Let’s talk about radical art. Maybe it happens in two ways. Either something smashes into a culture so abruptly that new aesthetic shards are flung far and wide due to the sudden impact. Or, there’s a creeping—an underground new way of thinking, making, and seeing that seeps into the scene. Maybe the circumstances are less of a binary and more fluid. There are always radical creepings in artistic scenes, and if one artwork happens to explode, it’s because there was a foundation of pre-laid dynamite. Frédérique Cournoyer Lessard (she/they) is not the first person to pair projection and circus, to tell an autobiographical story, to explore an apparatus at unusual heights, or to make a political work. These elements of hybridization and dissected circus disciplines have been creeping for some years now, but by the end of Scuse–Sorry in English–I felt like I had been bowled over by a radical circus show.

The show itself was a microcosm of the same phenomenon. A story trickled in, and then, very naturally, became something altogether different. It’s subtle, then quick. Like when kids play a game and suddenly it becomes too real: an “I don’t want to play anymore.” In the show, Lessard describes these moments in her life with the word “epiphany.” But for how my gut sank and heart pounded, how my skin crawled, and how I frowned as she told her story, the word is too soft, too billowy.  I saw Scuse at La Chapelle, an intimate black box theater, during the Montreal Circus Festival. Technically, what I saw was a first staging, a work in progress, but if I hadn’t known, I wouldn’t have guessed. The show is far beyond the beginning stages. It’s smart, well-crafted, and beautifully performed with sincerity and nuance. Lessard, an accomplished and awarded circus artist and filmmak...