A relevant theatrical format

September 27, 2008

Leading up to the Michigan trip I was getting e-mails from the Toronto Clown Festival that included interviews with the performers.

Here are their responses to one particular question I also needed to address in writing a business plan:

Do you think clown is a relevant theatrical format? Why?

Nicolas M. Di Gaetano

Nicolas M. Di Gaetano

“Anything static and method-centric runs the risk of remaining enclosed within the circle of those who understand it. Theatre is a tough medium as it is, so to brandish an obstacle like this where only those who do it support it may not be the most clever thing to do. Sure clowns in theatre are relevant, but to stick to specific clown-theatre smells of limitation which is maybe not so relevant.” – Nicolas M. Di Gaetano

Shelley Marshall

Shelley Marshall

“If you take “Borat” as an example, he needed a “real” audience to perform in front of to create the energy necessary to prove his point. He was theatrically performing in front of an audience that translated very well on film, but he needed a live audience to do that.  The theatrical format is critical to successfully performing bouffon! It’s the mingling of reactions that excites the bouffon.” – Shelley Marshall

Melissa D’Agostino

Melissa D’Agostino

“I think clown is a necessary theatrical format.  It’s about humanity at its simplest level: the pleasure to be silly and the joy of failing.  There is nothing more theatrical or universal than that. It also keeps the actor connected to the audience in a very meaningful, playful and hugely necessary way. This is an element so often neglected in other forms of theatrical expression, unfortunately.  Without the audience, the clown has no one to share her successes or failures with. Without the clown, the audience member can’t laugh at her mistakes.  It’s a pretty marvelous and freeing relationship.” – Melissa D’Agostino

Precious Chong

Precious Chong

“I think humour is a very powerful way of communicating.  I like laughing and I find human beings endlessly fascinating.  I’m a little nervous answering this question because I feel like I’m a traditional “clown” novice.  So I’m not an authority by any means.  But I love circus and vaudeville and burlesque.  Also, I think one of the great dangers in life is to take oneself and/or life too seriously.  Clown is a constant reminder to hold it all lightly.” – Precious Chong

Ravi Jain

Ravi Jain

“It always will be relevant because it is a style which allows us to look at us at our most ridiculous. It is important that we look in order to remain humble.” – Ravi Jain

http://www.torontoclown.com/

http://www.torontoclown.com/

Though I missed it this year, I’m keeping it in mind for next year.  Check out the 16 day Clown Intensive and 6 day Clown Boot Camp offered by the Clown Farm.

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Pieing Zander the Great

September 24, 2008

I got invited to Terry Zander’s birthday celebration at Traditions Fair Trade Cafe last month.  He wrote:

Food & libations will be provided

You are requested to provide the music, jokes, stories, and ?

Money will be given away.

I offered him a pie-in-the-face, and he agreed. One one condition:

“I hope you could do the pie thing close to 8, so I have time to clean up whatever mess is made without disrupting the party” NO PROBLEM

Since he was providing food, he especially wanted to get firm RSVPs. In fact, he sent such a flurry of e-mails concerning the details that I completely mistook the urgency of the message and showed up on Sunday, August 31st instead of Sunday, September 21st!

It was a two-digit Sunday that ended in a one!

With Trish and Orion in tow, we pulled up to Traditions near 8 PM and found the doors locked and the lights off. I asked her, “Isn’t it the 21st? The International Day of Peace?” She said, “It’s the THIRTY-FIRST.”

“Oh, well, I guess we’re early. … By a month.”

Luckily, Tommy “Pizza T” McKaughan was having his birthday party that night. I’ve already posted that picture.

By the time Terry’s actual party rolled around, Trish and Orion had made other plans. It was Gavin’s 5th birthday (at a bowling alley), and Trish had her GRE study class.

I got a ride from Tony, one of Terry’s son from Kelso. He’s a server at Red Lobster. He drives a Red Truck.

Terry had assigned seats. I sat down and opened up my face paints. My first customer was Kallie. Then she played a great set before leaving to play with her band Deaf Lester at Plenty. (Food and all that)

Kallie of Deaf Lester

When it looked light the night was coming to a close I ran up and did a short act that included Indonesian cultural heritage material.

