Seamy Details and The Drip Factor

Sweat

Sweat is the salty gloss of persistence.

The trout-like sheen of stamina.

Sweat is the condensation of toil.

The slick evidence of will. *

And now for the seamy details:

Sweat Management.

In the course of doing the clown acts in Kooza there will be sweat.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a Minnesota Matinee with 30% of the big top filled or a maximum capacity Vancouver crowd pumping energy back across the footlights at us. Doing the act makes me sweat profusely.

This is not to be confused with Flop Sweat. The chilly, unearned sweat that comes from some internal furnace of anxiety and is more a sign of mental turmoil than actual physical exertion. I’ve had that too, but this is different.

The costume department does what it can. Under my various costumes I wear t-shirts of a futuristic wicking (wiccan?) material. The latest ones have a hole over the left pectoral (fittingly directly over my heart) where I’ve cut the plastic emblem off because it was irritating my skin.

I am also given a small black terrycloth rag to mop my brow between entrances.
I can’t really mop my brow.
I must dab.
I’m not about to ruin the hour and a half worth of make up I have painstakingly applied to my mug.

Of course the make up (with lots of touch ups) remains intact through all the sweating. It doesn’t melt off because I’m using the same products Cirque uses for the performers in O in Las Vegas and that show is mostly underwater.

So sweat is part of my daily routine and I’ve learned to accept it as a fact of clowning life.

Raise your hand if you're sure.

In Praise of Sweat

Our director, David Shiner is reported to have said he never thought much of a clown that didn’t sweat. I’m a sweater by metabolism anyway so I’m inclined to think the same way.

Sweat has a way of reminding us of our animal.

When you’re looking across the stage and a stinging drop falls from its perch on the waxed curlicue of your overgrown eyebrow and lands with a salty splash directly on your retina, staggering in momentary myopia, you know, at least, you’re giving your all.

In fact some of the workshops I was giving at the Berkeley Rep I entitled Theatre of Sweat. I was interested in seeing acting as an aerobic activity.

Sweat tells us that the stakes are high enough to engage the organism fully.

The Drip Factor

I remember a press conference in Tel Aviv when I was doing
The Thousandth Night at the International Teattronetto.
Steven Berkoff and I were seated together at the event. We got into a conversation about the relative physicality of our respective one man shows.
(He was doing his piece about Shakespeare’s villains at the time.)

He fixed me at one point with those impossibly piercing eyes and said “When I do my show the sweat comes off my chin like this: Drip. Drip. Drip.”
I responded that when I do my show the sweat comes off my chin like this: Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip, doubling the time signature.

It was harmless actor posturing but it’s true: perspiration is a salty by-product of performance and the reality of it must be dealt with.

The same goes for saliva management.
This usually comes into play when tackling the more verbal challenges of Shakespearean roles and one man shows where sometimes you have to chart not only where you have to take your breaths but where to swallow all the extra saliva your jabbering is producing.

Seamy Details

The art of dealing with your own sweat onstage without bringing any undo attention to it, without betraying any sense of labor or effort while you’re sweating buckets and all the while adhering to the maxim of “Don’t Let Them See You Sweat” is just another one of the seamy details you encounter when in search of the Mask of Satori.

* "Sweat" republished courtesy of Scrutinies & Tangentia.

Walking The Tightrope Over The Uncanny Valley

Trying to enlighten the coulrophobes by beating them with a steak.

First, some etymology:

Canny is from the Anglo-Saxon root ken: “knowledge, understanding, or cognizance; mental perception: an idea beyond one's ken. Thus the uncanny is something outside one's familiar knowledge or perceptions.

Sigmund Freud was fascinated by it.

He tried to understand that uneasiness, that frisson of revulsion one senses the closer one gets to the almost in Almost Human.

He called it The Uncanny.

He said this feeling is what “unconsciously reminds us of our own Id, our forbidden and thus repressed impulses perceived as a threatening force by our super-ego.”

More recently Masahiro Mori, roboticist and author of The Buddha in the Robot (Charles E. Tuttle Co.; ISBN 4333010020.) did a study that produced this

handy graph below, illustrating the sudden chasm of revulsion you find the closer you get (but not quite) to human replication.

