Cirque du Soleil's ECHO explores symbiotic relationship between humans and animals

Aerialist Ethan Lottman melds his sporty and creative sides in the circus company’s new extravaganza

By Gail Johnson

ECHO. Photo by Jean-François Savaria

Cirque du Soleil presents ECHO from October 9 to January 5 at Concord Pacific Place

IT’S A WORK day for Ethan Lottman when Stir catches up behind the scenes with the Cirque du Soleil aerialist just two days before the famed company’s new show, ECHO, opens in Vancouver. He’s wearing a harness and, along with more than a dozen other artists at a dress rehearsal, dangles suspended from the rafters, moving around a giant cube at centre-stage. From the air, he’s able to dance on the cube’s walls in a sequence called symbiosis that could be described as vertical ballet. For the Omaha, Nebraska native who spent two decades as a competitive gymnast, it’s a dream job.

“I could never sit in an office—I don’t think I have that capability,” says Lottman, who has a degree in fine arts, majoring in drawing and painting, from University of Nebraska-Lincoln. “Every day is different: I’m on my feet, running around, solving problems. I get to be creative. I get to let my artistic side shine, and that’s really important to me. But I also get to blend that with my sports background, so I feel it’s the perfect combination of what I wanted to do in my life. I get to keep the sport aspect and take my art career and push them together to do one thing. It’s pretty much all I could ask for.”

Lottman was part of the Cirque show TORUK–The First Flight and travelled the globe with the Montreal-based company, performing in Europe, Russia, Australia, and Asia. He appears in several numbers in ECHO, as a pole aerialist in one of them and a horse in another. He also acts as an artist coach.

“This show has come with a lot of new challenges for me and new responsibilities,” says Lottman, who was discovered by Cirque recruiters when he was competing at a national gymnastics event. “Before, with my first contract, I was a generalist so you don’t have a speciality, but that got me into the performance world and I got to experience what it’s like to do eight or nine shows every week over and over again. Then the pandemic shut us down. I wanted to learn a specialty so I became an aerialist and I began teaching myself that stuff. They contacted me for a speciality aerial pole position, and now I get to do it with some of the best aerial pole artists in the world.”

ECHO explores connection, intention, and the reciprocity between humans and the animal kingdom. Viewers can expect all of Cirque du Soleil’s signature components, including a contortionist bending his limbs in ways that defy logic, female artists spinning from the ceiling attached only by their ponytails, flying acrobats doing multiple pirouettes in the air, and jugglers performing dazzling feats.

“The show follows Future, our protagonist, who, along with her dog—her best friend—stumbles upon this mysterious cube, and in interacting with it opens up this world of animals, colour, and whimsy,” says Justine Leblanc, Cirque du Soleil’s senior tour publicist for ECHO. “It’s a metaphor to explore the symbiotic relationship between animals, humans, and the world they share.”

ECHO has a seven-person live band as well as seven vocalists, a first for Cirque du Soleil, which in the past has featured just one or two singers. Among the cast of 52 and crew, there are 19 different nationalities represented. The costumes feature bright, bold monochromatic shades minus the sequins, glitter, and feathers that people might assume would be part of the show.

“We have a pared-down aesthetic for ECHO,” Leblanc says. “It’s part of our work to modernize the circus.

“It is so exciting,” she adds. “It’s going to be an incredible experience.” 

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