A Moscow Circus juggler never worries about the next job.   Popovich didn't know how or why he was chosen for the American tour. The producer simply told him one day it would be his next job. He returns to Moscow in May to perform for five months at the reopening of the Old Moscow Circus Building on Tsvetnoi Boulevard .

 

When he's not touring, he practices up to six hours per day. On tour he still tries to get in three hours a day.

 

His act begins with devil stick manipulation. It includes high tosses under a back flip, somersault and pirouette. He does combinations with three balls inspired, he said, by Kris Kremo and Rudy Schweitzer. Four other balls are lying on the ground, and he kicks them up into his pattern one by one until he is doing all seven. He finishes his ball routine with a six ball shower.

 

Next comes the ladder, a seven-foot unsupported model standing on an elevated platform. He climbs it quickly and does seven rings from that perch while balancing a pole on his head (he has done eight in practice). A second ladder is topped by small platforms for his feet. He climbs it, stands on the platforms and does five clubs with back crosses. He drops two and does many tricks with three clubs, including under the leg throws.. To finish the routine, he tosses one club high, does a back flip off the ladder and catches the club after he lands on the ground.

 

He says he wants to "do something out of the ordinary, " and is working on a more comic act with hat and cigar.

 

Popovich counts himself among the three top jugglers in the Soviet Union , along with Sergei Ignatov and Yvgani Bilyauer. They watch each others' careers, but don't see each other often, he said, because they are always traveling in different cities. While Popovich was in the United States , Ignatov was touring Japan and Bilyauer was in Mexico .

 

There are several other fine jugglers now performing in the Soviet Union , he said.

They include the 12-year-old nephew of Sergei Ignatov (who is also named Sergei

Ignatov), the Gibadulin troupe (who do fast-paced club passing), and Sarvat Bekbudi, a juggler on horseback. Bekbudi is continuing the tradition of Olhivikov, a juggler who died last year after a career that included juggling seven balls and five sabres while standing on a galloping horse.

 

Popovich did some tricks in practice for American visitors that he did not do in shows. During a visit from Dick Franco and Alan Howard, he juggled nine balls, finishing off the cascade with a neck catch. "I never saw anyone do nine with that degree of confidence, " Franco said. He also showed the duo confidence in a seven ball shower.

 

Franco set up and led an IJA delegation that visited Popovich in Philadelphia to recognize his expertise with the presentation of an IJA membership, t-shirt, videos and a plaque.

 

The St. Ignatius High School circus club got a chance to meet Popovich close-up when students at that school won a city­wide "Why the circus should come to our school" contest in Cleveland , Ohio . Art Thomas, an English teacher and moderator of the circus club there, said Jeff Hamman, president of the club, got a chance to pass clubs with Popovich after a joint show starring three Soviet acts and the St. Ignatius club. The club made a formal presentation of a club t-shirt, and Popovich responded with a gracious statement about his pleasure at the occasion. "It is exciting to see that a high school includes as part of its program the art which I have studied since I was a boy. Our art is one method of communication which may continue to bring about further understanding between different cultures."