'Cirque"at Hanover is a dream come true

WORCESTER — When the “Dangle and Swerve” sequence unfolded during the “Cirque Dreams: Illumination” performance Thursday night at the Hanover Theatre for the Performing Arts, it commanded unswerving attention.

Consider: not just rope maneuvers with a man dangling up, down and even swerving sideways, but also a paint can stacker front and center, balancing on impossible-looking cylinders to a catchy musical beat. As these central performances were going on, all sorts of things were going on behind them, most of it wonderfully incomprehensible: headless dancing overalls, women with elegant hats but no seeming heads.

It was audacious, spellbinding stuff, even if one didn’t really know what the spell was supposed to be. “Cirque Dreams: Illumination” at its best was captivating and enthralling. As a result, one almost hates to swerve in the review for a sentence or two and quibble with some aspects of the show. But there was an occasional “elsewhere, however,” which we’ll get to in a second.

With his long-running “Cirque Dreams” series, creator and director Neil Goldberg tries to blend aspects of the acrobatic European “cirque” with a Broadway glitz and showmanship. But he’s respectful and isn’t loud, and his shows have won huge followings. “Cirque Dreams: Jungle Fantasy,” which came here last year, was stunning, and the success of that production probably helped explain in part Thursday’s excellent attendance of 2,200 people — 100 short of a full house. (This was the first of three shows at the Hanover; shows were also scheduled for 2 and 7 p.m. Friday.)

Interestingly, the settings of “Jungle Fantasy’ and “Illumination” couldn’t be more different, even if many of the performers — including contortionists from Mongolia and a chair climber from Ukraine — were the same.

Last year the creatures of the jungle stepped forward to put on a show of acrobatics and aesthetic athletics. The story line wasn’t much, but it was the visuals that mattered (as James Cameron might tell you, that’s a formula that can work).

With “Cirque Dreams: Illumination,” the setting was thematically a little more complicated, and not one that always helped the cause. The central location seemed to be a train station — but one stuck in a bit of a time warp. This was really, intentionally or not, an urban vision of a train station in the 1960s (although the set did induce flashbacks of South Station in Boston during the Big Dig). No hip-hop or wireless at this train station. Goldberg has mostly European artists on his hands, so maybe the train stations in Belarus were really his inspiration. To backtrack — we might not know what the spell was supposed to be, but it’s possible that Goldberg doesn’t really know, either.

The idea of a TV reporter with her cameraman singing introductions to sequences also wasn’t a total success. It seemed a little pointless, and one couldn’t understand or make out half the lyrics.

Still, when the carefully trained sequences ran on time, as in “Dangle and Swerve,” well, you can forgive a lot of things when the trains run on time.

The visual beauty and poetry of the movement was as good as ever. The four women constituting the “Cube Aerialists” from Mongolia flowed together in astonishing unison in a couple of gorgeous set pieces, while sights like dancing fire hydrants in the background were sidelight delights. Argentinean brothers Maximiliano and Roberto Emanuel Laurino put on an amazing display of foot balancing, and perch aerialist Elena Berestova showed grace under pressure. Excellent lighting effects were skillfully deployed throughout, beginning with a clown chasing images.

It turned out we would see a lot of the clown (Martin Lamberti). Indeed, almost too much, as one sequence about making a silent film (with “randomly chosen” audience members who were obviously plants) dangling on and on in length.

But Lamberti could be very funny, and the show once again swerved back to its satisfying course of action.