CALLING ON OTHERS: Trust and Teamwork at Cirque du Soleil

John Grüber plops down in his leather chair, dons his headset, and opens a binder filled with charts and spreadsheets. Before John Grüber is a series of lights and buttons and switches reminiscent of the control deck of the Starship Enterprise. Grüber’s “office,” the light booth in the MJ ONE Theater, overlooks the sold-out audience of 1,805 attendees. The responsibility of ensuring that the show hits every cue -- and the hearts of all 1,805 attendees -- rests solely on Grüber’s shoulders. 

“Game on, folks,” Grüber says over the headset. “Let’s have some fun.”

As the General Stage Manager, Grüber calls the show. But, do not let Grüber’s words fool you.  Calling a show at Cirque du Soleil is far from a game. 

Grüber communicates 168 cues to 120 cast and crew members in 11 departments across 8 radio channels for 2 shows each night in over 360 shows a year. This equates to more than 75,000 moments of collaboration, communication, and trust that must happen -- seamless and to-the-second -- in order to create the mind-blowing spectacle that is MJ ONE.

“Just imagine it,” explained Trevor Workhoven, Assistant Head of Carpentry at MJ ONE, “you’re sitting in that booth 50 feet away from the stage. At any given time, you are literally asking different departments in places you can’t see if the stage, the lifts, and the harness are readied so that artists can fly 4 stories over a packed theater and land safely on the stage.”  Trevor shakes his head and smiles. “To give the ‘go' -- to blindly rely on the eyes and ears of others -- that takes a huge amount of trust.”

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