From the first day of the Lunar New Year to the sixth day of the Lunar New Year, a simple circus stage rose stubbornly and lonely through the downtown area of Huoshuyinhua and on the edge of the ancient city scenic spot with congested passenger flow. In recent years, the annual taste of the most lively towns in the past is getting worse every year. Colorful circus tents on the gravel ground are particularly eye-catching.
Circus is a very old entertainment. When you walk into the tent, countless plastic chairs and snack bags all over the floor make you feel a strong sense of the times. With the increasing penetration of online entertainment and the attack of offline consumption, this once crowded circus has long been covered by dust in the corner.
However, there are still activists wandering in the crowds of third-and fourth-tier cities with heavy burdens. Li Shuai (a pseudonym) is one of them. Magical magic, clever bears, funny clowns and energetic lions ... all these interesting performances are his daily work and even gradually integrated into his life.
In 2020, Cirque du Soleil, a 36-year-old Canadian national treasure circus, declared bankruptcy, which cast a heavy shadow on the industry. During the seven-day annual leave, Li Shuai took his team to visit various areas of Linyi, a populous city in Shandong Province. When asked about this trip, why? Li Shuai smiled and remained silent.
The most common circus may be simple. Sometimes a monkey used to put a cracked enamel bowl when beating gongs and drums, but now it has been upgraded to a QR code, which is a "circus" walking in the streets. In the glorious period of the circus, adults and children both like the sensory stimulation obtained in fantasy performances. Nowadays, more and more performers are becoming speechless while watching the stage.
Once in casino royale, Monaco, the founder of Cirque du Soleil, Larry Bate, was praised as a "perfect performer" by many media. However, after a long 36 years, Cirque du Soleil suffered a global performance interruption, more than 95% employees were fired and financial collapse ... Larry Bate's perfectionism was finally shattered.
The giants didn't perform well. 2020 is the turning point of all offline entertainment crises. On June 5438+ 10, Cirque du Soleil stopped performing in China, and Lariberte also sold his last 10% stake in the company. In March this year, the company announced that it would suspend 44 tour performances around the world, including fixed performances at the Las Vegas Theatre.
According to Reuters, Cirque du Soleil is facing the embarrassment of cash shortage and debt of about $900 million. In March 2020, Cirque du Soleil had only 259 employees. From a certain point of view, Cirque du Soleil is a microcosm of the rise and fall of the global circus performance industry, and in this context, those folk "grassroots teams" without star aura are obviously more difficult to survive.
Larry Bette was Li Shuai's childhood idol. Since he was sent to Wuqiao Acrobatic Art School by his parents at the age of 6, the slogan "Be a perfect performer" has been posted on the wall of the training room by teachers. Large performing groups like Cirque du Soleil are overwhelmed. Will the performance of Meituan be good in 2020? When faced with such a question, Li Shuai's answer was very calm: Even without the epidemic, grassroots actors like us would be finished.
Tickets for "Overseas Circus" in Li Shuai are generally 65,438 RMB for adults and 65,438 RMB for children. For example, at the peak of the year, tickets for performances can be sold for more than 65,438+00,000 yuan per night, but it is common to earn one or two thousand yuan per night when nobody cares. "Now everyone is holding a mobile phone. Do you want to see anything? Who will bring the children to see us get married? "
Circus performances in China used to be very popular. According to a statistic of Chimelong Circus, which was once comparable to Cirque du Soleil abroad, Chimelong International Circus performed 400 performances a year, at least once a day. In the off-season, the average audience is 2000, and in the peak season, there are nearly 10,000 people every day. According to each ticket 120 yuan, with an average of 3,000 people per day, the annual income exceeds 1 billion yuan.
Li Shuai is from Suzhou, Anhui. This small city with an area of less than 1000 square kilometers is called "the hometown of circus". In Li Shuai's own words, his circus skills are ancestral. In its heyday, the circus in Li Shuai earned 2 million yuan, but after deducting venue fees, animal feeding fees, actors' salaries and various expenses, it can leave hundreds of thousands each year.
