Chris Lashua has always liked wheels.
He was about 13 years old when he started practicing stunts on his bicycle, and eagerly embraced the BMX craze of the 1980s, performing in freestyle biking competitions and state fairs throughout New England. Later on, as a performer with Cirque du Soleil, Lashua mastered and perfected the "German wheel," a device in which the performer holds onto the inside of a wheel as it rolls across the stage.
Now, as the artistic director of his own circus company, Cirque Mechanics, Lashua has created a new work, "Birdhouse Factory," inspired by the industrial wheels of the small Massachusetts mill town in which he grew up. "Birdhouse Factory" appears Saturday at Providence Performing Arts Center.
The headliner for the final week of this year's FirstWorks Festival in Providence, "Birdhouse Factory" is a show based on the "simplicity of how the human body interacts with mechanical devices," Lashua said.
The production places the genre of circus performance art popularized by Cirque du Soleil within the environment of a factory, circa 1935. In the show's narrative, industrial workers unite after a bird is injured when it collides with the factory's main steam boiler. As the show progresses, the workers construct birdhouses and express their individuality — all through choreographed acrobatics, of course.
Lashua said he feels at home with the industrial wheels and gears of his show's sets. In addition to drawing inspiration from his hometown, Lashua looked to the artwork of Diego Rivera — who was commissioned by Ford Motor Company to do a series of Detroit murals in the late 1930s — and Charlie Chaplain's 1936 classic "Modern Times."
"The show is actually reverse-engineered. It began with us identifying what machines worked, and then figuring out how it would look, and what it would actually be about," Lashua said.
Lashua founded Cirque Mechanics after completing a six-year tour with Cirque du Soleil's "Quidam" in Japan.
"I didn't really know anything about the Cirque du Soleil shows as a teen. I remember watching them on HBO, but that was about it," Lashua said.
The German wheel became Lashua's trademark as a performer. He even improved upon the original design by inventing a trolley on which the wheel rolls.
While Lashua received "great feedback" from his changes to the German wheel, he generated even more praise from his audiences and colleagues with the invention of a "spin cycle device," which consists of unicyclists underneath a rotating platform. A contortionist would perform what Lashua calls "Matrix-style" moves on top of the platform as it moves across the stage at varying speeds.
In "Birdhouse Mechanics," Lashua said, "we drive this through the factory setting, and this way we can show the contortion acts from all angles. People get to see the bicycle element move through space. We want to show how the acts merge acrobatics and technology."
Now, as a father of three sons and head of Cirque Mechanics, Lashua does not have as much time to perform as he did in the past. But he remains involved in the creative process, currently developing a new show called "Boom Town," set during the 1850s gold rush.
Lashua also still serves as a creative consultant for Cirque du Soleil. He said "Boom Town" was "made possible" by Cirque du Soleil's creation of its genre, but the new show is also distinct in its aesthetic approach.
"We're trying to be respectful of their combination of acrobatics and choreography, but we do not focus on the fantasy setting," Lashua said. "Instead, we focus on a real place and time. Fantastical things might happen, but it is grounded in reality — our look and feel is unique."