Putting The Art in Artificial

I believe the roots of coulrophobia (fear of clowns) resides somewhere on the pratfall inducing slippery slope of The Uncanny Valley.

The clown is a kind of simulacrum of an actual human being. The make up, the wig, the sheer deranged unpredictability of the clown has an artificial sheen to it. A glint of malevolence seems to lurk behind those red noses. According to Freud people are afraid of the anarchic presence of clowns because they are afraid they will become one themselves. Just jump into their little car and join the circus. (Sounds familiar.)

Coulrophobia is a genuine fear just like acrophobia but instead of fear of heights, it is a fear born of being perched on the precipice of the yawning chasm of the Uncanny Valley.

Compensating for this natural human reaction is a kind of tight rope act for us clowns.*

*I am in no way comparing what we clowns do to the real high wire act in Kooza, where the fifth generation Quiros circus family nightly taunt gravity armed only with a combination of balance, poles, swords, bicycles and pure nerve.

Taking The Robot Out of Repitition.

I’m not sure where clowns fall on this graph but I imagine them bivouac’d somewhere on the perilous slopes of Mori’s Uncanny Valley where we run the danger of alienating 2500 people nightly.

Repetition can make a robot out of anyone.

Re-attaching to the human, child-like innocent nature of the clown is like picking a scab you can never allow to heal.

Of course repetition has its up side as well. It helps you find the economy of movement, the precision, the sheer physical geometry that allows you to do, say, a particular pratfall 10 shows a week for months at a time.**

**The adaptability of certain falls comes in handy on long runs.

You have a great shoulder roll. When the right shoulder gets bruised, can you adapt the same fall to the left shoulder?

(I trade off nightly which butt cheek I land on in one of my falls in Kooza.)

The Zen of Falling Down

There is a delicate duality at work here.

You’re a clown and the audience knows you may fall down in the course of your high jinks.

They kind of expect it.

But the clown cannot expect it.

That will kill the laugh.

Guaranteed.

The banana peel slip is only funny when the fallee’s mind is elsewhere.

When the oblivious meets the obvious and KE-BLAM!

(This seems to resonate with the idea that the clown lives perpetually in the present with little or no concern for the future.)

Meanwhile the clown, under all the brightly colored finery and his mask of make up must perfect (and maintain) the fall with mindful accuracy to avoid serious injury.

This is all under the penetrating perusal of a ravenously observant audience of 2500 or so that give you the instant feedback on the effectiveness of the bit.

And if they see you giving any indication that you know the fall is coming they will not laugh at it.

The best falls are surprises to everyone.

Especially the one doing the falling.

The clown then must be as surprised as everyone else in the room.

Maybe more so.

Tricky Landscape

Your basic pratfall is kind of like doing a three fold trick:

A trick that you didn’t know you were going to do while you trick yourself into not knowing what’s next while you perform the trick of making something look painful without hurting yourself.

Staying Human under the artificial layers, protecting the delicate latticework of tendons and bone and muscle and leaving your mind behind are just some of the handholds we cling to on the precarious slopes of The Uncanny Valley.

KE-BLAM! 10 shows a week.

"My turn!"

Stamina

Lee and Roch in the shadows of the Bataclan.

Stamina

The etymology of the word stamina is interesting.

The word first appears in 1676 and comes from the Latin stamen.

In those days the word stamen meant “thread” or “warp”.

The original creators of the word stamina prescribed to the notion that the warp is the foundation of the.fabric.

Stamina was defined as a “vital capacity of a person or animal” and “the power to resist and recover.”

Resisting sickness and injury and recovering as a team is what stamina is all about under the blue and yellow.

Each member of this company is a thread that runs through the fabric of each show and we all know that each show is the only one that particular audience is going to see.

Adding some finishing touches to a Denver audience member.

And yes, The Show Must Go On.

Empty Purel bottles stack up in the recycling bin.

Chewable vitamins (aren’t they all, really?) are dispensed like holy wafers to lines of performers.

It’s gotten to the point that some are replacing their High Fives with the much less satisfying but probably less germ distributing Elbow Bumps.