  • Snowball the Spinning Pie-Rat
  • Orangutan not Orangutang [The first means person of the forest, the second means person in debt!]
  • Boleh Saya Minta Tolong Pinjam Sedikit Uang (May I Ask a Favor to Borrow a Little Money?)
  • Juggling No Small Change Coins
  • Flipping Fans [I did double flips as well (two hands simultaneously flipping)!]
  • Juggling Fire

As I was introducing the idea of the pie as innocence, a blank slate, new beginning, etc. I was gesturing with the empty pie shell out the windows, and my phone rang.

Without even pausing, I answered, “Oh, nothing much… I’m JUST IN THE MIDDLE OF MY ACT!”

It was Trish, parked across the street, directly where I’d been gesturing. Orion had fallen asleep in the car. I put her on the speaker-phone everyone in the audience could say HI.

Okay, okay, do the pie and come home, right. I exited, stage left and filled the shell with whipped topping.

Terry told a joke about a bible-salesman with a speech impediment, and then I let him have it.

terry zander pied by jusby the clown

Terry Zander and Jusby in Tyvek with Face Shield

Did he give away money?  He gave away Lotto tickets.  When those were gone, he gave out dollar bills.

I gave out $4 bills.

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Kagami Stills from DVD

September 16, 2008

It may be a while before we get this thing youtubed … or even bliptv’d, as it were.

This occurs, as you may notice, at 8 minutes into the episode, during Sandman’s duet with Jen Graves.

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Uncanny Leaps

September 16, 2008

Again, Michigan summers are hot. Hotter than Washington summers. And muggy with mosquitoes. Timing our outdoor excursions properly was everything.

One morning we got an early start by paying a visit to Dad’s neighbors, Judy and Safu. They have a modest in-ground pool. Although they had guests from England visiting and everyone was still waking up around 10 AM, they let us use their pool.

It also has a modest diving board.

Orion and I swam for an hour or so, and then the English guests came out to swim and bask. The two adults basked. The two kids swam.

Safu stopped by and invited us to help ourselves to beverages in the fridge. Once Orion got a shot of that Root Beer he was good to go for another few hours. Although he said he was scared of the diving board, the young lad from the UK said, “It’s fun really.”

And that was good enough for Orion. He dove into 9 feet of water, exhilarated and carbonated! We stayed until nap time. I was quite sunburned. Orion had bronzed.

A few days later…

we drove to Ann Arbor to use the Huron Valley Swim Club. I had learned to swim there during my summer vacations. Aunt Mary Catherine told us that they were still members, so I planned to sign in as ‘Paul Wright’.

It took us a number of trips and web research to find the place. The last time I’d been there had been in the early 90s when I rode my bike there from Granny’s house.

Granny’s house nowadays

It was a Sunday when we finally knew where to go. It’s a hard switchback down a gravel road, so it was easy to miss coming from the opposite direction. En route, in the Camry the radio just happened to be tuned to WEMU and I heard the voice of my old friend, Arwulf Arwulf. It was his show The Sunday Best! So I pulled over and called in to the station. He was happy to hear from me, encouraged me to check his playlists, promised to respond to e-mails, and while he was otherwise engaged that afternoon he mentioned us on the air.

“You might go swimming today, like Justin and his son are doing”

[I once had to explain to the A2 Fire Department a huge bonfire I'd built in Arwulf's backyard to clear dead wood away]

We arrived at the HVSC and I noticed that they’d upgraded the entryway with a computer and what looked like a bar code scanner. Momentary panic as I realized I didn’t have a digital membership card. However, I knew the route, and I quickly saw an ordinary pen and paper sign-in sheet, so I wrote simple “Wright” and walked around the high school boy who was watching the door.

We showered and went in.

Orion decided to go up the high dive. At the top he started to have second thoughts, but an older boy at the bottom said, “It’s fun,” and I swam out to the middle in case he needed me. He jumped off into 14 feet of water, but it hurt his belly. From then on he stuck with the low dive.

Feeling the fear and…

doing it anyway!

Emerging victoriously!

