TIME Magazine: TIME 100: Guy Laliberte


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Guy Laliberté

Artists & Entertainers
	Mark Burnett Frank Gehry John Galliano Peter Jackson Nicholas Hytner Simon Cowell OutKast Norah Jones Jerry Bruckheimer J.K. Rowling Ken Kutaragi Bruce Nauman Katie Couric Charlie Kaufman Hideo Nakata Aishwarya Rai Ferran Adrià Nicole Kidman Sean Penn Guy Laliberté
	Leaders & Revolutionaries Builders & Titans Scientists & Thinkers Heroes & Icons Introduction Essay FROM THE ARCHIVE: Artists & Entertainers from 1900-1999

Revolution Under the Big Top

By STEVEN FRANK

EDWARD GAJDEL FOR TIME

FROM THE TIME ARCHIVE

	Voila! Cirque du Soleil, which reinvented the magic of the big top, brings dazzling theatricality to two glamorous shows in Las Vegas and California [10/3/1994]

Before Guy Laliberté's Cirque du Soleil rose 20 years ago, the big top had degenerated into a tedium of clichés: Bozo-like clown acts, dancing bears in dresses and men with whips sticking their coiffed heads into lions' mouths. Laliberté changed all that, building a new, animal-free circus prototype that emphasized heart-tingling theatricality, New Age sensibilities and jaw-dropping athleticism. Then his troupe invaded Las Vegas, bringing imaginative original productions to the land of showgirls and Elvis impersonators. Today, Laliberté's 3,000-strong company juggles nine spectacular shows: five that tour the globe and four resident ones, the biggest of which, sin Vegas, has been entirely sold out for five years.

How did a hippie with a résumé that listed fire breather and accordion player transform a ragtag band of Québécois buskers into a $500 million entertainment juggernaut? "Childlike naiveté," says Laliberté, the company's puckish owner, CEO and co-founder. His impact is hard to underestimate. "Every circus I see around the world has some influence in style of the Cirque du Soleil," says Ernest Albrecht, author of The New American Circus. Cirque has also sparked interest in vaudeville, acrobatics and street performance. Up next: another Vegas show, premiering in September, a new touring show for 2005 and possibly, down the road, even Cirque-themed restaurants, spas and casinos. The high-wire act continues.

May 26, 1980	July 8, 1998	Oct. 13, 1967

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