Under the big top at Cavalia’s ‘Odysseo,’ where the 65 horses are the stars
The 58,397-square-foot big top off the 405 freeway in Irvine may seem curiously large until it’s clear what goes on inside.
Essentially, the 25-foot-tall white tent for Cavalia’s “Odysseo” show holds a small village of 65 horses, 48 performers, 200 additional staff and a 17,500-square-foot stage made up of 10,000 tons of stones, dirt and sand, making “Odysseo” the largest traveling show in the world.
And for seven nights a week through Feb. 28, the tent, at 16576 Laguna Canyon Road, can also hold about 2,000 guests.
The equestrian production by Canada-based entertainment company Cavalia, which includes stage arts and high-tech theatrical effects, has toured cities across the United States, Canada and Mexico since 2011. This is its first appearance in Orange County. A shorter version of the show ran in Burbank in 2013.
During the two-hour show, the horses are arguably the stars.
They perform various tricks, and riders jump atop them as the animals run.
Eight horses take part in a liberty act, responding to verbal commands as they run in a circle around the person giving the orders and resting their heads on back of the horse in front.
Elise Verdoncq, who performs the liberty stunt with the horses, said she speaks French to them and they understand her. The horses can also understand Russian and English, she said.
While controlling eight horses at a time may seem like a difficult trick to master, Verdoncq maintains it just takes a little patience and understanding on both ends.
“You really need to have a relationship with your horse, and the horse really needs to trust you,” said Verdoncq, who has been working for Cavalia for about seven years. “It just takes a really long time for us to understand each other and know each other by heart. You start with just one horse and you just teach them the basics, then add more horses.
“It’s hard to get more than one horse to listen to you because they all have to pay attention to you at the same time.”
The horses and riders build relationships because they’re constantly working with each other at the different tour stops. A brown and white paint horse named Junior, for example, always answers to rider Spencer Rose, who has been working for Cavalia for about five years.
She talked about getting a horse to jump over railings nearly 4 feet tall and maintain a steady pace so that its rider can stand on or lay his or her back against the horse as the animal continues to move in a circle.
“I’ve never seen a horse take less than three months or longer than a year to get them to be able to do something that we need them to do,” she said. “It all really depends on what we want them to do. They are pretty independent thinkers, but the biggest thing we do here is not try to train the horse to think like us. It’s training us to think like the horse.”
As the horses gallop during a performance, a band in rafters above the stage plays mystical-sounding music with Italian lyrics.
Again, the horses are in charge, Rose said.
“The band just follows the actions of the horses with their music,” she said. “If you came to all seven shows in the week, you would see a different show every night.”
In another part of the show, the stage is flooded with 40,000 gallons of reclaimed water, creating a lake for a single white horse and its rider to run around in.
Darren Charles, resident artistic director and choreographer for “Odysseo,” said the water is used over and over for the shows.
“We are mindful of our water and we do not waste it,” he said, noting the extensive filtering process it goes through. “We know that’s especially important in California.”
Of the 65 horses that travel with the show, 45 to 50 perform in each show, giving each of them a night or two off per week.
Additionally, each horse is on stage for only about 10 to 15 minutes and only performs in one or two numbers per show.
Rose said the horses do exercises and stretches that she calls “horse yoga” daily to prepare them for the performances.
“What they do in the show is not enough to keep them in shape,” she said.
Pampering also keeps the horses happy and strong. They routinely have visits from masseuses and on-call veterinarians, and they stayed at a ranch in San Diego for 10 days, as a vacation of sorts, between the San Francisco and Irvine stops of the tour.
Rose said the horses deserve a lot of recognition.
“The artistic beauty of the show is really well done,” she said. “What these horses do, you’ll see lots of different things. You’ll see a guy who goes underneath the belly of a horse. You’ll see a jumping number where there are eight horses that do different jumps. There’s also a number with 32 horses on stage and only eight riders.”
After a recent preview, artistic director Normand Latourelle, visiting from his home country of Canada, expressed excitement about “Odysseo” being in Orange County.
Latourelle, one of the co-founders of Cirque du Soleil, said it has been amazing to see his “dream show” come to life.
“I always had a dream of bringing on tour a real entity of a real theater that can be compared to any good permanent show in Las Vegas,” he said. “This has become — I didn’t plan it this way — the biggest touring show in the world. That is because we wanted to offer the horses a great amount of comfort and enough space to have fun.
“We also wanted to offer the public the comfort that you can compare to the best theaters in the world.”
Show prices range from $40 to $260. Call (866) 999-8111.
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