Still, enough performers pick up the flu anyway prompting us to consider changing the show’s name to Flooza.

And there are other dangers.

Angelito the high wire artist just got 22 stitches in his mouth from a winch handle.

Big Dima, a Russian teeterboard catcher, (the French call them porters) got burnt by a muscle stimulation device while receiving therapy for some back pain.

(He’s back in the show, supporting two grown men on his shoulders nightly.)

From the acrobats to the clowns, we’ve all had to fashion our routines around available personnel.

Amazing acts are replaced with equally amazing acts.

Threads are mended and woven back in.

Stamina.

And based on their standing ovations no audience has been the wiser.

Circus Perks

In between shows we found time for another Cirque du Monde event, putting thirty "at risk" kids through a round-robin circus boot camp of sorts. Each of them got a taste of acrobatics, music, prop construction, juggling and finally clowning with myself and the delightful Stefan Landry, (“the Innocent” in our show) and Roch Jutras.

If there is a better feeling than widening some kids eyes for a couple of hours and opening up some young mind to new possibilities I don’t know what it is.

Knee Pads and the Suckhole

Just to the left of where we clowns put our make up on is the suckhole. An air vent that I imagine draws a mix of all the sniffles, colds and other bodily odors in the entire big top and re circulates them I have no idea where.

We use this vent to dry our kneepads.

Clowning means kneepads to most of us.

“Why?”

Except for Roch Jutras, the irrepressible Cirque veteran who has joined us while the injured Christian Fitzharris recovers.

Roch helped train me for the King role in the first place and he is the real deal.

Having begun as an acrobat, continuing as a director and now he is one of the clown sidekicks in our wacky triumvirate.

What a joy to work with him, an athletic miner of the funny with a great smile, sparkling available eyes, Quebecois accent and instincts borne of a life in and around the circus.

Roch does not use knee pads. A true pro and a master of pratfalls- (he does one down the three stairs that lead into the audience that gets laughs and gasps every time.) I wondered aloud one night why he didn’t use knee pads.

His answer: “Why? My knees don’t hit. Only my wrists. But it gets a good laugh, no?”

“Yes, it sure does.” I reply.

That’s Stamina.

Threads holding up the fabric.

Coulrophobia and The Fusiform Gyrus

Twenty minutes to showtime.
I give myself ten minutes.
If it’s an eight o’clock show that means I am out in the audience at 7:40 doing clown work as the “House Manager”.
Shaking hands, getting giggles, generally letting my Id run amok.
I’m testing the waters, tiptoeing on the edge of inappropriateness.
Dipping my big toe into the pool of 2600 people. And wiggling it.

I always try to thank the people in wheel chairs for coming and tell the caregivers sitting next to them how beautiful they look.

The dynamic is delicious. They’re here to have a good time and I’m wearing a ton of (painstakingly applied) make up, a kind of striped clown zoot suit and a wig that looks like two hummingbirds have fought in it for nesting rights.

There can be no doubt by my appearance. I am a clown.

And like Lear’s “all licensed fool”, there is very little that is out of bounds for me.

(Though I did have one kid ask “Are you in the show?” I wanted to say “No kid, I just wear this fright wig and gobs of makeup to help people find their seats.”)

Two masterpieces, one by Picasso.

Coulrophobia

About ninety five percent of the kids out there connect with us clowns much more readily than they may with the amazing acrobats in this show because, well, we are like them: childish.

But there are certain kids, about 5%, who clearly have some very deep form of Coulrophobia. (fear of clowns) running through their viens. One look at my smiling face and they go hysterical.
But not in a good way.

“WAAAHH!!”

And it’s not like they had some traumatic experience with clowns in their young lives, some Stephen King engram branded on their psyche that sends them on a one way ticket to conniption city. Coulrophobia can be an innate, hard wired predisposition and it is quite a thing to behold, let alone cause.

The parents look at me with a look that says “Well that beats us, we just paid a hundred and twenty five dollars so you could traumatize our kid for life. We’ll probably be paying for his therapy for the next ten years. Thanks.”

