DThe orchestra of the Monte Carlo International Circus Festival begins its circus march in the large chapiteau. The audience rises and claps to the rhythm of the music. The royal family enters the circus tent, flanked by artists carrying flags, walks to the royal box and takes a seat. The game can begin.
This scene has been repeated before every show for 50 years. Only the protagonists changed. At the first festival in 1974, Prince Rainier III sat. von Monaco, the founder of the circus festival, and his wife Gracia Patricia, formerly Grace Kelly, in the front row directly at the ring. They were later joined by their children: Princesses Caroline and Stéphanie and Prince Albert, heir to the throne. After the car accident on September 14, 1982, in which Princess Grace Patricia died, Rainier III appeared. often accompanied by daughter Stéphanie, who obviously inherited her father's enthusiasm for the circus.
The sympathy for Rainier III. stops
This year, at the 46th Circus Festival (the event was canceled four times, most recently in 2021 and 2022 due to Corona), Prince Albert II led the family. However, his wife Charlène, who apparently isn't particularly interested in the circus, was missing. The warmest and longest applause, longer than that for star artists, was given to a dead person at every performance at this year's festival – Rainier III, who died in 2005.
Before the presenter Petit Gougou announced the first number, a film was shown on a screen in the ring in which the former prince could be seen performing various circus acts. Everyone could see how much the Monegasques and especially the circus people had great sympathy for Rainier III. have preserved.
The prince, whose 100th birthday was celebrated in Monaco beyond 2023 at the 2024 circus festival, did a lot for the small country on the Côte d'Azur during his reign from 1949 to 2005: He transformed the financially strapped dwarf state into a luxurious paradise for the rich and beautiful, where apartments are now offered with a price per square meter of up to 100,000 euros.
Through the wedding of Rainier III. with the Hollywood actress Grace Kelly In 1956, the rocky nest on the Mediterranean was on everyone's lips and became a destination for the international jet set. As a kind of chairman of the board of directors of the Monaco company, Rainier III modernized. his country into a flourishing entity.
There are still many animal appearances in the program
For many, perhaps his most beautiful act was founding the circus festival 50 years ago. He organized the meeting of artists, acrobats, clowns and animal teachers less for economic reasons and more out of love for the circus arts, which at that time, in 1974, were in decline, not least because of television. In an exhibition designed for this year's festival entitled “The Prince at the Heart of the Circus” you can see how Rainier III. personally organized the meeting, selected artists, inspected the construction of the tent and ensured that the animals were kept and accommodated carefully.
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