Spring Has Come

The music was by Stravinsky, the choregraphy by Balanchine, the costumes by Norman Bel Geddes. But New Yorkers weren't swooning over a new ballet; they were in Madison Square Garden watching 50 elephants in pink panties cavort at The Circus. They were gaping at bright blue and red tanbark, girl rope climbers who looked like Ziegfeld chorines, wedding-cake beautifications, Peter Arno drawings in the programs, refreshments passed on china platters. If they were old or sentimental enough, they were wondering what had become of the pink lemonade, the gold-toothed lady bareback rider, the gaudy, dirty, bewildering oldtime magic.

But though the Ringling Bros, and Barnum & Bailey show has traded atmosphere for oomph, its exhibits are much the same as ever. There are no longer any tumbling Japs; but 600-lb., 12-year-old Gargantua is still on display in the basement. The sad, crummy-looking clowns still provoke mirth. Massimilliano Truzzi still juggles flaming torches; the Wallendas ride a bicycle tandem on the high wire; the Flying Concellos do their breathless, double-and-triple-somersault flying leaps; the lions & tigers look simultaneously ferocious and bored; the trained seals render My Country, 'Tis of Thee; and the band still blares & blares, making all its half-hundred numbers sound exactly like the one by Stravinsky.

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