The Circus Starring Britney Spears
The Circus Starring Britney Spears, commonly referred to as the Circus Tour, was the seventh concert tour by American entertainer Britney Spears. It was launched in support of her sixth studio album, Circus. Rumors of a tour arose as early as October 2007, however, nothing was confirmed until December 2008, when the tour was officially announced, with North American and European dates revealed. The stage was composed of three rings and set in-the-round to resemble an actual circus. Fashion designers Dean and Dan Caten created the costumes. A giant cylinder screen was set above the stage to showcase videos and backdrops. Effects were provided by Solotech. Magician Ed Alonzo joined Spears during the second act. The setlist was composed generally from her albums In the Zone, Blackout, and Circus. Spears announced she would tour Australia for the first time in June 2009.
The Circus Starring Britney Spears was described as a "pop extravaganza". It was divided into five segments. The Circus featured a metamorphosis of Spears from a ringmaster to a slave, while being surrounded by different performers. House of Fun displayed a series of upbeat numbers with different themes, including magic and military. It ended with a Bollywood-inspired performance and a ballad in which Spears performed while floating on a giant umbrella. Freakshow/Peepshow featured a video interlude set to heavy metal music, and continued with dark and sexual performances. Electro Circ displayed energetic dance routines, and the encore consisted of a video montage of Spears's music videos and a police-themed performance. Some changes were made to the show throughout the tour. Several songs were remixed; Spears also performed "Mannequin" in selected European shows and covers of Duffy and Alanis Morissette songs on some North American dates.
The Circus Starring Britney Spears received mixed to positive reviews from critics. While some praised its aesthetics and deemed it an entertaining show, others criticized Spears' lack of involvement during some segments. The tour was a commercial success, with a total gross of $131.8 million, making it Spears' highest-grossing tour and the fifth highest-grossing tour of 2009. A great number of tickets were sold within a week of the tour's announcement, which prompted supporters to add more dates. The tour also broke attendance records in many cities and all the North American shows were sold out.
Background
On September 9, 2007, Spears performed "Gimme More", the lead single from her fifth studio album Blackout at the MTV Video Music Awards. Her last live performance had been during The M+M's Tour in May of the same year. Her singing, her dancing and even her wardrobe were all commented on extensively, and it was considered hurtful for her career. In October 2007, it was reported that Spears was planning to go on tour to promote the album and was holding open dance auditions, but this was later denied by Jive Records. In February 2008, similar reports surfaced that Spears had already rehearsed in private for a month at Millennium Dance Complex in Los Angeles, and would be leaving to Europe during the following weeks for a worldwide tour. However, it was finally cancelled for unknown reasons. In September 2008, after New York City radio station Z100 premiered her single "Womanizer", Spears made a surprise appearance on the show and announced she would be going on a worldwide tour during 2009 to support her sixth studio album, Circus. The concert promoter was AEG Live. Former director of the tour, Australian choreographer Wade Robson, said that the tour would visit the United States, the United Kingdom, and would also reach Australia.After her live performances in the Big Apple Circus tent at Lincoln Center for Good Morning America on December 2, 2008, Spears officially announced a first leg of twenty-five dates in the US and two dates in the UK, with the tour launching on March 3, 2009, in New Orleans. Big Apple Circus performers supported Spears during her performance, and ultimately went on to open for her throughout the tour. The Pussycat Dolls were also selected in October 2008 as the opening act of the first North American leg. Spears's manager Larry Rudolph claimed that the show would "blow people's minds and promises to show Britney's fans something they will never forget." He later added, "she goes full-speed the whole show – about an hour and a half. It's pretty intense. This is a full-blown, full-out Britney Spears show. It is a pop extravaganza. It is everything everybody expects from her — and more!" On April 28, 2009, eight European dates were added. The following day, four more dates were announced in Russia, Poland and Germany. On June 9, 2009, Spears announced that she would tour Australia for the first time in November. Six dates were initially announced. Spears stated, "I've wanted to tour Australia for quite some time and now it's finally happening. My Circus tour is the best show I have ever created and I can't wait to perform it for all of my Australian fans. See you guys soon!"
The following day, it was announced on her official website that she would return to North America for a second leg, visiting twenty cities. The Circus Starring Britney Spears was also rumored to reach South America, however, Spears's manager Adam Leber denied this despite their efforts to do so.
