From a New York Times story by Sarah Maslin Nir headlined “Ringling Circus Is Returning. Lions, Tigers and Dumbo Are Not.”:

LAS VEGAS — In a cavernous audition space, one by one the circus performers contorted, flipped, spun, danced and stood on their heads (at one point while on another person’s head), drawn from around the world to this circus casting call. But there was one notable absence in a room filled with would-be ringmasters, macabre clowns and more than one person capable of hanging from a hoop suspended from the ceiling.

Not a single animal act.