Circus performers to lead audiences on a merry dance at the Wales Millennium Centre

For those of you who still imagine the circus as a seated experience in a big top with bearded ladies and seals bouncing balls on their snouts, you'd be surprised at just how far removed the work of the NoFit State company is from that vision.

Currently wowing the crowds at the Roundhouse in London, their latest production, Bianco, moves to the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff next week before visiting other venues in Wales.

An evening with the Cardiff-based company is never dull and Bianco promises to be just as jaw-dropping and thrilling as their previous shows.

Having been developed at the Eden Project in Cornwall last year, it is a promenade production, directed by Firenza Guidi. It will see the audience joining the troupe of performers on stage in what the show's creative producer Tom Rack describes as "an unfolding rollercoaster journey."

Tom, who is NoFit State's creative director and co-founded the company 25 years ago, is excited about the prospect of bringing the production to home audiences.

He told me: "It's a promenade show, so the audience moves around the space and the action happens above them, behind them, next to them and they won't know which way to turn.

"They will enter through the centre's back doors and see the hidden, forbidden backstage areas, before we lead them onto the stage into our world.

"The show involves all the traditional circus skills but they are presented in a very untraditional way and woven together into a coherent theatrical performance, with some very touching, soulful moments as well as striking images."

The show involves a group of 20 performers as well as a live band and Tom believes it provides an opportunity for Cardiff audiences who know NoFit State as a community performance space, rather than as an international touring company, to get to know their other side.

The company is currently developing a new HQ in former Victorian schoolrooms in the Adamsdown area and the project is due for completion this autumn. You can read more about it in my previous blog post.

This is the first time NoFit State has performed inside the WMC building, having previously entertained audiences in the oval basin outside in their big top.

Conrad Lynch, artistic director at Wales Millennium Centre said: "We are constantly trying to explore alternative ways of enhancing audience's experiences here at the centre and I believe offering a promenade performance on stage with the performers does just that.

"We've been working closely with NoFit State for a number of years now and I'm delighted that as one of our associated companies we can this time welcome them inside the centre."

Bianco runs at Wales Millennium Centre from 1–4 May 2013 with a matinee performance on 4 May at 2pm. To book, visit wmc.org.uk or call 02920 63 6464.

The production will then be transformed for the company's big top for an extensive tour of the UK. Those unable to catch it at the WMC can see performances later in the season at Narberth and Bangor, dates and venues are to be confirmed.