BESTSELLERS
performance of Cirque du Soleil. The toddlers were completely enthralled. They went to every circus under the sun after that: the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, Zoppé, Circus Vargas and UniverSoul Circus. They enrolled in the local circus school Kinetic Theory, taught themselves how to unicycle and eventually learned about Le Petit Cirque through a friend.
“They had no form. They didn’t know anything about pointed toes or nice, straight knees” when they walked through the doors, Gaulthier recalled. “It was a mess.” But they worked hard and got better. “Now they’re at the top of their game ... they’re barely human.”
Jai Carter is also a wonder. At age 8, he’s the youngest, the only boy and among the few performers of color in the company. Gaulthier spotted his talent during a summer camp session and encouraged the Los Angeles youngster to stay on. He’s a newbie and doesn’t have any big acts yet, Gaulthier said, but “he’s absolutely incredible.”
Though the company offers circus scholarships through Inglewood’s Faithful Central Bible Church, it currently doesn’t have any students from the city.
After attending Zoom classes at the height of the pandemic’s first wave, Le Petit Cirque performers are back to training in the studio three times a week — five hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays, seven on Saturdays. Performing for a camera has been challenging. “You can’t really connect with an audience; you have to connect with the person filming,” Brooklyn said. On the plus side, messing up during a recorded performance means you can redo it.
The training is rigorous, exhausting and sometimes painful: The Bakers have pulled muscles, twisted ankles, burned skin, fallen on their wrists, drawn blood on their ankles from unicycling. Bruises and blisters are as common. Spinal fractures are not unusual, especially among contortionists. of who they are and they’re so OK with who they are.”
The hard work has paid off. Brinkley and Brooklyn were recently accepted as members of UNESCO’s International Dance Council; the organization’s affiliates include notable companies, individuals and federations.
Wonderful as these experiences can be, performing among adults runs the risk of making troupe members targets of predatory behavior. That’s where the wigs, full body costumes and heavy makeup come in. “Their identities are camouflaged” when they’re touring, said Gaulthier. Their jackets and bags don’t bear their names when they travel, and an adult chaperone is assigned to every three children.
Despite the challenges Le Petit Cirque is facing, things should turn around as long as the pandemic abates this year. Among other things, the company is planning tours in Canada and New Zealand, along with a trip to Uganda to film a documentary with a circus orphanage. There’s also a series with MGM Television in development. The company has also partnered with Brown, the Cirque du Soleil choreographer, to launch Merveille, a circus troupe in Inglewood and Las Vegas for young adults.
Gaulthier certainly isn’t going to give up her Inglewood studio without a fight. “I believe that Le Petit Cirque is really blessed.... This company is full of kindness and goodness. Anything that’s good and driven by God, or driven by light, will always be OK. So I’m just going to keep going and keep fighting.”
Fiction
1. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett (Riverhead: $27) Identical twin sisters run away from their small Black community in the South and live very different lives.
2. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig (Viking: $26) A reader in an infinite library is torn between the life she is leading and the life she could be leading.
3. Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline (Ballantine: $29) A sequel to “Ready Player One.”
4. Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey: $27) A woman is summoned to a mysterious home in rural Mexico.
5. Anxious People by Fredrik Backman (Atria: $28) After a botched bank robbery, the perpetrator takes eight hostages.
6. Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell (Knopf: $27) A tale of love and grief in 16th century Stratford-Upon-Avon.
7. Outlawed by Anna North (Bloomsbury: $26) In the Old West a married, childless woman joins a gang of desperados.
8. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab (Tor: $27) In 1714 France, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever.
9. The Law of Innocence by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown: $29) Mickey Haller is framed for murder.
10. The Prophets by Robert Jones, Jr. (Putnam: $27) A forbidden relationship between two enslaved men is torn apart when a fellow slave begins preaching the master's gospel.
Nonfiction
1. A Promised Land by Barack Obama (Crown: $45) The first Black president of the U.S. offers an account of the issues faced early in his presidency.
2. The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy (HarperOne: $23) A modern fable plumbs life’s universal lessons.
3. Untamed by Glennon Doyle (Dial: $28) The peace that comes when we stop striving to meet the world’s expectations.
4. Caste by Isabel Wilkerson (Random House: $32) A hidden caste system influences American lives.
5. Keep Sharp by Sanjay Gupta, M.D. (Simon & Schuster: $28) The TV doctor debunks myths about the aging brain and offers tips.
6. Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey (Crown: $30) A memoir from the actor.
7. The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson (Crown: $32) A portrait of Winston Churchill.
8. Modern Comfort Food by Ina Garten (Clarkson Potter: $35) 85 new recipes.
9. Wintering by Katherine May (Riverhead: $24) A perspective on the cold dark season.
10. Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake (Random House: $28) The biologist reveals the complex role fungi play in the environment. 32 10 26 14 18 10 34 44 23 12 40 14
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TUESDAY
Glenn Close and “Hairspray” filmmaker John Waters research their family histories on the return of “Finding Your Roots With Henry Louis Gates, Jr.”