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Double Hats

September 16, 2008

The story of the Double Hats

Right as we were walking out the door to fly to Michigan I decided that I needed to bring both of my black formal hats… stacked one on top of the other. I knew there was a slight risk of losing them, but I vowed to be mindful and attentive.

I purchased hat number one from the Clown Shop in Lakewood right as Jusby’s character was being born. It’s a black felt top hat.

This is my tip-top, well, it’s my top hat, AND my tip hat, so it’s really my tip-top hat. You can put tips IN it when it’s not ON top. Hey, do you know what my tie said to my hat this morning? It said, ‘You go on a head, and I’ll hang around here for a while!’

I had Nita put a red band around it when she was tailoring my old white tux. I was a Dandy Tramp of sorts. I was a nouveau-pauvre (or New Poor… a clown who was still living it up in spite of losing everything in a dot com bust and market crash).

Eventually the red band disappeared, and I replaced it with a green one. I kept funny money in the band.

Hat number two has a more mysterious origin.

I’d wanted a Bowler hat ever since I’d seen the first 20 minutes of LASER Vaudeville at the Washington Center. They’d done all sorts of hat tricks that are impossible with a flat top hat. Then I met Sage of the Petting Zoo players, and he sports a bowler! Then I met (on-line) Chance Marmelade of Troupe Comique, and he wears a bowler too!

One day Trish arranged for us to go help pick up some furniture we were inheiriting from a friend. However, we would only be physically picking it up long enough to load it onto the upholsterer’s truck. We’re getting a free couch, chair and ottoman, but they all need to be reupholstered.

At his house we started looking over the fabric samples. and looked. and looked. We’d need a dozen yards of material at a variety of prices. This project was going to cost as much as new furniture for sure. The cost would be somewhat defrayed if I spent some time in the workshop removing the old fabric. It sounded fun, but I didn’t schedule a particular time for it.

As we drove off I spotted a hat. On the opposite side of the street. In the grass of the green buffer between the sidewalk and road. Right where people leave free stuff or garbage. I had Trish stop the car, and I jumped out to fetch it. It’s a nice black bowler.

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Meeting Clash in Kalamazoo

September 14, 2008

During the Michigan trip…

I called “Clash” (Anna Wilinski) of Jest Party (Kazoo Party Crew), and she said she’d help arrange for a CLOWN FIESTA! I desperately wanted to connect with other clowns for National Clown Week. I told her that a photo opportunity would be worth a great deal. We’d come 2000 miles already, so I could easily manage another 200 (Round Trip).

Jusby in Kalamazoo! Jusby in Ypsilanti! Jusby sketching a giraffe at the zoo and it looks like a balloon giraffe! LMAO! It was an exhilarating conversation. I was on fire with ideas.

She thought that she could learn a lot from ME! It turned out to be the complete opposite. Anna is a great teacher! She’s an award-winning face painter. I was a doodler and dabbler.

88.6 miles from Grumps to Kalamazoo! In a Toyota Camry with no air conditioning.

And the driver’s window doesn’t roll down. At mid day on August 31st.

We stopped in Battle Creek after Orion had fallen asleep. I took him to see Wall-E at the mall.

LOVED IT!

When we arrived in Kalamazoo it was time for a swimming trip with Anna and friends at the public park. I also brought the PVC stilts to walk on the beach with our new friends.

Then we went to Perkins for a clown meeting. Two other clowns showed up. One was SuzyQ who is primarily a Balloon Twister.  The other one was Anna’s mom, Donna.

Donna in clown

Most of the others were either on vacation or at Mooseburger camp.  So we just had an intimate chat.  I explained that I had not yet joined the COAI (Clowns of America International), and Donna offered to “take up a collection for Jusby”.  She said that their publication, The New Calliope had vastly improved in recent history.  I have since paid my membership dues but not yet received my first issue.

Donna, Anna, SuzyQ, Jusby and Orion (note Jusby’s double decker hat and Anna’s face painting trunk)

Three Generations of clowns.

Anna and I did some team painting. I followed her lead. Here’s the two-tone brush technique. Mine is the left.

Now using two-tone sponge technique with brushes for a full face tiger. Mine is the right side.

Here’s the fruit bag stencil technique for dragon scales.

Here’s the finished dragon. I did the right side again.

