The 'Barbette' Residency Has Begun! (Patreon)

Hello beautiful people!

I wanted to share a little bit of how the first couple weeks of my summer residency at the École Nationale de Cirque, courtesy of La TOHU, is going!

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QUICK RECAP (for new patrons):

• I'm working on a new aerial straps act this summer/fall  
• I applied to the Residency program that TOHU offers professional circus artists and was offered space in the BEAUTIFUL studios that all the mini professional circus students get to use year round up in the north of Montréal, Quebec, Canada.
• I'm currently nearing the end of a small horror movie project that cropped up rather unexpectedly at the end of April – so I've been juggling film things with circus things for the past month

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The past few weeks of juggling the filming schedule of this horror movie and the necessary training / research / lessons for my circus grant goals has felt like an exercise in extreme folly. 

Between the long shooting hours, unpredictable schedule changes, travel woes while attending the QFX convention in Tampa last weekend for Motherland: Fort Salem contract obligation stuff, and  the general mental ups-and-downs that accompany learning difficult and new physical skills, I'm a little worse-for-wear. 

My straps coach, William, delightfully points at my face each lesson and says: "Panda!" when I walk in with dark circles under my eyes. 

I will be very relieved when this current filming project is wrapped in early June, because trying to push hard on two different career paths –simultaneously– is ... inadvisable? 😅

BUT THAT'S OKAY -- !  Despite the scheduling crunches, conflicts, and challenges, I'm still able to pause and realize that I feel happy to be where I am, and doing (trying to do?) the things that I am doing.

And one not-small part of that happiness is the ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS TRAINING FACILITIES that I've been getting to play in for the last couple weeks. 

Check it out!

Here’s the school itself (École Nationale de Cirque / National Circus School). It takes me about 50 minutes to get up here by bus right now! 🚌

And you walk by these really cool sculptures on your way to the entrance. About 4 days has elapsed since I took this photo and now the grass is covered in beautiful little pink wildflowers….!

Here’s the registry that greets you when you walk through the front doors of the circus school — I need to make time to visit the library on the 5th floor sometime! (The ENC librarian even bought a copy of SLOW CIRCUS last year…!). My rehearsals and training happen on the 4th floor.

You exit the elevator and walk out out to THIS epic studio (‘Studio Palèstre’) on the 4th floor:

And if you look out the window you see the TOHU building itself; the tents set up for the ENC students’ year-end show and the summer circus festival; and, JUST out of frame to the right is THE headquarters for Cirque du Soleil. So much epic Canadian circus is ALL HAPPENING in this one square block in a rather unattractive, grey concrete slab of industrial-suburbia in Montreal’s north-end. Wild!

If you walk through that epic first studio you find the Studio Création — I get this ENTIRE SPACE to just me and my coach for the residency hours they were able to offer!!! 😱 (which, at the moment, is 2 hours blocks 3x/ week in the evenings, for the past 2 weeks) (the residency will pause for a few weeks in June for student rehearsals and then resume at the end of that month with 4 hour sessions in a different studio at ENC!)

As you can see, I’m pretty happy with the absolutely ridiculously awesome rigging system here (not to mention the natural light):

It’s also been my first opportunity to go REALLY, TRULY HIGH. William is starting me off “not too high” (HA) and we’re working on building up to proper scary height over the summer 🫣:

Aaaaaand there you have it!

It’s going to be a challenging balancing act to keep going the way I’m going with TV and film things and keep doggedly pursuing these circus goals. I wish I could wave a magic wand and have all my scheduling fall into neat little arrangements that don’t conflict or overlap — but that’s just not how this cookie is crumbling. So I’m keeping a smile on my face and doing my best with whatever cards get dealt!

In the past, I’ve always felt like I have to try to absorb as MUCH AS I CAN over a couple short weeks and then desperately attempt to maintain on my own, solo, in Toronto, with no coach.

…. But not this time 🥹☺️

The mayhem and chaos is certainly made easier to tolerate by things like being in a beautiful, calm, world-class environment to step into, like this one. I’m feeling very grateful every time I get to walk into this residency studio. It feels really exciting to have access to this space.

It also feels really wonderful to be in Montreal for an extended period and KNOW that I’ve got time on my side to slowly and methodically build up the physical and technical strength I want to create with my coach.

More to come!

In the meantime, stay strange & wonderful 🥰🎪

XOXO — ess