Paris De Nuit will be at the Assembly Palais De Variete at George Square Gardens for the month of August.

1 Tell us about your Fringe show

Paris de Nuit is really a diverse show where you can see some of the best contemporary dancers, circus artists and finest jazz musicians of Hungary. Paris de Nuit carries, despite it’s french title, something deeply hungarian because it’s linked to the artwork of a famous hungarian photographer, Brassai. Brassai was the first photographer able to capture night images. He lived in the 1920’s-’30s of Paris. This period offered him an extraordinary material. Thanks to this technique of night photographing he captured the hidden side of the parisian nights: prostitutes, peddlers, bars. Those ones that we might have seen on paintings or read about in books, but never experienced so close. These photographies are unique. Recirquel has taken these images and allowed them to be inspiration using the descriptions, stories Brassai written about the same characters he photographed.

During the creation this was essential for us. We worked a lot on showing both faces of these characters, imagining how these people moved, behaved and trying to relate to the audience. If I want to put it simply, Paris de Nuit is a great theatre show. Not only dance and not only circus that is entertaining you, but theatre with which you identify.

2 How does it feel to be playing the Fringe for the first time?

I can say that Recirquel is super excited. We had been preparing strongly for Fringe in the last months with redirecting the show. We made some changes because we want to be sure that Paris de Nuit is ripe for the event, showing the best side of our company. We do appreciate the incredible work of Fringe and we are expecially proud because it’s been a long time that a hungarian company had been so strongly represented at the festival.

Recirquel is proud to be one of Assembly’s main shows.

3 Best live act you’ve seen at a Fringe?

Alan Cumming: I bought a blue car today. I believe I will never forget it.

4 Best thing about the Fringe?

The chance that you see a great production at the moment of it’s „taking off”. I am talking about those shows that later become iconic, world-famous Broadway stars but you got the chance to see them before, here at Fringe in their „babyhood”. The moment before being discovered is the most untouched and honest state of art.

5 Worst thing about the Fringe?

Timing. The moment when you have only ten minutes for getting from one show to the other and you realise that the second show is on the other side of Edinburgh so you have to run across the whole city. At the end of Fringe you become like a GPS of Edinburgh.

6 If you were not a performer what would you be doing?

Well, now I am working as a director of Recirquel Company, however I’d been working as a dancer in the past. I loved and love my profession. But if I really should choose a completely different one, I might be a vet.

7 How do you combat pre-gig nerves?

Recirquel Company has a special method for this: we never start a production without having a common meditation. My artists are practicly not allowed to go on stage until we find even energy among all of us. Circus carries a lot of danger within, therefor being calm is the first before any other duties.

8 Worst on stage experience?

As a director the worst is definitely when any kind of technical difficulty accures during the show. For example when your aerial strap artist is blocked in the air by the motor that doesn’t want to move down anymore. So the artists is just hanging there until everything is fixed. The hardest and longest moments without a doubt…

9 What do you love about Scotland?

I travelled across the whole country from the most northern to the most southern part a couple of years ago. Hard to describe or choose one thing, it’s more a mix: the misty fog, the green hills reminding you like if you would be on a different planet. The silence at sacred places, hotels built from old castle buildings… Once you come to Scotland you understand fairy tales, old mysthical stories.

10 What do you like about Edinburgh?

2003 was the first time I came to Edinburgh performing with a dance company. It felt like the most european city in the UK, reminded me a bit of my hometown, Budapest. This city gives you a nice impact of culture, something you can really taste. Edinburgh is a welcoming city.

11 What’s the most Scottish thing you’ve ever done?

Jenny, one of my classmates from the times I was a dance student at LIPA, tought me how to talk with a scottish accent.

12 Favourite Scottish food/drink?

Shortcake when I have my tea.

13 Sum up your show in three words

Live. Love. Die.

Paris De Nuit will be at the Assembly Palais De Variete at George Square Gardens for the month of August for tickets go to www.edfringe.com