Q&A with the Cast of Merry Mayhem!

Black background with an image of a performer in a red dress standing on the shoulders of a performer in a green dress with text that says "Meet the Cast of Circus Oz Merry Mayehm"

Buckle up for a uniquely Aussie celebration of subversive circus fun as Circus Oz explodes onto the New Victory stage! Merry Mayhem asks all the important questions: Can a blindfolded archer hit her target? Can a daredevil granny survive the Dive of Death? Now, we’re asking the ensemble of Circus Oz some of our own questions about what it’s like to be a top circus performer from Down Under.

Describe a day in the life of a circus performer.

Sharon Gruenert (Acrobat): Days look very different depending on whether it’s training, teaching, a rehearsal day or a show day. But there’s always a cup of tea, physical training and quite a few flips!

Carl Polke (Musician & Composer): Wake up, shower, coffee, do some practice, enjoy life, play a circus show, enjoy life till bedtime.

Two people in colorful dresses stand on top of a third person who has two other people hanging off the ground by clinging on to her.

What act in the show tickles your funny bone?

Jarred Dewey (Trapeze): Olivia’s unique juggling act always gives me a kick!

Spenser Inwood (Acrobat & Aerialist): I think I would have to say the Knockabout. There is so much going on, I think you could watch it three times in a row and still not see it all.

Angelique Ross (Acrobat & Aerialist): Every single part of Special Roberta—our 75-year-old pensioner performing a death-defying stunt.

Leo Pentland (Aerialist): Flying trapeze! With our dramatic capes and faux-serious professional attitudes, acting silly makes for some hilarious moments.

Performers watch to the right and left while a trapeze artist is in the middle of a flip off of a trapeze swing towards a performer bending backwards off of a bar to catch the trapeze artist.

What’s something about Australia we might not know?

Jarred Dewey (Trapeze): Australia is home to the world’s oldest continuous living culture, which is the culture of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Sharon Gruenert (Acrobat): Voting is compulsory.

Chris Lewis (Musician): Australia is home to at least 250 Indigenous languages.

A performer in a long green dress speaks into a microphone while other performers sit in chairs, smiling. — Every performance of *Merry Mayhem* includes a land acknowledgement at the beginning of the show.

What’s your favorite holiday tradition?

Leo Pentland (Aerialist): Christmas lights! I set up a festive display of illuminated Christmas dogs all over my roof each year.

Olivia Porter (Juggling, Clown, Acrobat): I’m a sucker for Christmas bonbons (crackers)! Perhaps it’s my competitive spirit, but I do love to make everyone wear the stupid crepe paper crown and read the bad jokes, then wrestle the plastic toy from my two-year-old niece before she chokes on it.

Spenser Inwood (Acrobat & Aerialist): My partner and I started a tradition we call “the long table dinner” on a weekend near (but not on) Christmas. We set up big long tables somewhere on our property and invite friends, family and neighbors to come and spend the day with us. We eat and laugh, dance and play games.

Several performers are surprised as they slide off a table lifted but another performer.

It’s the New Victory Theater’s 30th birthday! How do you like to celebrate your birthday?

Debra Batton (Trapeze): Quietly or a big party—either extreme depending on the number.

Angelique Ross (Acrobat & Aerialist): A cycle along Merri Creek, coffee, watch the birds, more coffee, dig up my front lawn, cuppa coffee, plant vegetable seedlings, light a fire, kiss my girlfriend.

Olivia Porter (Juggling, Clown, Acrobat): I like to be surprised. I’m still waiting for the day someone throws me a surprise birthday party.

A performer dressed as a red kangaroo with red ears, big red shoes and red boxing gloves chases after a frightened performer in a purple dress.