TONIGHT
E-mail a friendFranco Dragone
airdate October 4, 2005
Skilled at merging theater and circus, Franco Dragone is the mastermind behind the cutting-edge Cirque du Soleil productions, including Mystère and Le Ràve. He also created "A New Day" for Céline Dion at Caesars Palace. As a child, the Italian-born director moved with his parents to Belgium. He studied acting and eventually began working with street performers and the circus arts. An assignment choreographing a performance of Canada's National Circus School led to his first Cirque commission.
Franco Dragone
Tavis: You may not know Franco Dragone by name, but if you've ever been to Las Vegas, you surely know his work. He is one of the creative forces behind the Cirque Du Soleil empire and one of the biggest shows in Vegas history. Shows like 'Mystere,' 'O,' and Celine Dion's 'A New Day.' He now heads up his own company whose latest blockbuster is called 'Le Reve,' which is based at the new Steve Wynn Resort and Casino. That would be the one called 'Wynn.' The show runs, when? Saturdays through Wednesdays. Franco Dragone, nice to meet you.
Franco Dragone: Nice to meet you.
Tavis: Glad to have you here. I knew your work; I've seen three or four pieces that you have produced. But I knew that your work was spectacular, one, when I saw it the first time. But I really knew it was spectacular when I took my dad. My dad's probably watching. I probably shouldn't tell this story. My dad's 37 years in the Air Force, military guy, macho guy. I took him to see 'O,' and he was just floored.
And I looked over at my dad. I didn't want to turn to him. I just kept looking at him, kept looking at him. You had him. This piece was so magnificent. So your work is astounding, first of all. I haven't had a chance to go to Mr. Wynn's new hotel, Wynn, yet. But I hear that this theater you created, you designed, so it's different than the other theaters that your work shows in, in Vegas. Tell me about the theater, first of all, that we just saw on the screen a moment ago.
Dragone: Actually, I would like that you bring back your father to see 'Le Reve.'
Tavis: I'll bring my dad, yeah; I'll bring my dad back. Yeah, I'll do that.
Dragone: He will cry again, I hope so. Because, yeah, I really wanted to change the relation with the show. My previous show, where always you have a stage, and the audience was watching the show from afar. So here I wanted to bring the audience into the show.
Tavis: Make it more intimate.
Dragone: Exactly. So I designed a theater in the round. Also, because the round is a perfect geometric shape, I would say. And also, because people use together on a circle. Also, I wanted really to have only 14 seats and we are 40 feet from the action. So the audience is really into the show. Also, I did not want to create a theater. I wanted to create more a kind of sacred place where people can come and, for 90 minutes, just be far from the reality of their life outside.
Tavis: Is there another, maybe I'm missing something. Is there, I don't think there is. I could be wrong. Like I know Vegas in and out like this. Like I'm Oscar Goodman or something, the mayor of Las Vegas. This is the only theater that I'm aware of that's in the round in Vegas?
Dragone: Yeah, it's the first...
Tavis: The first one.
Dragone: ...in the round. And I think it will be not the last one because, you know...
Tavis: You done started something again. (laughs)
Dragone: In Vegas (unintelligible). But, yeah, it's the first one in the round. Very difficult to work, actually, in the round, but for the audience, it's fantastic, because they see each other, so there is a dynamic that doesn't exist when you are watching a serious theater.
Tavis: Right. And 40 feet away is as far as you get.
Dragone: Yeah, it's really for 2,000 people capacity, which is not bad. We are only 40 feet away from the center.
Tavis: So in the center, you got a whole lot of water, obviously. How much water in the middle of this thing?
Dragone: Ooh. I know that it takes 12 hours to fill the pool.
Tavis: It takes 12 hours to fill the pool.
Dragone: Also, it's huge because you know, the water is not only what you see, but it's also in the backstage, because the artists, the performers, they come from backstage under the water. So the show, I used to say, the show is in front of your eyes, but also under the water, in the backstage, and everywhere.
Tavis: Every one of these shows that you've created obviously has water as a centerpiece of it, dancers, and wonderful athletes, which I want to get to in a second, where you find these people who do this stuff. But tell me, 'Le Reve' means "The Dream,' so tell me what this production is really about.
Dragone: This production, I mean, I really wanted to explore the fields of dream. So, I mean, I create a different scene, like a dream. A dream, you know, sometime it's, you laugh, sometime you are moved, sometime you are impressed. And so it's a series of vignettes, I would say, but with a story line. So the - it's the story of somebody, an average guy, I call him Joe, average Joe. So, he's, going into his bed, and from that moment, he fall in dreams. And mostly this character is only a premise or, a story line to help the audience to follow and to accept the convention of the dream.
