A documentary film currently in production that explores the unconventional lives of the women who dazzled the crowds during the golden age of the American circus.
Story
The work was dangerous, unconventional and well outsides the norms of polite society. At the turn of the century from May to December hundreds of circus performers, many of them women, crisscrossed America by rail as cast members in some of the largest circuses the country has ever known. At a time when women’s place was most decidedly in the home, and femininity was marked by quietness, grace and deference, women were an integral part of the circus, working as sideshow performers, equestrians, acrobats, aerialists, wire walkers, trapeze artists and animal trainers. Traveling by rail eight months a year, these women were a long way from home and while many had stunning grace they were far from delicate or reticent. In an era when strenuous activity was frowned on for women and the mere bicycle had caused quiet a stir, these performers showcased incredible feats of strength and skill.
The circus life brought freedom for these women, but it also came with sacrifice and danger. While female performers were free from many of the social pressures of the day life in the circus came with its own restrictions and rules.
These edicts, put in place by the show owners to ensure the circus could maintain a level of respectability, restricted who single female performers could speak to and governed their physical appearance inside and outside of the tent. The physical risks for performers were immense, and the chance of tragic injury and even death loomed over each performance. But many found the insular and demanding world of the circus far preferable to the life of a gillie – an outsider – and those performers who left struggled to fit into a society they didn’t understand and that often viewed them with suspicion.
Before radio and cinema, the circus brought entertainment for all in the form of massive spectacles unlike anything else available at the time. The shows reached far across the country, arriving in rural towns in the middle of the night, the tents going up before dawn and then gone the very next day on the way to their next stand. The great American train circuses inspired and entertained a nation. Big Top, Little Lady explores the lives of the women that challenged convention and dazzled the crowds.
Why Women In The Circus
Dixie Willson spent a short time working as a ballet girl in the early 1920’s with the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus. She would go on to write a book recounting her experiences on the show, and in one section she lists the extraordinary number of workers it took to keep the circus running. She writes, “There are two hundred men on canvas, and over them reigns the boss canvasman. There are fifty property men, fifty wild animal men, eighteen bull men, eight dog men, and ninety grooms for the ring horses.” Her list of circus staff stretches on for multiple paragraphs, and it includes everyone from the barber to the esteemed equestrian director. It paints a picture of both an incredibly efficient and massive show. Her words also tell us that the circus, like most American businesses in this era, were worlds run by men.
But under the big top and at the sideshow it wasn’t just men who entertained the thousands of spectators.
There under the canvas were women visibly at work, earning a living with strength, skill, and ingenuity. Big Top, Little Lady will explore their lives and experiences. Using female circus performer’s autobiographic writings, letters, photographs, and other archival materials the film will bring women’s stories, often missing from larger historical narratives, to the forefront. The film will not follow a particular circus, instead it will center its focus on the performers themselves and consider multiple popular circuses of the time, including Barnum & Bailey, Ringling Brothers, and later the combined Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circus, as well as the John Robinson Circus, Sells Floto Circus, Al G. Barnes Circus and others.
The American railroad tent circuses flourished in the years between 1872 and 1929, and Big Top, Little Lady explores the unconventional lives of the women who dazzled the crowds during this golden age of the American circus.
Support
Big Top, Little Lady is a Women Make Movies Production Assistance Program Project. Women Make Movies is the fiscal sponsor for the film and you make a donation to support the completion of the documentary at their website. Films are listed in alphabetical order and you will need to scroll down on the page to find Big Top, Little Lady. Thank you!
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Image Credits: Top: Adam Forepaugh and Sells Bros Circus, date unknown, Middle: Sparks Circus, 1927, Jaunita Grey, Mary Lenett, Alice, Insert: Bird Millman, 1921, Bottom: Barnum & Bailey, date unknown. All images from filmmaker’s personal collection.