The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Last Ringling circus brings the 1st female ringmaster to town
If you’ve been paying attention, you know the greatest show on Earth recently added some girl power to its lineup.
Kristen Michelle Wilson was named ringmaster of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus in December, the first female ringmaster in the entertainment giant’s 146-year history.
But just one week in, Wilson was sadly out. She learned it was only a matter of months before she’d be gone, along with the other Ringling performers. The circus that had entertained many generations was ending.
“I just kind of went into shock,” Wilson told me recently.
At the time of her hiring, Feld Entertainment described her as a dynamic performer with tremendous stage presence and exceptional vocal skills and said she beat out hundreds of candidates in a nationwide open audition process.
When I talked to her by phone last week, I could see why.
If personality had a color, Wilson’s is definitely red. I could hear the energy and excitement in her voice.
There was no indication she’d just lost her dream job, and it didn’t feel like someone putting on a good public relations face.
“If they had told me, ‘We’re going to give you this job and it’s only going to last one day,’ I still would’ve done it,” she said. “It’s the biggest joy of my life.”
Earlier this week, metro Atlantans got to witness Wilson make her mark in the iconic role at Philips Arena, where she will be performing through Feb. 20. She’ll be with the circus Feb. 23-March 5 at Infinite Energy Arena in Duluth.
As a kid, Wilson, 35, said she always found the circus and
the ringmaster, in particular, mesmerizing, “thinking how powerful and commanding he was.”
“I knew even at age 4 that that was the type of person I wanted to be,” she said.
After graduating in 1999 from Tallahassee, Fla.’s Leon High School, where she honed her skills as a singer, dancer and gymnast, Wilson headed to community college, then studied international affairs at Florida State University.
She left Florida State after a few semesters and landed a job as an on-air television host for CBS affiliate WCTV before striking out on her own as a videographer, making commercials and filming county commission meetings.
“I loved doing those things but knew I wanted to be the one on stage,” she said.
At age 29, she moved to Orlando, a city she believed could support her passion for performing. And it did. For the next six years, six days a week, Wilson worked as a show host and lead singer of the band Sonic Gypsies at local dinner clubs.
Then in August, she saw a Facebook post announcing Ringling’s worldwide search for a new ringmaster.
“I had to throw my hat in the ring,” Wilson said. “As a performer, the goal is to have fun and create memories with people. To be able to do that on a grand scale, traveling the country, performing in arenas for 20,000 people at once would be such a dream come true.”
Wilson applied and began work perfecting the circus’s opening song. She also prepared Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You,” and appropriately Christina Aguilera’s “Welcome to the Greatest Show on Earth.”
At her audition in Orlando a few weeks later, Wilson was peppered with questions about herself.
She headed back into the waiting room, where the cast and crew from a show happening next door broke into applause.
They’d heard her singing through the walls.
If Ringling doesn’t want you, Disney wants you, they told her.
“I left the audition that day feeling pretty good,” Wilson said.
Several days later, Ringling called with more questions and invited her back a second time to sing, to meet more of Feld Entertainment’s staff.
After a very long day, Ringling offered Wilson her dream job.
“It is such a thrill and truly the biggest accomplishment of my life so far,” she said. “I am so honored to represent women, to prove that we are capable of anything and show young girls that we can be large and loud and in charge and still be feminine.”
She’d performed just seven days in Orlando when at the end of a full day of shows, Wilson and the rest of the crew were notified of a mandatory meeting.
The greatest show on Earth was ending, they were told.
“All of us were in shock,” she said. “No one had any idea it was coming. We burst into tears all at the same time. It was so sad.”
Unlike Wilson, many in the room that night were members of multigenerational circus families, including a clown who had been born on the Ringling train. Not only were they losing their jobs, they were losing the troupe they’d been performing with for years.
Although saddened, Wilson said she didn’t share the same sense of loss. In the weeks leading up to the show, she had received media exposure. And unlike many of them, she could sing and dance.
“There are a lot more options for me to showcase my talent in other ways,” she said. So what’s next? Wilson said Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Presents Circus Xtreme (which includes her) will continue until May 7, when it ends in Providence, R.I., for good. (The other show, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Presents Out of This World, ends May 21 in upstate New York.) After that, she isn’t sure. “This has been such an incredible life chapter,” Wilson said. “It’s going to be hard to top it.”
Well, maybe not. However short-lived it may be, there is just one more thing, perhaps, for Kristen Michelle Wilson.
“My secret dream is to be on ‘Dancing With the Stars,’” she said.
Hello, ABC?