Development
The choreographer was Jamie King, who previously collaborated with Spears in her Oops!... I Did It Again Tour. He did the casting of the dancers and acrobats, and worked with Spears on the setlist and the choreography. Simon Ellis was hired as the musical director. The production design was done by Road Rage, a formed alliance between Nick Whitehouse, Bryan Leitch, William Baker and Steve Dixon. Lightning design was done by Visual Light, conformed by Whitehouse and Leitch. The stage was designed by Road Rage and set in-the-round, with a big stage in the center painted to look like a target. There were also two satellite stages in the sides unified by small catwalks, to resemble an actual three-ring circus. The stage was built by Tait Towers and included nine lifts, which had a cost of $10 million. It traveled in 3,000 rolling cases packed into 32 semis and a crew of 150 people was needed to set it up. There was a semi-transparent Element Labs Stealth cylinder screen above the stage, comprising 960 panels that Solotech built into custom frames. The backdrops & projection content were designed by Dirk Decloedt. There were three new film sequences shot exclusively for the tour: an opening video featuring Perez Hilton, a video of Spears set to Marilyn Manson's "Sweet Dreams " and a final montage. The three videos were created by Veneno. Props, including swings, couches, unicycles, stripper poles, a gold cage and giant picture frames, were designed by ShowFX Inc.; they also provided custom VIP couch seating that lined the perimeter of the stage. VYV provided the video control, which included two Photon Show media servers and two Photon Controllers. The servers took timecode for the show and wrapped the images around the Stealth screen. Emric Epstein of VYV explained, "The servers and software permits us to control a large number of video layers on the 360˚ LED screen, composite the layers in realtime, and transform the final output so that everything look seamless after going through the LED controllers. There is also an astounding 3D preview of the stage and video screens in the software so you can control or re-program the show without being inside the arena bowl".The sound was provided by Solotech. Front of house engineer Blake Suib explained that, " and Solotech were asked to come up with a design that blocked the fewest seats but provided the quality and coverage that expects and that we were looking for". The public address was made of 64 Milos that split into four hangs of 16 per hang. Two at the 50 yard line pointed one way and directly behind, two at the 50 yard line pointed the opposite way. Also present were 32 Micas; 16 per hang, pointing to the sides. Each one of the four hangs had its own equalization and level control, so in case one of the speakers were louder there would be a separate EQ to compensate for any change in the tone due to the distance. All the components and tools used in the public address were designed by Meyer Sound Laboratories, including a software called Mapp, used to decide where to point the PA; the Simm, to analyze and time align the PA accurately; and the Galileo, used to EQ and balance all the sections of the PA. The speakers were self-powered with amplifiers also built by Meyer Sounds. There were 24 HP700 subwoofers positioned all over the arena floor, and the Simm and Galileo were used to time align. Spears used a Crown CM-311AE headset microphone wearing the mic's beltpack on her top or pants, she did not use in-ear monitors; instead 12 Meyer CQs were positioned, eight flown around the center ring and two on each of the smaller stages. Spears specifically asked Suib to make the show sound similar to a dance club. Solotech provided the lighting package, including a mostly Vari-Lite rig, with 80 each VL3000s and VL3500s in various positions, and 60 VL500s built into the stage deck. Whitehouse also had 18 PRG Bad Boy luminaires, 16 of which sat in pods that hung in various positions lower than the rest of the rig, with two more at either end of the stage. Each of the eight pods housed two Bad Boys, two of the VL3500s, one Robert Juliat Ivanhoe followspot with scroller under DMX control, and a Molefay. Fifty Martin Professional Atomic Color strobes and four front of house Robert Juliat Aramis followspots rounded out the lighting package. The lightning team had to rehearse for a month to prepare. The tour was also the first to use the touring version of the PRG Virtuoso V676 console to control the system, which was used from the beginning of the European leg until the end of the tour. Pyrotechnics and jets of smoke used in the show were created by Lorenzo Cornacchia of Pyrotek Special Effects and Tait Towers.
Spears explained that since she did not tour to promote Blackout, she was excited about having to include songs from that album into the setlist. The finished setlist would include three songs from Circus, six songs from Blackout and five songs from In the Zone ; other parts of the setlist consist of a medley of "Breathe on Me" and "Touch of My Hand", both from In the Zone; and a remix of "...Baby One More Time", the only song performed off the album of the same name. "Everytime" was the only song not included in the released setlist but was performed regularly on the show. Magician Ed Alonzo joined Spears in one of the acts, and she played as his assistant. Alonzo stated, "We're going to be doing the classics of magic but a little high-tech. We'll be doing a little dissection, transposition, a vanish, an appearance — and if I do a trick, she doesn't just hold the props, she's actually getting inside the big boxes or I am slicing her up.... Some of it's pretty scary, but she gets right in there with no reservations." The costumes were designed by Dean and Dan Caten from DSquared2. They recreated classic circus outfits, like clowns, jugglers and trapeze artists in a more provocative way. They commented that,
"We are enormous fans of Britney, and have been waiting for the perfect moment to collaborate with her. It's going to be wild. We wanted to create something much more provoking and indecent... something animalistic and primal. We are confident that this tour partnership, an autobiographical tribute for one who has always been in the spotlight: scrutinized, watched, imitated, photographed, criticized and loved, will be an enormous success".
The costumes of the first segment were selected to show a metamorphosis. The cheetah headdress represented an animal. The jacket and whip represented both a ringmaster and a lion tamer. She took the headdress off at the end of the first song to reveal a Swarovski-crystal corset, fishnets, and boots and entered the cage to represent a slave. The wardrobe for the song "Mannequin" included black jeans from True Religion and a yellow tank top with rhinestones designed by Spears herself. Spears's outfits had a duplicate set in case of any problem and were numbered in sequence. The total number of costumes was approximately 350, kept in order by six full-time women. The wardrobe was also revealed to have $150,000 worth of Swarovski crystals.