If you look out into the East River these days, you'll see the pointy tops of bright blue tents on Randall's Island, which can only mean one thing: Cirque du Soleil is back in town. Once again, this monstrously successful franchise has pulled together a host of marvelous, awe-inspiring, and sometimes laws-of-nature-breaking acts into a show -- this time called Kooza. But thanks to director David Shiner, this new-to-New York offering from the Canadian-based company has a big surprise in store: the piece has a decidedly American edge to it.

One's sense that Kooza -- the name is derived from the Sanskrit word for box -- will diverge from the New Age European artiness of many previous Cirque s[...]