Gravity & Other Myths acrobat: Expect serious play in ‘Ten Thousand Hours’

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State will host Australian contemporary circus company Gravity & Other Myths at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 27, in Eisenhower Auditorium at University Park. The troupe will perform its award-winning show “Ten Thousand Hours,” featuring eight acrobats, one musician and an original score.

Lachlan Binns, a founding member, director and acrobat with the troupe, discussed the contemporary cirque company and what audiences can expect from “Ten Thousand Hours.” He started circus classes at 8 years old, then worked as a trainer and a street performer. After almost 15 years with Gravity & Other Myths, Binns said he watched the art form evolve.

“One of the biggest things I’ve seen change is a shift away from individual, separate skills or stunts into longer passages of physical choreography, with these skills seamlessly incorporated in interesting ways,” he said.

The collaboration doesn’t stop at the acrobatics. The show features its own percussion-focused original score, composed by Nick Martyn and Shenzo Gregorio. Gregorio also is a member of a Sydney-based rock string quartet called Fourplay.

Binns said the Gravity & Other Myths artists often create the acrobatics first, then the composer will develop the score while watching each scene.

“We will try to shift the acrobatics to accentuate the musical pace and flow,” he said. “It’s then a bit of back-and-forth adjustment ‘til it’s perfect.”

For those who haven’t seen a Gravity & Other Myths show before, Binns said to expect spectacular group acrobatics, joy, humor and play. He noted that they don’t take themselves too seriously.

“We have packed so many skills and tricks into 60 minutes,” Binns said. “I've never been a part of a show as dense as this one.”

For those already familiar with the performance group, “Ten Thousand Hours” is still a unique show. The title comes from the idea that it takes 10,000 hours to truly master a skill, popularized by Malcolm Gladwell’s 2008 book “Outliers.”

“Audiences who have seen us before will recognize some of the things we do, but we have developed the physical languages and added so much to the visual palette,” Binns said.

He said he hopes the audience leaves feeling inspired, whether it’s to “keep learning that difficult thing” or “get together with some friends and have some fun together.”

Visit the web event page for more details and to purchase tickets.