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ARIZONA DAILY STAR
"FLIRTING WITH FIRE"
BY SARAH MAUET
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NOVEMBER 5, 2005
Fire dancers and flame eaters are not just the subjects of myths and legends - they're alive and well in Tucson's pyrotechnic performance troupe Flam Chen.
At a recent show, performers twirled fiery chains, sparred with flaming staffs, danced with fire fans, spun on stilts, created a ring of fire and set the stage ablaze.
"I was mesmerized," Mark Donohue, 34, said after watching his first Flam Chen performance. His wife, 24-year-old Lizz Donohue, is a big fan of the group.
"There's an element of danger that is just so hot," she said.
Artistic director Nadia Hagen, 42, started Flam Chen a decade ago after a friend who visited Bali taught her to spin poi - a chain with flames on each end. Hagen was instantly hooked on fire spinning, which was more playful than her previous performance art projects.
"It was something I was doing because I was tired of being serious," she said. "This was really lighthearted and circus-y. A lot of what I'd done was verbal, and I was relieved to not have to think of things to say. To be able to communicate in a way that wasn't about words was actually freeing."
While fire spinning does sound circuslike, the troupe's performances touch on deeper themes. The show at Nimbus Brewing Company last month was called "Monkey King," and the costumes, characters and story were inspired by East Asian folklore.
"We try to write shows without thinking about the fire so much," said performer and technical director Paul Weir, 39. "It's almost never, 'This is a show about fire spinning.' "
The most somber show the troupe does all year is for the finale of the All Souls' Procession - Tucson's annual community-wide grieving ritual.
"We're not doing any fire spinning in this year's show to get that point across," Weir said. "We want the community to have the best, most powerful grieving experience it can."
This year, people are invited to place photos and notes of loved ones into an 8-foot papier-mâché urn that will be pushed and pulled through the streets. At the conclusion, the urn will be hoisted above the crowd and burned - it will be the only fire during the grieving ritual's finale.
"We write a special show for the All Souls' Procession," Hagen said. "It's performed once and never again. It's the resolution of the energy of the procession."
For the first couple of years, Hagen was spinning fire with only one other person, but Flam Chen quickly grew because of her desire to create a finale for the All Souls' Procession.
"When you have more people, you can have more theatrics," Hagen said. "We take on a lot of extra people at the end of the procession. Working in that context allows us to know if we want to work with someone."
The troupe now consists of 10 core performers and a couple of crew members between the ages of 15 and 42, but it takes on additional people for large and touring performances.
Performer Randall Swindell, 18, has been spinning with Flam Chen for a year. He has performed in every Flam Chen show since he first learned to walk on stilts for last year's All Souls' Procession.
"Since I started doing it, it has expanded my awareness," he said. "I've learned more in the past year than I have in the previous 17 years."
Performer Kelsey Hadfield, 26, has been in Flam Chen for three years. She compared the troupe's performances to an opera without singing.
"It's an amazing creative outlet," she said. "It's a show. We all take on characters."
While fire spinning falls under the "don't try this at home" category, it is fairly safe, Hadfield said. She learns all the moves with unlit tools and practices over and over before trying anything lit.
"I practice until I'm comfortable with something," she said. "If you're smart about it and take precautions, it's really safe."
While pyrotechnic performance is still fairly new in America, it's catching on like wildfire. Flam Chen has performed around the country and in Canada, including at a festival in Montreal where it performed before a crowd of 5,000 to 10,000 each night for 12 nights in a row.
"People want to see things that are more visceral," Weir said. "They want to smell the smoke and feel the heat coming off the stage."
For a truly entertainment-based fire-spinning show, check out the group's performance Nov. 19 after El Tour de Tucson, the annual bicycle race. The troupe is planning to have 75 to 80 people on stage, including 15 BMX bike riders, a dozen roller derby skaters and a crane to hoist performers into the air.
The group's shows and fire-spinning techniques have become more and more elaborate over time, Hagen said.
"There's a learning curve," she said. "Once someone tells you that you can do that, it's possible. It becomes easy. Twenty years from now, who knows what people will be doing."
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"OUR TREASURES"
BY ERIN WHITE
The parade, held in honor of Día de los Muertos/Day of the Dead is one the biggest bashes Downtown Tucson sees all year. Thousands of people line up along, and in, the streets, clad in costumes, from a black shirt and jeans to ripped and tattered clothing complete with a white face or a mask, to participate. Expression is a theme of the evening.
Tucson's artist community, as well as Tucson Puppet
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