But mostly what I wanted to create a kind of introspection. I wanted that the audience would see in the tableau that I was creating, I mean, their own dream, maybe. And so I use characters that look like several things that exist in different culture. So, and, this is I would say - the artistic description, but I use, as you - I wanted to use here, I use dance, vocal, real lyrics, not anymore gibberish, like I used before.
So the relation with the performance is totally different. I mean, we have no trapeze. We have different things. We have a table, chairs. We have a tree. So we don't have anymore the traditional apparatus that we, I used before.
Tavis: You mentioned a moment ago, and I'm glad you went there 'cause I wanted to ask you about this. You mentioned that what makes this particular show 'Le Reve' at Wynn different is that you're using lyrics this time, and by your own, I'm glad you used the word, I didn't, not the gibberish, to quote you, that you've used in your other plays. That gibberish works, at $100 a ticket, the gibberish is getting old. But anyway, I ain't mad at you. But you're using lyrics this time, not the gibberish that you used before, which raises a fascinating thing for me.
Back to my father, now. My father, and again I'm gonna get in trouble for this, my father, again, military guy 37 years, my father doesn't have a college degree. He's the greatest, you know, greatest man I've ever known, the most disciplined, hardest working father. I love him dearly. Love you, Daddy. But my dad isn't that, he's not cultured in that way. And I wondered whether or not he was going to get 'O,' but he got every bit of it.
He got every piece of it, even with the gibberish that you're saying you don't have now in 'Le Reve.' So, what is it about the story line, what is it about the work that you think allows folk who come to Vegas from all over America, just ordinary, everyday people, but yet they get this stuff, even though they don't understand what's being said, necessarily.
Dragone: Yeah. I really believe that something exist, I mean, the show that I do, I do for everybody. Some people that want to find certain references in the show, they can find. But I do the show also for my father. In a way, I'm saying this is not, I'm not jumping on the opportunity that you talk about your father. I'm really, you know, when I was younger, I found theater, I went to the theater, and I wondered why my father was not going to the theater.
And so I try to find the kind of languages that could reach everybody, because I firmly believe that there is universal languages where we use the same ingredients, same vocabulary to reach people. They don't, and they don't need to have references to understand, to be moved by what, it's not gibberish or not gibberish. I mean, sometime people are too literal. I think you have to leave the space to the viewer. And I'm sure that the audience has a kind of - intelligence that we have to respect, and I really trust that the kind of languages that I use, it's for everybody.
Tavis: Speaking of everybody, where do you find these 'everybodys'? Where do you these people to perform? I mean, - I'm a simple guy from Indiana. I'm impressed they don't bust their behind slipping on the water, from one - scene to the next. Nobody slips down. Nobody falls down. But the acts, I mean, what they're doing, their performance, is quite amazing. Where do you find the people who actually perform these stunts?
Dragone: Yeah. They - don't perform these. We teach them. I mean, they are from 13 nationality, you know. In 'Le Reve,' we have 13 nationality.
Tavis: That's why you got all that gibberish. You got too many people talking different languages. Anyway...
Dragone: (laughs) And so we cast them everywhere, in Nagoya, in West, in East Europe, in America, everywhere. But we, for 'Le Reve,' we were six month in Belgium in a very little city where they can do nothing else than work, and stay together. And so we teach them dancing. We teach them acting. But, no, they are, 99% of them are gymnast that's coming from the gymnast world, competition. Some of them are, were at the Olympics, so, it takes time to teach them to go out of their traditional tricks. But, when you take time and when you trust them, it happens.
Tavis: I was on a plane the other day, and the 'New York Times' on Sunday did a big piece about stars who were choosing to do their work in Vegas these days. The article that I read focused on Celine Dion and Barry Manilow. So how is - Celine's show obviously is doing very well, and you're behind that as well.
Dragone: Yeah. You know, when Celine asked me to do this show, I remember...
Tavis: She's at Caesars, right?
Dragone: Yes. So we really built a designer theater for her. And some people were skeptical in Las Vegas. They did not believe that a theater with 4,000 seats could be filled every night with a headliner like Celine. And now it's working. I've been, of course, myself, I was nervous, too. But now it's working, and other headliner want to come there. So the work with Celine was, nice. Really, it took a long time because it take time to do this kind of show, but it works.
Tavis: Yeah. Well, if you've got any talent and you get a chance to hold it down and to do your thing in Vegas, call Franco and ask him to (laughs) design a show for you and build you a theater, and I promise you, if he's behind it, it will become a hit. 'Le Reve,' of course, is at Wynn. That's the new hotel from Steve Wynn in Las Vegas. An honor to have you on the program.
Dragone: Thank you.
Tavis: That's our show for tonight. You can catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. See you back here next time on PBS. Until then, thanks for watching, good night from Los Angeles. And as always, keep the faith.
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