In Li Shuai's eyes, although the industry is declining, the annual income of hundreds of thousands is more real than work. In his circus, there are only three or four regular people, leaving two lions, several monkeys and a bear. The difficulty in finding actors is Li Shuai's biggest headache. This circus doesn't have much artistic style, and it doesn't have high-end dancing skills. It can attract audiences only by the word "technology".
Because he is a boy, Li Shuai can do 20 somersaults, handstands, trapeze and tightrope walking in a folding chair, but the skills of extras in the group are really worrying. At a party in Linyi on the sixth day of Lunar New Year's Eve, the actor with the water bowl made three mistakes. For Li Shuai, the most embarrassing thing is not that the audience is booed, but that the crowded audience is always indifferent.
(Li Shuai team performs at high altitude, source author)
"Few children love to learn this now, and they can't suffer." In order to fully mobilize the enthusiasm of the audience, most high-altitude programs of folk circuses are unsafe, which is a drainage stunt, and Li Shuai even repeatedly emphasized this point in the radio. This leads to the problem that accidents can never be avoided.
For example, in April 20 18, Cirque du Soleil actor Jana Nord died while performing in Florida, USA. Li Shuai said with a wry smile that they don't even want insurance companies to participate in this business.
In Tik Tok, performances like circus are very popular among young people.
During the Spring Festival, the cumulative broadcast volume of short circus videos from all over the country reached nearly 900 million. With the specific performances such as Diabolo in Circus being listed in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage, young people are increasingly interested in cheering street performers. According to the data report of Tik Tok in 20 19, in 20 19, 93% of the national intangible cultural heritage projects had related videos in Tik Tok, with more than 3.3 billion likes.
Have you ever considered entering a short video or performing in a live group? Li Shuai seriously considered the problem. These thrilling performances can really make waves in short videos, especially acrobatics and magic. In Li Shuai's view, shaking voice coil powder is very simple. Recently, Lin Changgui, a magician in Tiankan, used his "one-look fake" magic to quickly suck nearly 500 thousand powder.
Another movie became popular in Tik Tok because it showed magic. A video revealing the truth has been played 654.38+600,000 times in Tik Tok, winning 420,000 fans in just seven months. However, Li Shuai looked down on this kind of performance. "Revealing the secrets of magic will deprive it of its amazing ability. What is the difference between this kind of thing and grabbing the rice bowl of the peers? "
Li Shuai was born in a circus family and likes reading martial arts novels. He has always had a chivalrous dream in his bones, that is, to fight swords in the Jianghu. In Suzhou, Anhui Province, there are countless circus "successors" like Li Shuai. It is said that more than 80% circus performances in China are from Suzhou. The data shows that at the peak, there were more than 300 circuses in Yongqiao District, Suzhou, with more than 20,000 employees and an annual income of more than 400 million.
"Circus is a cultural heritage that needs us to inherit and carry forward. Those people in Tik Tok are grandstanding, just performing honestly and don't want to provoke those moths. " In the dim performance shed, Li Shuai looked at a sharp knife in the snow with a mobile phone. In fact, if you carefully observe the major social platforms, few circuses open accounts on social platforms for marketing, except the accounts uploaded by the audience themselves or circled by acrobats.
As for the reason, it may not be as justified as Li Shuai's. First of all, most circuses can't avoid animal performances. In this era of pet economy in full swing, young people's attitude towards animal appearance has already changed from curiosity to pity and cherish. Last June+10, Zheng Zheng's new drama was boycotted by netizens on a large scale for allegedly harming animals.
In short, the performance of the traditional animal circus on the Internet may not be applause, but a curse.
At present, the whole world is protecting the life and dignity of animals. According to statistics, 389 cities in 36 countries around the world prohibit or restrict animal performances. For example, Cirque du Soleil has survived for more than 30 years, and one of the reasons that cannot be ignored is that it never uses animals to perform.
But it seems impossible to ban animal performances in grass-roots circuses. In recent years, China has become more and more strict with animal performances, which is a fatal blow to the survival of circuses. According to reports, the number of circuses in Yongqiao, Suzhou once dropped sharply from more than 300 in the peak period to more than 100.