But the fact remains: a majority of the kids love the clowns in Kooza, but some kids, after one waggle of my insanely arcing eyebrows, are sent into paroxysms of unadulterated terror. Ever cause a spontaneous tantrum in a 5 year old?

I have.

The Mask of Grease and Powder

There have been studies. A hospital in London had to repaint the children’s ward because the circus theme and bright clowny colors were freaking the kids out faster than you can pop a balloon animal with a fistful of thumbtacks.

Apparently there’s something deep seated here and us clowns are depicted as evil in this day and age more often than not.
Heath Ledger’s Joker, the band Insane Clown Posse, the clown spectre from Poltergeist notwithstanding, I wonder when clowns went from empathetic sometimes elegant innocents like Jean Louis Berrault in Les Enfants du Paradis to Tim Curry's malevolent creature in It.

That layer of make up, that fraction of an inch of grease and powder can be enough to curdle the disposition of an impressionable child faster than you can say John Wayne Gacy.

A U-turn on the Mind's Superhighway

Maybe it’s related to the fusiform gyrus.

The fusiform gyrus is the superhighway of the brain along which images from the eye are transmitted by the optic nerve to the visual cortex where the images are processed for perception. It is also described as playing a crucial role in face and body recognition.

The “mask” I wear as both the “House Manager” and the “King of the Clowns” clouds the perception, jangles the fusiform gyrus, plants the seed of fear in some kids. (and adults apparently)

People innately appreciate honesty I guess and when they are confronted with the lie of a false eyebrow or an enhanced leer there is a crack in the fusiform gyrus superhighway. And Coulrotrphobia fills the gap.

“WAAAHH!!”

The word Clown and the adjective Childish have gotten a bad rap. But indeed the role of the clown in society is a sacred office, a naive soothsayer in a complicated world.
Maybe fostering a little of the quality of childishness in our lives would go a long way towards creating a world where honesty is prized over deception. Invention over cynicism and “why not” wins out over “why”.

I remember when I was playing Buckminster Fuller in a one man show and asked a child I sat next to during a performance why humanity was having such a hard time seeing themselves as crew members on “Spaceship Earth”.
The six year old calmly replied “Because the world is run by adults.”
Everyone laughed.

Long live the Clowns.

Heroes, Habits and Making It Crackle

Shiner sings my praises or is saying "NOOO!" I can't remember which.

The Crackle

As performers we all seek it.

It’s a sharpness.
An urgency.
A crispness of delivery.
The unguarded alacrity of thought.
It says “Pay attention audience. Or we will leave you in the dust.”
It’s not about pacing though.
It’s not rushed.
It breathes.
It's a living thing.

It can live in an excruciatingly long pause just as it can live in a flurry of words and action.
And to keep an audience riveted, it is essential.
My fellow clown Jimmy Slonina here at Cirque has a great word for it.
He calls it The Crackle.
And when our bits go well he says
“That was crackly!”

David Shiner worked with us clowns on a recent visit to insure The Crackle Factor was alive here at Kooza.

Heroes

I had spent the morning in the Bronx.

Cirque du Monde, Cirque du Soleil’s outreach program had a few of us out to Hunt’s Point for a break down cruise of perhaps the most environmentally toxic funnels of real estate in the United States where we toured one of the “little victories” these intrepid social worker/activist/clowns have carved out of this ravaged urban landscape.

Sandwiched between a reeking fertilizer factory and the burning smoke stacks of a waste management smelter is a park where kids laugh and play and learn circus skills.

Amid this Industrial wasteland the kids-
(70% of which have extreme cases of asthma from the diesel trucks that they must navigate around to get anywhere)
-spend a few hours after school dodging drive by bullets and the lure of drug dealers to, well, just be kids.The heroes of this story are these young clowns, jugglers and acrobats who come here every day and face the “cooler than thou” teens and pre teens to give them a taste of circus arts and the trust and teamwork these skills entail.

.

We can be heroes, just for one day.

The darkened circles under their eyes are the tell tales of a thousand “Why should I’s” and “I don’t wanna’s”

Then it’s back by dingy subway to the light of the Artistic Tent at Le Grand Chapeteau for my rehearsal with David Shiner.

