About ten minutes in I realised I hadn't thought about the film once. I'd assumed I'd spend the whole night comparing the two, but I just ... didn't.
Beautiful voices across the board, a lovely ease with one another, and enough self-awareness to never let the comedy become caricature.
There is a reason The Sapphires has become one of Australia's most beloved musicals.
Even when individual works did not fully land for me dramaturgically, there is no denying the precision, intelligence and care of the artists creating them.
Helios begins with the ancient Greek myth of Phaeton and gently pulls it into something recognisably human: school buses, mixtapes, teenage dares, grief, fathers, first kisses and one bright gold car.
No band. No spectacle. Two performers, a small collection of instruments, and a room prepared to listen.
Cirque Alice is a night of astonishment and delight – a celebration of bodies doing the impossible.