Atrium acrobatics aboard Royal Caribbean’s Grandeur of the Seas

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Quoted from Tom Stieghorst of Travel Weekly

Royal Caribbean International’s giant Oasis of the Seas has just about every experience available at sea, but one thing it doesn’t have is something called the vertical theater, now playing in several revitalized Royal vessels.

The VT is a four-story aerial show, featuring duos, trios and quartets of acrobats, doing Cirque du Soleil-type maneuvers in the central atrium of certain older Royal ships.

I attended a performance last week on the Grandeur of the Seas, freshly arrived in Miami from Europe.

The most memorable of those was the show staged in the Grandeur’s Centrum. Built around a “four seasons” theme, it opened with performers descending from the heavens, draped in white, while “snow” flurries drifted down through a shaft of blue light.

Singers and dancers on the floor of the performance space fought for attention with the bungee-equipped entertainers in their midair harnesses above. It was great spectacle, and all the more so because it was occurring in such an informal theatrical setting.

Crowds gathered at the railing encircling the Centrum on Decks 5 and 6, as well as around the R Bar at the base of the space. There were early and late shows that lasted about a half-hour each.

The only drawback I could see to the VT is that since it isn’t planned as a dedicated theater, it has no seats. Viewers had to drag bulky club chairs to the railing to sit down, although standing was the best guarantee of a complete view of the show.

On a full cruise, it could be a problem, but on this cruise with about 1,500 on board there was plenty of room.

Be sure to catch it if it plays in an atrium near you.

 

And if you sail from Baltimore starting in April it will be even closer to you.