Molly Whitehouse-Udry’s performance in the Circus Big Top, though short (it clocks in at just six minutes long), may just be one of the most impressive performances at Glastonbury Festival.
Earlier in the week, she was part of an incredible mass of performers that performed Look To The Skies in the Pyramid Stage’s opening ceremony – the first theatre show on the stage since 1990 – today, she performs a solo aerial show.
She begins by being hoisted high above the stage, rotating slowly, dangling from a long length of rope. As the strains of Exit Eden’s cover of Alice Cooper’s Poison kick in on the Big Top’s sound system, she launches into a rope routine that is, quite simply, breathtaking.
She manoeuvres into seemingly impossible positions before releasing herself into a controlled tumble towards the floor, catching herself at the last possible moment and then rising again into another seemingly impossible position.
At one point, she spins, held only by the length of rope in the nape of her neck, her arms extended outward. It’s an incredible physical feat performed with grace and elegance.
