Filming Circus in Pittsburgh’s Nonprofit Home for Live Comedy
- Jul 12
- 7 min read
Updated: 4 days ago
Arcade Comedy Theater in Downtown Pittsburgh isn’t normally what one may think of as a destination for circus entertainment. The surrounding community recognizes it as the city’s nonprofit home for improv, stand up, sketch, and other comic surprises. But accessible variety is, indeed, the secret sauce to this organization’s longevity. So it’s no wonder why they may open its stage door to a couple of cirque jags with an idea for a short film project.
The Film Project The Universe Didn’t Us to Finish
The cirque jags, in this case, were myself and Lindsey Briant, my former classmate at Pittsburgh Filmmakers and current aerial circus arts buddy. Hungry for a creative film project, we embarked on a journey to make this piece, Boléro Challenge, as a bootstrapped duo with no real budget to speak of except for what I was willing to dole out from my own bank account. We were the whole cast and the whole crew.
When the shot covered me, Lindsey was behind the camera. When the shot covered her, I was behind the camera. If it was an over-the-shoulder shot covering the both of us, a tripod did the camera duty. The only time we had a third set of hands involved was for the tracking shots at the end when both of us were on the aerial hoop. Many thanks to our friend, Liz Seip, for being that third set of hands.
With this scheme in mind, I wrote the script in July of 2025. The final cut went live on YouTube on May 29, 2026. Why did it take almost a whole year between ideation and completion? As any filmmaker in any stage of their career will testify, there’s a collective frequency embedded in the universe that says “It doesn’t matter how well-prepared you are. A dozen things - at minimum - will make you have to detour around your original plan.”
Illness. Holidays. Ambient sound. These were just a few of the dominoes the universe knocked out of line for us. And technology, technology, technology.
I had to order a new laptop with enough computing power to edit the footage because the iPad app wasn’t cutting it. And when my first laptop order was cancelled by the seller, I had to order yet another laptop, which, thankfully, made it to my possession. Only then could I begin the maiden voyage (more like saga) of editing in a new-to-me program. Again, the film project the universe didn’t want us to finish.
The Show The Pittsburgh Arts Community Let Us Finish
While the universe seemed bent on challenging us, a community of artistic Yinzers were ready to lift us up. And there lies another lesson we artists need to understand.
If you don’t ask, you don’t ever get the chance to hear “yes.”
An artistic journey (or life in general, for that matter) involves fluctuating measures of waiting and creating. Sometimes you have to wait for your green light. Other times, you need to pave your own road. It all depends on where you are and what’s going on around you. More on that later…
In this piece, we wanted to showcase a variety of venues around Pittsburgh that offer unique performance art experiences. This where that “know what you need-lack-have” advice is clutch.
We needed venues that could hold us filming a specific multidisciplinary circus skill.
We lacked a gold-standard budget (our was tin-standard at best).
We have a network of artists and arts proprietors with community-oriented values.
With Arcade, we had an organization in a position to not just say “yes,” but to say “yes, and.”
How Arcade Comedy Theater Collaborates With Local Performers
This wasn’t my first time “circusing” on an Arcade Stage. For that bonkers story, check out the article How I Scrapped My Circus Act the Night Before a Show (and Lived to Juggle Another Day). And Arcade has certainly had its fair share of ground-based circus talent on its stages before. Plays and musicals? Those have also hit the calendar throughout the theater’s history.
What does this mean for the broader performing arts community in Pittsburgh? That Arcade Comedy Theater offers more than laughs through programmed improv, sketch, and stand-up. It is a pathway to production.
A few months after I scrapped my circus act the night before a show at Arcade, I was encouraged to apply for its Board of Directors. It’s my pleasure to say that since March 2025, I’ve served on the board, getting to know and support its governance, fiscal health, and development.
Fast forward to the fall of 2025, when location scouting for Boléro Challenge was underway. I pitched the idea of filming the tightrope scene on Arcade’s main stage to a couple of my board colleagues who, in turn, connected me with staff in charge of booking the theater. The process thereafter was relatively straightforward. Given the scope of this project, the only cost we incurred was for a required theater technician to operate the light board. This was affordable (even with our “not budget” budget), and both parties walked away benefitted.
The Takeaway
Within Pittsburgh’s nonprofit performing arts community, there are organizations willing to work with local stage and film producers whose ideas fit the scale of their operations. If you’re willing to put in the work to optimize the venue’s chances of breaking even, there are opportunities to explore.
Arcade Comedy Theater’s collaboration in Boléro Challenge demonstrates that. Moreover, its commitment to accessibility, affordability, and playful artistry poetically align with the characters onscreen as well.
