Operation Montreal – Guest Blog by Jeana’s Mom

As the lucky mother of KA’s newest cast member I am both very proud and extremely excited to be joining Jeana on her trip to Montreal.  Despite a little mishap at the original hotel booked online (site unseen) I was able to deal with the issue and move to the Sheraton in downtown Montreal which was a great base for “Operation Montreal”.  Two things are immediately evident:  (1)  Jeana and I have not spent any “one on one” time since her pre-wedding month nine years ago, and (2) Jeana is always up for a good time and can walk for miles.

While Jeana will surely update you on the various activities of each day, I’m going to focus on my day visiting Cirque headquarters.  Once Jeana learned how to negotiate the metro she provided absolutely precise instructions for me.  I knew what entrance, exit, stop, bus, etc. to take to deliver me exactly to her dorm.  I was quite proud of my auto-less and successful transition from downtown to my final destination.

Jeana eagerly provided a tour of the general facility.  There are two cafeterias, a very large training room, costume shop, hat/wig making department and their very own shoemaking department.   Since this is the headquarters they are also all other departments needed by a corporation, approximately 2,000 local employees and a dormitory for athletes auditioning and training.

Here are some photos of inside Cirque headquarters – The first is a main area outside the gift shop, the second is the main office for Artists.

Early in the day Jeana had sat for her head mold which will be used to construct her wig and hat to her precise measurements.  We are there when the model is unmolded and it is amazing.  There is a large storeroom filled with heads of all the cast members.  They don’t need the ears so they are removed and there’s an entire wall with ears on it.  I don’t suppose you can keep secrets in that room.

A photo of me with the head mold ladies and Jeana’s head:

Next we visit the training room where several athletes are working on various skill moves.  These athletes are in great shape and there are trainers and fellow athletes working with each other to learn new skills and perfect some the most intricate of moves.  I thought it was very interesting to see how hard they work and how eager they are to show what they can do.

The training room:

Jeana has arranged for me to join her at the costume fitting and as a hobby seamstress I’m more than a little pumped by this.  It was truly impressive.  Every show is grouped together with their seamstresses, designers, fabrics and trims.  They are constantly building costumes, improving designs and repairing costumes.  There are file cabinets with a folder for each costume containing patterns, fabric swatches, and samples of trim, thread and directions.  I saw some truly unique fabrics and creative methods of building the famous “Cirque” designs.

In the dressing room, Jeana begins by putting on the “fat” suit.  It is a marvel of design and very light weight considering that it makes her look about 40 pounds heavier.  Her seamstress is placing the tubes of Styrofoam balls on her boobs, belly, hips and arms and they have to be arranged such so to make the costume looks right.  The “wings” are leather and weigh a lot although Jeana removes those for some of the show.

Some photos from the wardrobe session:

The designer comes in and her job is to make sure that the costume exactly matches the one that the other nanny wears.    I get the complete tour of the costume department and I’m just absolutely fascinated.   What a great way to see the behind the scenes and to celebrate this wonderful opportunity for Jeana.

We ended our day of adventure by returning to downtown Montreal with a plan to visit to the Latin Quarter.  You cannot imagine our surprise when we exited the metro right into the middle of the “Just for Laughs” street festival.

This was our first view of the festival:

But that’s a whole other story best left to Jeana’s skillful writing.  I enjoyed the week with Jeana, the visit to a beautiful city and the insider’s visit to Cirque.  I think I’ll need to rest up a bit before we visit Vegas for the real experience.