Difference between revisions of "Virgile Peyramaure"

Born February 18, 1971 in Châteauroux, France, Virgile grew up in show business: His father ran a small circus company, and his mother was a wardrobe mistress. For a while, Virgile considered a ballet career, but he eventually opted for the circus and, at age fifteen, entered the [[Centre National des Arts du Cirque]], the French state circus college in Châlons-en-Champagne. There, he developed a [[hand-to-hand balancing]] act with another student at the Centre, Sophie Ferrero. When their act was ready, [[Sophie and Virgile]] embarked in a brilliant international career that took them to such prominent venues as [[Circus Knie]] in Switzerland, [[Circus Roncalli]] and Berlin's Wintergarten in Germany, and [[Cirque du Soleil]] in Canada. In 1995, they won a Gold Medal at the [[Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain]] in Paris. They performed their remarkable act at the [[Big Apple Circus]] in the US in 1996-97, and returned there in 2000-2001 for their farewell season—after which Sophie decided to retire from performing to start a family. After that, Virgile remained at the Big Apple Circus as Assistant Performance Director, and became a member of its resident company. He has since performed there in a variety of acrobatic acts, including hand-to-hand balancing acts with [[Andrey Mantchev]].