When Circus Embodies The Lessons of Comedy
Honestly, the choice to film the tightrope scene at Arcade was based more on logistics than narrative value. I knew the people. The space was available. The conditions were favorable. It worked out .
That may have been where the significance ended. But in retrospect, I don’t know if we could have found a more appropriate setting. Comedy requires a mindful balance of absurdity and truth. And comics need to balance the faith they have in their art with the faith an audience has in them. As an artform that lives on such a delicate axis, it makes sense that it would serve as the backdrop to a tightrope act.
The scene seems simple. My character, Erika, walks on a tightrope on the stage, while Tess, Lindsey’s character, films her from the house. They're repurposing elements of Erika’s performance art project that lost its funding into content for social media. Simple, right? Maybe. But as in a good comedic sketch, a simple premise can say a lot.
One of the truths this scene articulates is if you’re a performer, rejection is unavoidable. There are a hundred reasons why you may not get the gig, some more legitimate than others. But no matter what, anyone who’s ever auditioned for anything knows that there are no guarantees, even if you’re the most skilled performer in the room.
The most resilient performers, however, understand two things:
Rejection isn’t the same as failure.
Failure isn’t the same as over.
True comics tend to learn this better than most artists because there are few feats more difficult than mapping your individuality and sense of humor to a crowd expecting to hear something they find funny. Try finding a successful comic who never bombed. And even when comics are praised by their audience, the intelligentsia has a habit of dismissing what they do as “lowbrow.” Try counting the comedies that won the Oscar for Best Picture.
But as Mel Brooks puts it, “Comedy is the opposite of death.” We, as humans, gravitate toward humor to enhance the positive and reduce the negative in our lives. At the very least, it helps us comprehend messiness. No where is that more apparent than in this scene.
At first blush, the scene appears to be more about Erika. But if you want to pinpoint what the scene is truly about, Tess provides that moment.
After Erika’s completed her first cross on the tightrope, she turns to Tess, and asks “Are we good?” Tess’s reply: “Are you asking for feedback or permission?”
The Dual Duel: Artists Battling The World and Themselves at Once
Are you asking for feedback or permission? Whether that’s a punchline or sage wisdom, it’s the core message of the whole film.
Artists have to fight an existential duel with a sword in each hand. On one hand, their opponent is a society full of detractors, career critics, and skeptics who see art as a luxury item (that last one holds particularly true in America). On the other hand, they turn the sword on themselves, perfectionism and inner criticism constantly jabbing and slashing at any otherwise enthusiastic spirit.
This is one of the reasons art needs a community to survive. When we, as artists, are fending off the weapons of the outside world, we need a close, clear-eyed friend to help keep us from wounding ourselves in the act.
Tess is that friend for Erika. Despite her “Tess The Mess” M.O., she knows how to put her friend’s mental gremlins in their place. With few words, she reminds Erika to be intentional about what she’s asking for. It’s a question everyone (not just artists) needs to understand.
Do we create, or do we wait? Be the change or count on the cavalry showing up?
There’s a time and a place for each approach in life. But using artists as an example, the most frustrated ones are those waiting for “the job.” This tells us that we all need to master the artform of determining what we need in the moment: feedback or permission.
I admire how Arcade Comedy Theater achieves a productive relationship between feedback and permission. If you want to learn the art of comedy - no matter which form - you need to be ready for feedback, whether it comes from fellow sketch writers around the table, an improv coach, or the audience. And if you want an opportunity to perform comedy on a regular basis (because that’s the only way to get good at it), you need to be ready to produce your own shows. Yes, you’ll have to get permission to use the theater, but then the bus is yours to drive.
We’re grateful to them for letting us drive our minibus of a concept through their creative space and letting us capture it on film.
Watch Boléro Challenge on YouTube
You can watch Boléro Challenge on YouTube where you’re invited to enjoy more pretty & gritty stories from around The 412 by subscribing to the Cirque Jags Channel.
For Yinz: Let's Make More Pittsburgh Stories Together
Boléro Challenge was the short film the universe didn’t want us to finish. But it happened because a handful of Pittsburgh artists and organizations trusted us to tell a meaningful story. More lessons from our collaborators will be shared here in the coming weeks.
This is the kind of work Cirque Jag Productions strives to create: multidisciplinary stories that celebrate the creative people and spaces that strengthen Pittsburgh's economy through art.
If you're a business owner, property owner, arts organization, nonprofit, or creative entrepreneur who believes your space has a story worth telling, let's talk. Stages, storefronts, studios, warehouses, or somewhere in between, let’s explore how performance, filmmaking, writing, and digital storytelling can help people see your creative mission in action.
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