Filao

Inspired by Italo Calvino's magical-realist novel "The Baron in the Trees," this "new circus" event is called Filao, a clever contraction of the French word for high wire. Now, after having toured Europe and America since 1997, Filao comes to Lincoln Center Festival 2000, its second-to-last venue. Artistic directors of Les Colporteurs company, Antoine Rigot and Agathe Olivier, along with director Lazlo Hudi, have assembled a company of aerialists and musicians that work as a family to develop innovative shows that are eminently unclassifiable yet utterly delightful. Calvino's novel tells of a young baron who one day decides he's had enough of ordinary life. He climbs up into the trees of his estate and never comes down again.

The Filao cast likewise spend most of their time above the audience in the Damrosch Park tent. In twelve scenes (movements) with acts ranging from trapeze to tightrope to juggling, the performers challenge conventional limitations and propose freedom in place of security. Five aerialists and trapeze artists take full advantage of the tall but narrow playing space full of walkways, ladders and long ropes that resembles a light-hearted version of Piranesi's prisons. In spite of vertiginous feats, the mood is less daredevil than flight of fancy. Tightrope walker David Dimitri defiantly avoids anything ordinary, choosing instead to scamper or somersault above the audience's heads. (A forest of sturdy, Y-shaped tree branches below wire-level under his feet is almost the sole reminder of Calvino's radical baron.) Earlier, Dimitri balances on the edge of an oval table that the others roll slowly on its side across wooden the playing area at ground level. More earthbound is dancer Kathleen Reynolds, but even she gets to whirl and swing in wide arcs from a handy chandelier, her red hair flowing in the breeze.

Lighting is as wonderfully varied as the performances. A three-person band vaults from spot to spot under the circular tent to play instruments including steel drum, flute and xylophone. The saxophonist somehow gets to the upper reaches of the tent before holding forth from a suspended wrought-iron lounge.

Filao is short on the poetically sentimental moments that make another French company, Zingaro of horse fame, memorable. On the other hand, humor is rampant, particularly in a gag routine about falling off a swaying catwalk onto strategically placed, shock-absorbing cushions below. Kudos to Lincoln Center Festival for capturing this enchanting butterfly of a show.