Orion loved his Spiderman face all through dinner (Chocolate Chip Pancakes with Bacon and Blueberry drink).
After eating, the kids hadn’t had enough play time, so we adjourned to Donna’s house until dusk.  She was very happy to try out the stilts.  Anna prepared some special face-paints for me and we drove off into the sunset.

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Pieing video from Super Sat

September 8, 2008

Thanks for e-mailing this phone camera video!

Audience support helps keep the media flowing.

Any photos or videos you send are good for discounts on future services.

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Kagami at TCTV finally

September 6, 2008

Katy, Bruce, Heather, Justin, Deborah, and Gabe

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Kagami Reunion Tonight (Fri 9.5.08)

September 5, 2008

A dedicated core group of butoh critters will perform tonight (Fri 9.5.08) on TCTV’s Dance Oly Dance from 8 – 8:15.

This group includes Deborah Butler (Berkley), Gabe Raley (LA), Heather Duke (Olympia), Larissa Podzaline (Olympia), Bruce Fogg (Olympia), and Justin Wright (Olympia).

We invite any former students of doranne crable to participate.  The group will move from the TV studio to the Evergreen campus for a pilgrimage through student housing and culminate on Red Square.

We will be getting into make-up in the Governor House at 4pm and arriving at TCTV (440 Yauger Way) by 6pm.

Join us in person or see us on channel 22 at 8pm.

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Cousin Jeff

September 3, 2008

BTW,

Cousin Jeff DeBin is ‘Psychedelic’ from Meta Theory, a nerdcore band from Detroit.  Actually, he described it somewhat differently, but I suggested the term and he agreed that it fit.  I heard the genre ‘nerdcore’ first used about MC Frontalot.

Jeff used the terms hip-hop and progrock.

Jeff told me that their latest album makes extensive use of the Fibonacci sequence for its time signature.

If we’d been in town longer I might’ve been able to get a copy of it or see him play live, but I’m definitely gonna hook him up with some Bryce Panic, Sandman, Log Hog, et al for a little of that Northwest hip hop sound.

Maybe book him some shows out here.  It’s just a two man band, but the other guy has a job!  Jeff could get him to quit for a tour.

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The PVC Stilts

September 2, 2008

Cousins Jeff, Sasha, and PJ with Grumps, Jusby and Orion with the PVC Stilts we made in our free time.

They made a great hollow Thunk with each step.

I toyed with these ideas:

  • smoke coming out of the top
  • bubbles coming out of the top
  • springs inside for more sound effects
  • speakers inside for music coming out
  • stripes (painted or taped)

Later Grumps started thinking about how he might cut them apart for shipping back here.  There’s actually a set for Orion too.

It ran about $50 in parts and an hour of labor plus drying time for the Gorilla Glue.

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Musical Score for Kagami Reunion

September 1, 2008

Just burned 14 min 2 second score.

Agent Tao “Life But Passion”

An alarm clock is dropped on the sidewalk from a second story window

My friend and I kneeled and buried it and when we dug we found an adding machine

and what can I ask of life but passion?  And what can I ask of life but passion?

George Crumb “Ancient Voices of Children II” (Based on Lorca)

Bobby McFerrin “Flight of the BumbleBee” (Based on Rimsky-Korsakov’s opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan)

SWAN-BIRD:
Well, now, my bumblebee, go on a spree,
catch up with the ship on the sea,
go down secretly,
get into a crack a little distance away.
Good luck, Gvidon, fly,
only do not stay long!
(The bumblebee flies away.)

Sandman “I Still Miss Someone”

At my door the leaves are falling, a cold wild wind has come

sweethearts walk by together, and I still miss someone.

I go out on a party and look for a little fun

but I find a darkened corner cuz I still miss someone

Though I never got over those blue eyes

I see them everywhere

I miss those arms that held me when all the love was there.

Bryce Panic “Track 13 (Can I Kick It?)”

14 minutes and 2 seconds, enough lead time for the producer to switch disks to the rest of the hour.

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Pizza T Pied

September 1, 2008

Happy 30th Birthday Pizza T!  The KFC was da Bomb!

Visit Z-Kamp at http://zkamp.com/

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