Barnum Bailey

Next week, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey will return to Baltimore with Fully Charged!, the 141st edition of The Greatest Show On Earth. Everyone at Ringling Bros. takes great pride in presenting quality family entertainment to audiences in Baltimore and across the country. Unfortunately, animal rights groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals have used our return to continue their radical agenda by distorting our dedication to animal care and welfare. It's time we set the record straight.

Past a small woman delicately balancing eight spinning plates on the ends of long metal rods stands Mark Oliver Gebel, holding steadfast to the only rope keeping two acrobats suspended 20 feet from the floor during morning practice.The only son of animal trainer Gunther Gebel-Williams, Mr. Gebel has had the task of taking the reins after his father's early retirement from circus performance in 1990. Now, in the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus' first visit to Baltimore in more than four years, he takes part in nearly every aspect of the show's preparation.

The entertainment world's lord of the rings, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, is turning the spotlight on the audience as it celebrates its 135th anniversary this year. The show, which rolled into Baltimore this week and will run at 1st Mariner Arena through March 19, includes an audience-exercise routine, the chance to partake in a few circus stunts, try on costumes and talk with the performers. "We're one year older than baseball. Things need to be done to keep fresh," says Melinda Rosser, a Ringling Bros.

Step right up. "The Greatest Show on Earth" has come to town. The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus has officially taken over the 1st Mariner Arena, now through March 21. This year's show, the 133rd edition of P.T. Barnum's spectacle, features the usual cast of circus characters - elephants, tigers, clowns, jugglers, acrobats, aerialists and stilt-walkers - as well as some other familiar faces, new stars and new death-defying acts. "It's probably the most thrilling show that Feld Entertainment has put together," says Melinda Rosser, spokeswoman for Ringling Bros.

SHE ENTERS just before intermission. This is what the audience has been waiting for. Into the darkened arena floats a huge glass globe, and from within it rises Sara Houcke, the headliner for the 130th edition of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey's Greatest Show on Earth. It is a star's entrance. Lowered into a cage with eight full-grown Bengal tigers, the 23-year-old doesn't flinch. She doesn't puff up, wield a chair or shout at the animals. Instead, she gently demonstrates her control through hand signals and intimate whispers.

WASHINGTON -- In a city teeming with lobbyists peddling pet interests, even jaded politicians crack a smile when former Florida Rep. Andy Ireland plunks down his business card on Congress members' desks.It features a prancing horse, two elephants and a red-capped clown.Mr. Ireland, 65, lobbies for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, a business that sees potential local and national legislation as no laughing matter. He is part of a cast of thousands who have sway over much of the work that is done in Washington.

For Casey Carle, soap bubbles are more than a backyard diversion. They're a never-ending wonder, a visually arresting natural occurrence. They're an art, things of beauty that lie at the intersection of creative expression and scientific principles. They're also his career. A self-described "comic bubbleologist," Carle has spent 16 years traveling to science centers, museums and schools throughout the country and occasionally abroad with his one-man show, "BubbleMania!" This weekend, he is scheduled to perform three shows daily in the atrium of the Maryland Science Center.

Bring in the (new) clowns; Graduates: Ringling Bros. and 0) Barnum & Bailey Clown College turns out another crop of funny-bone ticklers.Brad Reiss would like nothing better than to graduate from college and fall flat on his face.Or slip on a banana peel.Or get smacked in the kisser with a whipped cream pie.For Reiss and Lea Abiera, today is graduation day. The Baltimore students have completed the eight weeks of bowling pin-juggling, face-painting and car-stuffing otherwise known as the Ringling Bros.

This is about Cirque du Soleil. Translation from French: Circus of the Sun.That's the dazzling, kaleidoscopic Canadian troupe making a spectacular debut tomorrow night as a pay-for-view television attraction from TVN Entertainment. Animal-free circus as theater, even on a small screen it makes the conventional, sawdust-as-usual Circus Vargas and Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey crowds look like "The Gong Show."But first this prologue:There's a famous song in "Fiddler on the Roof" that celebrates tradition.

When Circus Chimera opened recently in Anaheim, Calif., it had the usual fare: jugglers, clowns, acrobats, trapeze artists.What set the show apart was what it didn't have.There were no elephants doing headstands, no lions or tigers snarling at trainers, no monkeys clinging to bareback riders on galloping horses. Every performer was human.It's about time, animal-rights advocates and some circus officials say. "The show is better without the animals," said James Judkins, who created Circus Chimera last year in Hugo, Okla.