Breaking Habits

As a director David Shiner can be mean.
In all the right ways.
Mean the way you want your director to be mean.
Like California Shakespeare Theatre director Jonathon Moscone, he cares deeply about the work enough to not be concerned about your perception of him. He wants you to succeed and it might not be all hearts and flowers and nurturing. There might be some deeply entrenched habits that need breaking and David is there to break them.
And I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Nowhere was this better exemplified than when we watched a DVD of a previous performance of mine.
On the screen I make a kind of clever, facile and theatrical choice that may have served me well in the theatre world and David pauses the tape-

“No! No! No! No! NO!” he cries and stamps the ground with his foot.
“Why did you do that?”
“Well, I thought-“
“NOO! You’re supposed to be an idiot! You can’t think!”

Maddening as these contradictions seem, the upshot is that my character must always come back to simply being me.
Confused, addled, distractable, excitable, dictatorial, adorable but always coming back to me.

We rework the “Transformation” section of the act-
(The boxer now takes a knock out punch and I get to do a nice rag doll fall. See My Brain Is My Enemy)
–and somehow the work magically goes from replication to actual creation and a wonderful sense of ownership starts to form.
The next night, sweaty, exhilarated, I exit from our first scene and find Shiner exulting me in the tunnel: “That’s it! You rocked it!”

Jimmy and I keeping it crackly.

My job has suddenly become both easier and harder:

Easier because as long as I breathe and have fun and stay in the moment I can always come back to myself as the base character.

Harder because doing that is a very vulnerable and naked way to work.

No artifice.
No theatrical slight of hand.
No display of technique.
No cleverness.
Just me.
Breathing.
Having fun as The King of the Clowns,
In the moment
And making it Crackle.

Nine shows a week.

Pinch Me Hard

Pinch me.
Pinch me hard.

I want to know this is real but it feels like a fabulous dream.

After my plane was delayed at the San Francisco airport, (A Ron-delay?) sitting on the tarmac for two and a half hours while the captain occasionally gave us status reports:

“A fifteen cent bolt was replaced with the wrong one back at the hanger so we’re looking for the right one. We checked the red tray in the parts box but the paperwork didn’t match up so we went back to the hanger and we’re checking the parts locker over near the vending machine we have. There’s an outside chance we’ll find it in the gray cabinet at the bottom drawer- We’ll keep you posted.”

That is a direct quote.

Presumably they give you all this detail to put your mind at ease.
Dear American Airlines,
It doesn’t work.

“This is your captain speaking again. We’ve sent someone over to the supply room on the south side of the runway and we’re in contact with him via walkie-talkie. His name is Carl and he’s wearing a red baseball cap because it is a bit nippy out there-“

Will you shut up?!

So we finally get under way but it’s too late for me to make my connection at Ohare so I spend the night in Chicago and fly out to Montreal the next day.

Luckily getting my work permit goes off without a hitch and my luggage is waiting for me at the airport. Benoit, the fedora clad driver from Cirque du Soleil takes me to headquarters and it begins.

Apparently when you join a company like this they like to know what they’re getting.

In the past 2 days I’ve had a physical examination, a baseline brain test- (so if I have a concussion on the job they can give it to me again to see if I’ve got a hitch in my mental git-along) and I’ve had my full head cast. Through this all my heart is racing. Is this really happening? Somebody pinch me! Please!

Head in clouds, heart in throat.

I’ve had a shoe fitting. They are completely custom.

Can you say butter?

Then I have a make up test with designer Florence Cornet. We're going with a kind of Don Quixote look which I love:

Okay, maybe a little more Don Knotts than Don Quixote but you get the idea.

A wig fitting.

Can you say Plastic Man?

And a full head cast. Quite shocking to see yourself in such detail.

Two Rons don't make a right.

Finally I am introduced to my personal clown coach Roch. Great guy. He was an actor, became an acrobat and is now a clown. (I guess I’m skipping the acrobat stage.) Now he teaches clowning to “at risk” kids around Canada for Cirque. And me. Am I “at risk” too?

