Roll up, roll up... Giffords Circus is back

While watching an old documentary of the 1902 film A Trip To The Moon, Nell Gifford knew with absolute certainty that she had just found the theme to her next show, with its iconic image of a rocket through the eye of the moon.

Moon Songs is the result, which has just opened in the Cotswolds to rapturous applause — meaning that Giffords is back with another winning show to bowl us over this summer.

The famous circus has also extended its remit in Oxfordshire to encompass locations such as Blenheim Palace and Oxford’s University Parks, making Giffords more accessible to everyone.

But look beyond the glitz and the glamour, the spangles and the chutzpah, the sawdust and the acrobats’ chalk, to the woman who not only started the whole circus, but has kept it rolling into town year after year, Nell Gifford herself.

Now a mother of five year-old twins, Nell never rests on her laurels. Giffords is her baby and having brought the circus into the spotlight she’s determined to keep it there by bringing something new and fresh to the table every year.

So if the illusion is one of Cotswold privilege and eclectic elegance, backstage it’s all hands on deck.

“I’ve just come out of four weeks of rehearsals and I feel like I’ve been in the boxing ring. I’m absolutely exhausted, because it’s non-stop. So you take a punt and hope for the best,” the former Oxford University graduate says. “We are only here because we have built Giffords nail by nail and stitch by stitch.” And yet Nell’s commitment means Giffords has built a formidable reputation over the years. Having realised a childhood dream, Nell and her husband Toti started Giffords in 2000 on her farm in Gloucestershire, and it’s now one of the most famous circuses on the circuit.

On the road again with Moon Songs, she adds, “that’s what a touring circus is all about though. It’s relentless but such fun, and the magic soon takes over.

“So you can practise and practise and have a pretty good idea of what you’ve got, but it’s not until you put it in front of an audience that you know. So I’m always quite nervous before a new show opens.”

Never aiming to replicate the film, Nell came up with Moon Songs instead and incorporated into it the Giffords performers (which this year includes a troupe of Ethiopians and a Hungarian contortionist).

Weeks of sitting around the kitchen table, she batted ideas backwards and forwards until the vision was complete and could be put into practice.

“A Trip To The Moon had a touch of the Wizard Of Oz about it which we wanted to replicate, just not too literally. But we must have got something right because people went mad for Moon Songs when it opened this week, a real mania vibe with screaming. I suppose the show is quite naughty and irreverent,” Nell smiles.

Does she worry that by going more mainstream, Giffords might lose some of its exclusivity? “We have to be practical about it, because this is our business, and we don’t get any funding, so we have to be resourceful to make it work. To make a profit we need to be 90 per cent full, so making the circus more accessible is really important and by including Univer-sity Parks and Blenheim it means more people can walk there.”

One of the circus performers showing his horsemanship

For now it may seem an insurmountable task, but come July, when Giffords is mid-flow and everything is running like clockwork, she’ll forget.

Once Nell hears the roar of the crowds, smells the popcorn, sees the lights shining off the children’s faces in the packed-out circus tent and bathes in the applause, she will remember why she does it. “Maybe,” she smiles, “but then it’s not my job to be self-congratulatory. My job is to be dissatisfied with what we’re doing and think about how to make it better, to maintain standards.

“Life would be much easier if we did something else, and I’m 42 and tired,” she laughs, “but this is what we do and we love it. This is how I express myself. It’s my job. So it’s nice to be celebrated.”

And what of her children, Red and Cecil?

“They can’t wait. They come on for the grand finale, that’s their little job, and they get the whole hospitality vibe and look after everyone. They even call the circus troupe ‘The Friends’ because they can’t remember everyone’s names,” Nell says, smiling, getting ready to go back into the ring. And as she leaves I think that sums up Nell rather effectively.

However dazzlingly glamor-ous and ethereal, she is the hostess with the most-ess.

Giffords Circus
* The Giffords 2015 summer tour takes in Stadhampton village green (May 29-June 1), Blenheim Palace (June 4-8), University Parks, Oxford (June 26-July 6), Daylesford Organic Farm, near Kingham (July 9-13), and opposite the Fox Inn, Great Barring-ton, near Burford (July 16-27)
* For tickets, and a full list of locations and tour dates, visit  visit giffordscircus.com or call the box office on 0845 459 7469