Founded in 1978, Circus Oz reinvented contemporary circus with jaw-dropping acrobatics and aerials, irreverent humour and a rock 'n' roll attitude, and took Australian circus to the world.
The company used to run on millions in taxpayer funding, paying wages to dozens of touring artists and support staff, but lost federal funding and closed in 2021 amid disagreements over governance.
In more recent years, Circus Oz has been run on a much-reduced scale, with a team of volunteers and performers relying on intermittent box office income, although the company has just returned from a run of shows in New York.
"It's a funny one, it feels like we're back in the 1980s in some ways, where you work quite a lot and sometimes you get paid and sometimes you don't," said assistant director Stephen Burton.
Circus Oz premiered its latest show Here, There and Everywhere! as part of the 40th Melbourne International Comedy Festival, and Burton is clear about what's at stake.
"Every dollar counts. If we don't make money at the comedy festival we will be in trouble, so it's pretty close to the bone," he said.
With a cast of nine made up of old hands and up-and-coming performers, Here, There and Everywhere! is the sort of belly-laugh family show the company built its reputation on, says performer Debra Batton.
The 66-year-old, who flies on the trapeze in the comedy festival outing, says a smaller ensemble means more work for everyone.
"We're all doing everything, we're on stage, we help with stage management, rigging, helping someone do a costume change or doing a costume change ourselves," she said.
Circus Oz still operates out of its home in Collingwood, but the building is now run by the Flying Fruit Fly Circus, one of eight elite arts training organisations with federal funding.
Over more than four decades of Circus Oz, the company and its alumni spawned an Australian circus ecosystem, including the Flying Fruit Fly Circus in Albury/Wodonga, Melbourne's National Institute of Circus Arts, Brisbane's Circa, and Adelaide's Gravity & Other Myths.
The determination to keep Circus Oz going even in a stripped-back format is born of a desire to represent Australian humour and concerns, and a strong sense of what Australian circus has been for a long time, says Batton.
She and Burton are part of a group of about a dozen volunteers working to keep the company alive for the next generation of circus artists - but they ask themselves regularly how much longer they can stick at it.
"When we're working there's a great feeling, the audience laugh and it seems to be going really well, but that's not coming through to the funding bodies and we haven't been able to change that," said Burton.
Here, There and Everywhere! is on at Melbourne Town Hall until April 18th.
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