Sometimes you just have to seize the day and save the planet. Well, maybe we didn’t exactly save the planet, but I’d like to think we helped a little by purchasing a few of the remaining tickets to Cirque du Soleil’s One Night for One Drop presented by Zappos.com and MGM Resorts International.

A year in the making, this fabulous annual event features a custom show to raise money for One Drop, Cirque founder Guy Laliberté’s non-profit that aims to provide access to safe water to each and every person on the planet.

The star-studded fundraiser included packages from $1,500 for an individual VIP ticket to $250,000 for the presenting package. A live auction featured luxury items and once-in-a-lifetime experiences, like a 160mph powerboat ride with adrenaline enthusiast Laliberté in Italy. Yikes! All proceeds from the event benefit safe water access and conservation programs across the globe.    

When we arrived at New York-New York for One Night for One Drop, my partner and I immediately took note of the blue red carpet graced by several familiar faces, such as Mayor Carolyn Goodman and her husband Oscar Goodman, comedian Carrot Top, Penn Jillette (Penn & Teller), Red Foo (LMFAO), Marie Osmond (looking absolutely stunning, by the way) and some of our local community favorites, like Mike Snedegar (Tao Group), Michael Shulman (ShulmanSays.com) and Jaymes Vaughan (Celebrity Page TV), who was also covering the event.

Before the show, my partner and I met up with our friend Chris Michael Hepler, whom we had invited to join us for this “Cirque show on steroids”. We had a glass of champagne and wine at the hosted bar and quickly found our seats inside the intimate Zumanity Theater.

What unfolded before our eyes was one of the most thought-provoking and beautiful live performances we have seen in a very long time.
Grace VanderWaal performed her touching song, “Light the Sky”. I am convinced the live performance we were privy to was the best version that will ever exist. Another standout moment was William Shatner singing along with the entire cast underneath a dangling cast member dressed as planet earth.

As for the show itself, it featured quirky characters like The Old Ringmaster, a metaphor for Humanity and his faithful assistant, Orbis, a metaphor for Earth. The show told the story of our finite resources and stressed that time should never be taken for granted. The Old Ringmaster races through time with the help of Tempus the time keeper to try and fix his many wrongdoings to his various circus performers.

One of the performers, the faithful assistant Orbis, pleads with The Old Ringmaster throughout the show to let him perform the act he had been vigorously working on. After facing rejection throughout most of the show, Orbis (played by little person Alan Jones Silva) was finally able to perform his aerial act to “Bohemian Rhapsody”, sung by The Tenors.
In watching his performance, the lines of imagination and reality were blurred as you wondered whether perhaps the scenario of Alan Jones Silva wanting to perform this particular piece existed in reality long before the evening of this show.

Silva performed with such pride, skill and grace in this moment that it was hard not to have the feeling that Freddie Mercury had actually written “Bohemian Rhapsody” especially for Silva’s silk work. “Open your eyes, look up to the skies and see” … Silva blow your mind. “Little high, little low, any way the wind blows doesn’t really matter” because through the Zumanity Theater spotlights, I saw “a little silhouetto of a man” that left the biggest impression on every single one of us.

A reminder that no matter how little of a Scaramouche we may be in this world, we should do what we can to have a positive impact on one another and the bigger picture – our planet.

For more information on One Night for One Drop, visit
onenight.onedrop.org.

To learn how you can help with safe water access and to learn more about One Drop’s global water initiatives, please visit www.onedrop.org.