So they put Roch and I in a room with a bunch of props and we start hammering out the funny.
At last my training begins.
But come to think of it, I’ve been training for this all my life.
Maybe it started 40 something years ago when I stood at the end of a diving board somewhere in the San Fernando Valley and begged my dad to “Shoot me! Shoot me!” and fell into the water with legs and arms akimbo. When I got to the surface they were laughing. Hmmm.

(In those days I didn't dream of being a clown or even an actor when I grew up. I wanted to be a stunt man like my dad’s friend Hal Needham who created Stunts Unlimited.)

I heard an interview with Leonard Cohen shortly before leaving San Francisco. He quoted a Zen saying that may be apropos: "Leap and the net will appear."

Now here I am diving into another pool entirely, body akimbo, head in the clouds, heart in my throat, but instead of yelling “Shoot me! Shoot me!” I’m saying:

“Pinch me.”

“Pinch me hard.”

Squeezing the Lemon

Many years ago, while studying with Georges Bigot of the Theatre du Soliel ( a seminal workshop that had a lot to do with the formation of the Actors’ Gang) I was introduced to the concept of “Squeezing the Lemon.”

Existing somewhere between “Carpe Diem” and “Milking It”, Squeezing the Lemon was Bigot’s way of admonishing us to explore all the comic/tragic possibilities of a moment before moving on to the next. It’s become part of my own vocabulary when teaching and I’ve tried to keep the concept alive in both my art and life and I think my last week in San Francisco is a bit of a testament to that.

So here’s how I tried to "Squeeze the Lemon" before heading off to join Cirque.

The Ship

First a final sail on Valhalla. A brisk breeze, Danielle by my side, cole slaw and sushi at sea, a nip of Laphroig at port. Perfection. It almost hurt to button the boat up and say goodbye for now. Knowing she’s there, (growing a pendulous green beard of sea life) will soften my own feelings of moorlessness on the road.

The Crew

Next, had some great dinner parties with my very own Wicked Mercy Danielle Thys and Jeffrey Wiseman and Kimble Jackson, Lol Levy and Nancy Gold, (Click here to check out her book Finding Your Funny Bone) Carol Brubaker and Luc Martin.

Nancy spread her incredible collection of masks out on the floor at one point. Many designed by the late Bari Rolfe. All those personalities staring up at us filled the room with a this incredible feeling of power and expectation. These things are so packed with sheer mana. Here's just a few I shot at Nancy's book signing at Borders in San Rafael:

Jeffrey showed us some of his rare and fantastic collection of classic comedy footage. Jeffrey was giving me a crash course in clowning and I was just soaking in all that brief and flickering genius. (Lupino Lane, Charlie Chase, Martha Rae, et al) I was part laughing part crying throughout. Crying because of the sheer gravity of time separating us from these brilliant performers and laughing because, well, they’re so damn funny. I believe now I’ve watched every George Carl clip available. Click Here for him. I think there’s a quality he has that might be right for my King/House Manager character in Kooza!

The Sword

The Nishi Kaigan Iaido Dojo demonstrates a little Zanshin.

My Penultimate day in the Bay Area was spent at the Cherry Blossom Festival demonstrating Iaido with my colleagues from the Nishi Kaigan Iaido Dojo. As Nidan, I performed 5 Waza including Shinobu, (pictured) and a raucous katsu dinner with Sensei Diamantstein and the rest of the iaidoka followed.

High winds may have effected my performance somewhat.

The Show

With Gilkey and his "band", Jane.

On my final night I was a guest on The Gilkey Show, former Cirque du Soleil clown John Gilkey’s live talk show at the Climate Theatre where I did some mime, made a little funny, cut my finger onstage on a Campbell’s soup can I was using for a gag and got a grand send off with balloons, party hats, and jugglers hugging me (plus a nice bottle of wine from Jen Fong and a couple of squeezes from Robin Harvey/Trousdale) as I went off to Cirque with the strains of Alegria wailing in the background.

Joyous, but there were some tears. The next morning Danielle took me to the airport.
I guess when you Squeeze the Lemon you risk getting a little in your eye.

Next stop: Montreal

Jerk du Soleil

The species Goofus Idiotus Maximus
Costume fitting room at the Montreal Headquarters