(Li Shuai team lion performance, source author)
Li Shuai has repeatedly stressed that animals are all formal channels. It is said that many circus performances in Suzhou are not only technically ancestral, but even animals are "ancestral". Li Shuai has a friend who keeps more than ten tigers at home. These tigers are descendants of the tigers used by his great-grandfather and grandfather in the circus performance.
But do these circus animals have "certificates" In fact, it is hard to say that many judgments related to key words such as "Suzhou Circus Tiger" can be found in online judgment documents in China. 202 1 1 The Yongqiao District Court of Suzhou City ruled a case of illegal acquisition of precious and endangered wild animals.
In the face of netizens' doubts about animal performances, Li Shuai said he didn't understand. "These children in our group have to eat beef chicken racks every day and feed vitamins and calcium tablets. Some little monkeys have to drink imported milk powder, just like you have a pet. How can they be abused? "
But when the tiger jumped into the ring of fire and the bear climbed onto the gymnastics platform, no one wanted to accept this statement. Rather than describing animals, these circus performers are in their own situations.
Why is the town suddenly deserted at the end of the year?
Li Shuai's team spent seven days in Yizhou Ancient City, Linyi, which is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Linyi. During the Spring Festival, it will take half an hour to stop. The north and south areas of the ancient city have not been fully planned, and the circus venue is chosen at the unfinished end. The ground is rugged, and several excavators are parked not far from next door.
"It's very cheap here." Li Shuai explained that 7: 00 p.m. to 9: 00 p.m. is the busiest time in a circus day. Outside the tent painted with clowns, there are scraps of paper for buying tickets everywhere, and there are several plastic chairs inside, which makes the central barbed wire stage look a bit bleak.
Li Shuai obviously prefers to recall the past rather than talk about the present.
According to him, the circus was in its golden age in the 1990s. At that time, the lack of cultural life made them crowded wherever they went. "The team can be tens of meters long!" Li Shuai described a performance in the park with his parents when he was a child. It is no exaggeration to say, "There can be 10 performances in a row every day, and every performance is packed. There is no audience standing, and actors are afraid of squeezing the net."
(Li Shuai team lion performance, source author)
Although we can't imagine the sea of people at that time, in that era when the monthly salary was average, when the business of Li Shuai family was booming, the daily income could break thousands. Judging from the relevant information, these are also traceable. 1993, a circus once contributed more than1300,000 annual income to a zoo in Guangzhou.
"The taste of the year is weak, and our life is even more difficult. Since the previous year, we have been counting on this year's money. " When I came to Linyi this year, Li Shuai's biggest regret was that the market almost disappeared. There is no denying that entertainment activities in small towns are gradually decreasing. Take the market in Li Shuai as an example, it has developed from a multi-functional place integrating trade, culture and entertainment into a single-functional trading place.
Nowadays, traditional entertainment activities such as dragon and lion dancing and circus have long been replaced by short videos and grabbing red envelopes. It is an irreversible trend that entertainment consumption places in small towns shift from offline to online. The data shows that by 20021year, Taobao's e-commerce and logistics traffic will increasingly penetrate into rural areas, and 309 million rural netizens and 55.9% Internet penetration rate will make this once lively town suddenly become deserted.
For young people, going out to watch acrobatics in the cold wind is better than lying in bed and playing with their mobile phones. In addition, the annual consumption of the whole country is declining. According to the data of the Ministry of Commerce, as early as the seventh day of the Spring Festival in 20 19, the national retail and catering enterprises achieved sales of about 1005 billion yuan, an increase of 8.5% over last year's Spring Festival Golden Week, the lowest growth rate in recent years.
Moreover, in recent years, the number of people returning home for the New Year has gradually decreased. According to a questionnaire survey, from 2020, 86.95% of people said
More inclined to stay at work for the New Year, on the one hand, the epidemic is capricious, on the other hand, subjective factors such as urging marriage and blind date make young people start to resist the New Year. On the Weibo, there are nearly 8,000 discussions about how happy a person can be during the New Year.
Maybe these people are not the target group of Li Shuai, but they are few and have a weak taste. Looking around the whole ancient city of Yizhou, after the seventh day, it is like an empty city, leaving a string of lanterns and dust. I am afraid that his dream of wandering in the rivers and lakes is almost impossible to come true.