might as well be an Olympic event, and he’s doing it twice a night in front of thousands. But because our anticipation isn’t wrapped up with whether or not the performer will medal, we’re able to enjoy such feats in Without a Net from a more personal perspective. We aren’t just watching the moment of competition. We saw all the sweat and toil it took to mount the performance. We’re invested in how a Cirque acrobat will stick the landing, because she already showed us the X-rays from her eight surgeries. “Injuries from my craft.” In the end, Without a Net is inspiring, because who among us doesn’t worry about sticking a landing every single day?

Our Call: STREAM IT. Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net is a post-pandemic story with a lot of benefit to come out of what was a tough time for everyone. And with its level of access to the work these artists and performers put in, it sometimes feels like we’re the ones about to grab that trapeze or fly unfettered through the air.

Johnny Loftus (@glennganges) is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift.