Life and Death ...
Gotta love Shakespeare - The Comedy of Errors (a ... comedy) starts with a man being condemned to death. (Egeon, a merchant of Syracuse, is condemned to death in Ephesus for violating the ban against travel between the two rival cities). My dark imagination was engaged.

​Set-up = stage set
The great joy of directing a final year production at a Drama School means the Design Students can support the production. I decided on a bold premise. The whole play takes place on a television sound stage. Before the play proper begins, people with headsets and clipboards roam the set - at this moment just a large empty grey platform with a gentle rake.

Most of the play was played for comedy - there was, however a Dark Clown predicament in the opening scene, which I describe here.

Pressurised Predicament - Beat the Clock
A giant clock face (whose hands turned throughout the play) is suspended at the back. At certain moments, the names of the various shows* is projected onto it e.g. (towards the end): 'The Abbess knows Best'.

A sofa is brought on and we hear a classic undulating tones of an American chat show Voice Over: 'Ladies and Gentlemen, citizens of Ephesus, welcome to 'Beat the Clock', with your host, that provocative Prince of electrifying entertainment, Duke Solinus! 

Act 1 Scene 1 - bit of Implication
Canned applause and the production staff gee up the live audience applause too, using cue cards.

​Duke Solinus: Hello Ephesians! Welcome to the show where we find out: will someone be Frying To(morrow ) Night? (Badoom tish ending in a short blare of electrical fizz) But first, do you want to see the chair?  

Audience are encouraged by cue cards to chant 'Show. Us. The chair!'​ (supported by canned chanting)

A chair, somewhat reminiscent of an electric chair, is brought on. (Scary tick tick buzz sting and the chanting ends on a button)

Duke Solinus: So, Lance - who do we have in the chair tonight?
Voice Over: Well, Duke, today's illegal immigrant comes all the way from Syracuse. He's a small businessman, separated from his family. Let's give a warm welcome to our somewhat melancholy merchant from ... Syracuse!

Audience are encouraged by cue cards to boo at the mention of their rival town​ (supported by canned booing), as Egeon - in an orange prison uniform, handcuffed and hooded is frogmarched on by two operatives wearing attire reminiscent of executioners and differently masked.

Egeon's hood is whipped off and the poor man flinches and blinks, dazzled by the light. A studio crew operative has crawled on and, kneeling, affixes a lapel mic to Egeon, which unexpected action (and the fact that there are wires involved) startles and frightens the captive Egeon.

Duke Solinus: Speak, Syracusian! 
.... 'say in brief the cause
Why thou departed'st from thy native home
And for what cause thou camest to Ephesus.'

High Stakes and Enforced Performance
Egeon begins to tell his tale (the pressure is on because Egeon's tale is, not in the least 'brief'). Plus  not only is the poor man being forced to tell his tale, he finds himself in the ghastly position of being made complicit in the prostitution of his personal pain. No sooner has he begun, when smiling hired actors dressed as mimes come on with props to enact the events. Imagine the humiliation of your heart-rending tale being presented as prime time entertainment. Imagine recounting how sailors stranded you, your wife and your twin babies to a 'sinking-ripe' ship while smiling facilitators waft a rising cloth (to represent the sea) up to your neck and bind plastic baby dolls (representing your missing children and their servants) together. Imagine hearing audience laughter while this is happening.

When Egeon falters with stress, disorientation and emotion, the Duke says:
'Nay, forward, old man; do not break off so;
For we may pity, though not pardon thee.'
It's like those unscrupulous reporters who prod people's emotions: 'And how did it feel when (the disastrous thing) happened?'. Here it is even worse: 'You're still going to die, but let us have an emotional experience from your predicament'.

The cost
Egeon is forced to continue his account and he does, lamenting that
'by misfortunes was my life prolonged
To tell sad stories of my own mishaps.'

Whereupon, the Duke obliges him to recount more: 'dilate at full
What hath befall'n of them and thee till now.'

Once Egeon has been wrung out, Solinus makes (in this production) a show of cheesy magnanimity by posing the challenge:
'I'll limit thee this day
To seek thy life by beneficial help:
Try all the friends thou hast in Ephesus;
Beg thou, or borrow, to make up the sum,
And live; if no, then thou art doom'd to die.'

As in the plot of the film Run Lola Run, Egeon must raise a huge sum (in this case, a thousand marks) and he only has 24 hours to do so (... or 'feel the burn').

Duke Solinus then points in a showman-like manner at the large clock which sounds a few loud and momentous ticks, followed by the electrical buzz sting. 

Egeon is stripped of his prison uniform and begins his faltering steps off stage while studio crew rush onto the set with cue cards encouraging the audience to chant 'Beat the Clock!'​ (supported by canned chanting).

On to Act 1, Scene 2 ...

* Antipholus of Ephesus's house was played like Friends, with Adriana and Luciana discussing Adriana's problems over a tub of Hagen Daas. At the moments there were costumes and props for other shows passing through e.g. a war programme. Plus Teleevangelism (Pinch) and adverts for Angelo's jewellery business. The courtesan was portrayed as a successful Dominatrix. Voice Over: "In just a moment it's double your pleasure with the gang from 'Ephesus Bay' - it's the one where Adriana's miffed at Antipholus's tardiness, Luciana is obsessed by hot new boy in town and as usual, Dromio gets the wrong end of the stick ... Laugh? You will, but first a glimpse of late night low life - it seems local businessmen are seeking a little correction in 'Ephesus Vice'. Stay tuned!"

Don't read this post, it's too personal and soppy. 

I was teaching last year (2019) in Leamington Spa - a special in-house course for a dance theatre company. As part of teaching Clown State, I mention finding an image for your heart.

In a break, one of the participants came up to me and said what is the image for your clown heart? Ha! good call. I often work from the heart centre, put my energy and focus there, but had not stopped to actually visualise a personalised image for my heart in clown mode.

So I thanked the woman for her question and just dropped the question into my intuitive thinking - and then I remembered an image from a book I read in childhood.

​I did some research recently and found information about the author: Ivy Wallace. As a firm believer that accidents are 'manna from heaven', I was delighted to read how the illustrated story had come into being by accident: 'While working on a police switchboard, she doodled a picture of a fairy sitting on a toadstool with a little rabbit in front and by chance it appeared that the wings belonged to the rabbit. She then decided that fairies were "two a penny" so she erased the fairy and kept the little winged rabbit ... and wrote his story.” As well as working as a Police Officer, Ivy Wallace also founded her own book company!

Pookie - (I know, even as a child I found the name somewhat cutesy - but check this - Ivy Wallace's father was Scots and here is a Scots definition of the word pooky) - we meet Pookie living with his family. He has these two tiny useless wings and his siblings tease him because of this. He sleeps in a bed with all his brothers and sisters and that looks cosy except it's not because Pookie is an inconvenience because of his wings. Pookie's mother actually bandages them up at night. Omg - something as wondrous as wings must be tidied and bundled away. Like foot-binding! Something unique about you makes you both ridiculous and resented even in your own family - Pookie is an outsider and an underdog. 

As you see from the book cover illustration, he takes a classic bundle-on-a-stick and goes out to 'seek his fortune'. He is on a quest even though he does not know what he is looking for; and no one he meets, no matter how magical, can offer him any advice or guidance. Ah - the clown (and spiritual) practice of not-knowing.

At the end, having journeyed far, a snowstorm overtakes Pookie and he is swept by the wind onto the doorstep of a kind and lonely little girl. When she puts him by the fire to warm up, two little broken, frozen fragments, bright as rubies, fall out of his fur. The girl mends Pookie's heart and pops it back into his fur. Oh and his wings grow beautiful and big.

The under-valued Pookie's intrepidness in the face of uncertainty and his mended-broken-ruby-bright heart make interesting ingredients for Clown.

There are two parts to this post. Trigger warnings: race, prostitution, colonialism and eek, yes a bit of a gentle feminist viewpoint.

First, an acknowledgement that, as a white educated woman, I aim to interrogate myself for the ways I may be perpetuating and benefiting from racist systems. Also to say that I aim to hold the Dark Clown work in general as ethically as I can, always being ready to learn and address new awarenesses and other perspectives as they come to my attention. The edginess of the work keeps me vigilant and I aim to hold the notions of exploitation and profiteering in mind as I write.

Part 1: A desperate response
Back in 2016, one woman responded to the reports of a disproportionate number of Police shootings of black citizens, and to the racist White Lives Matter moment which arose in response to the #BlackLivesMatter movement. According to the TYT coverage (see below) of the video, her name is Tashala Dangel Geyer.

This amazing woman posted a piece of performance art or activism online (to my knowledge, she herself did not define it in any way*). If you google 'woman paints herself white', you'll find clips of people watching the footage and wondering 'is she crazy?' (while at the same time saying she is 'serious' and also judging her as if she were proposing this as a serious 'answer'). One vlogger felt it was unhelpful to the issues at stake.

​The video and images from it are often taken down because of the small amount of nudity involved (the paint largely obscures any anatomical detail although occasionally, she turns around and we see her body without the coverage of paint). 

'If you wanna survive'
I admire what Dangel Geyer has done.
She begins with: 'This the best shit I ever could have thought of. This is saving my life! 
​... You know what, the Lord woke me up - and sent me this sign (slapping the brush to paint her inner thighs, profile view)  so I went on ahead to Home Depot and got this paint.
(Standing facing us) 'Cos white lives matter. Guess what? White lives matter. White Lives. (painting her right leg again).  Just white. White. White. White white white white.  (Exhales)
That’s the argu – never – if you wanna survive ... I’mma keep sayin’  (right palm up) go white!
Jus' go white ... Baby, I don’t want nothing brown on me.'
She continues with her message to 'Black families' and keeps interrupting herself by spotting bits of her body that she has missed. It's a classic clown predicament of solution-problem-solution-problem. She is working with repetition, interruption and rhythm. She engages her audience, too, asking the viewer to 'Hep me out' ... so that she misses no patches that would give her away. ... 'Bring in the white! Hoo, gonna be a’right' (painting left armpit) ... (waves left hand in front of her face, to indicate) 'Ronald MacDonald, man! You won’t get shot.'

Troubled Laughter 
I first watched the footage with compulsion. Her focus and commitment are palpable. I am also surprised into uneasy laughter by this woman's lively rhythms and wit, combined with the horror of the situation i.e. I am afraid for my life because of the way I look / because of the way I am -  it's not a comfortable laugh. 
In this video document, a woman demonstrates vulnerability by appearing naked live online.**
​At the same time she makes a very direct address to the audience. This piece has many elements of Dark Clown work: Troubled Laughter, Palpable Cost, direct appeal to the audience - we witness her and those of us with caucasian privilege experience Implication. Also, Dangel Geyer has the courage to allow us to witness (and experience) Marginalised Emotion - plus she possesses good comedy craft.

Distance 
Dark Clown, similar to Comedy, equals 'Tragedy plus time'. Dark Clown work (as I work with it in teaching and in dramaturgy) needs sufficient distance from the actual real life predicament / subject. Often by being abstractified into a non-specific Absurd realm (see the posts on The Maids and this review of Hamlet or Die) and / or by a distance of time.
Dangel Geyer's piece / statement / performance is very close to the bone. It is temporally immediate, dealing with ongoing race issues and pointing at the entrenched impasse between those trying to raise awareness of inequality and of conscious (and unconscious) bias and those who somehow manage to interpret #BlackLivesMatter as a threat to their own rights and validity. Racist behaviour and inequality have, in the UK have been exacerbated by Government policies of austerity and by the xenophobic media campaign in advance of Br*xit. 

... a 'sidebar' musing on spatial distance and intimacy
Dangel Geyer's piece / statement / performance exists online - the internet being a medium which can often create positive connection but which is also well known for knee-jerk, divisive reaction. It is a courageous choice of platform. There is no time here to  contrast and compare the internet with the more dream-like, contemplative space of a theatre where life can be seen simultaneously intimately, but also at a remove, except perhaps to ponder whether we can say that, as theatre offers a physiological experience of shared space in the auditorium, it may possibly contribute more to cohesion as opposed to division between watchers.

Controversy
TYT coverage of the phenomenon is in this clip together with a discussion (from a mainly white) panel. One panellist manages to make sexualised comments about the footage, even while conceding / recognising that the woman's intent was not sexual. But that is a side note to the thrust of this blog post.
​
When some vloggers who review / watch this video call her crazy, they fail to  consider that the author of the footage, Tashala Dangel Geyer may be, like Hamlet, only mad 'north-north-west'.*** She knows what she is doing, she is doing what she is doing for a purpose, for effect. Hamlet uses a smokescreen of craziness to a purpose (we are never quite sure whether it's to buy time, to be discounted, thereby making spying on Claudius more easy allow himself more licensee to say the unsayable?). We can say that Dangel Geyer  in fact is braver than Hamlet as she is saying the unsayable and taking the absurdity of a situation to a logical conclusion.
I find her piece / statement / performance bitingly apposite, witty, disturbing and also moving.

The medium (housepaint, not social media) and the message
A couple of the male viewers express concern about the paint on her skin. Rightly so  - it's housepaint. Yes, uncomfortable, unhealthy and must have been difficult to remove. She is being bold and reckless for a purpose. Using some nice pan-stick make-up would have sent a completely different message. Makeup coverage would have risked being too light and cosmetic an effect. It may have been a contributing factor that paint was more affordable than makeup. 
Paint is also a protection for wood, whereas make-up is more aesthetic, designed to create an illusion, an enhancement or possibly an enticement.
House paint is a rough and ready solution, and an accessible one. This woman is communicating immediacy and pragmatism as well as communicate desperation. She addresses her audience with urgency. Go, go now to Home Depot - a different message to: google your nearest Kryolan outlet.

Dangel Geyer is not to my knowledge a theatre maker, she is a human being responding to a desperate predicament. What we see in this remarkable creative document is a human being in extremis, demonstrating the absurdity of her situation by pretending she has discovered and is sharing an absurd 'solution'. 

Part 2: A strong challenge
The Dark Clown work provides a way to address tragic and troubling issues. The subtitle of the Dark Clown documentary is 'taking Laughter to the Limits.' Yes even the Troubled Laughter has limits - for example, it does not include Evil Laughter. More than once I have been asked if it were possible to portray the issue of violence towards women using Dark Clown. I find that a very strong challenge indeed.

On one of my Take It Further courses, a talented Asian performer  came with a will to look at the Indian equivalent of the Korean Comfort Women. She was researching women doing sex work during the days of the Raj who were kept in dreadful conditions. Wikipedia tells us: 'Although the governments of many Indian princely dates had regulated prostitution prior to the 1860s, such regulation in British India was first ushered in by the Cantonment Act of 1864. The Cantonment Acts regulated and structured prostitution in the British military bases. ... The structuring features of the Cantonment Acts provided for about twelve to fifteen Indian women for each regiment of British soldiers.'  (I can't find the specific number of men in a British regiment in the days of the Raj but I found this more recent source: 'A regiment normally contains of around 650 soldiers depending on its role.')
The performer had researched and found that women were kept in the dark in cockroach-ridden 'accommodation', and forced to service a large number of men each day - this figure of sex acts per woman per day was not given I'm the above Wiki entry; however, 650 divided by the upper number of 15 women is 43.3333 recurring).

I once read of a woman trafficked forcibly into prostitution who had, one Christmas day, been forced to service 80 men. Sorry for the downer. It depressed me too, when I read it. I was reading the article on my phone on the tube, and the number would not make itself real to me. I decided to count men I saw, innocent commuters, on my journey home, just to appreciate that number: 80.

An existential exercise
​Now that I come to write about this, I think that what made this instance work for me, this Dark Clown treatment of this particular subject was not only some historical distance, but also the fact that this improvisation was achieved in service of this course participant trying to come to terms with events that were part of the oppression of her race, her forefathers/foremothers' nation and her biological sex.

The absurd - and finding a workable metaphor
​After telling me/us (the assembled course participants) about the cockroaches and the dark and about the large number of men in a single day, I said, 'Ok. Can you think of some boring action or movement that you can repeat. And after each repetition, you will count: 'one', then 'two', then 'three', and keep going.

I was impressed at her commitment and her level of physical fitness that she chose burpees! And off she went. This performer is a very funny woman with experience in stand-up and improv. She did those burpees: down out, squat, up 'one.' Down out, squat, up 'two'. We could see and sense the cost almost immediately. Down out, squat, up 'three.' She had also come dressed in a saree ... unhappily. In the pre-course interview, she told me that she had enrolled on a course with Philippe Gaulier and that he had suggested that she come back dressed as 'Mrs Ghandi'.  She reported that she was cross with herself for not having challenged the brief, and also for the way she responded to the brief because she felt her ability to play was hampered because she found the costume was so physically restrictive. 'I cannot flee the scene!', she quipped in an earlier part of her Take It Further session, while wearing the saree.

Down out, squat, up 'four.' Due to the exertion, she started, quite naturally, to make noises ... pants and grunts. This performer had done my Clown & Dark Clown workshop, so knew how to release and work with the sounds - they were compelling and rhythmic and varied.  She kept on; with burpee five, six seven, eight.  The sounds started to include a noise like a cow moaning (appalling and hilarious simultaneously). Incrementally, she introduced sounds from other barnyard animals: lambs, goats, chickens and pigs, all with the ongoing burpees keeping the base-line, inexorable rhythm going  - Down out, squat, up 'fifteen.' Down out, squat, up 'sixteen.' ...

Comedy Craft plus the cathartic value of Witnessing
Perfect Dark Clowning. We were laughing at the ridiculousness of the counting, and our physiology was affected by the vigour of the movement. The animal noises were absurd and ridiculous, however her desperation and commitment had an earnest quality - in her willingness to engage with the task, we could also imagine the women's choicelessness or obligation to fulfil their daily quota of men.  

The underlying rhythm of the burpees affected our physiology (our 'laughing gear'), the moment to moment surprises (contrast) of the chaotic sounding but wonderfully varied and contrapuntal animal noises added laughter nudges, and a sense of the Ridiculous (while at another level making a comment on the poor sex-workers' de-humanisation). So laughter was created, but Troubled Laughter - because the improvisation clearly conveyed the horror of what was being demonstrated  / presented for us to witness.

* I celebrate the uncategorisable.

** Her nakedness is not sexual in intent - although some viewers respond to it through a sexualised lens.

*** of course there are some who think Hamlet has actually been driven crazy - and it would be totally understandable if that were the case for Dangel Geyer - there is ample cause for mental pressure.

The Only One Action exercise 
This an early Enforced Performance* exercise, to encourage application of releasing the Marginalised Emotions and using the comedy craft. The player does not need to exercise their imagination in terms of generating ideas for the scene, but the Only One Action exercise does benefit from strategic play (or can train strategic play). Strategic Play is born from an adept ability to accept the (imaginary) predicament, clock and accept the audience's reactions and to mine the predicament over time.

Possible pre-steps 
1/ The player is invited to focus on 'Exposure in the space' i.e. playing with the anxiety due to being alone on stage and looked at. Sensitivity to group members is required, however. Some people have issues surrounding being seen, so I often, on a short two-day course, omit directly exploring 'being looked at'. For players who are ready for it, it is fun. 'What? what? What do you want from me? Stop looking! Your eyes, your eyes! All of your eyes! Seeing. See-ing. Look look looking. Stop it!' cover eyes 'Are you still looking? are you? I can feel you looking! Aargh!' Riffing with basic concrete words is a useful thing to do for clown work. We all know how often our minds will worry that they need to present a clever idea. 2/ A useful exercise to develop trust in the power of keeping it simple and concrete and being unafraid to mention the obvious  would be the 'Here and Now' exercise which I learned about in Oliver Double's excellent book Getting the Joke. The student/course participant doing the exercise faces an audience and may only talk about things that are happening in the here and now: the decor, the thoughts and feelings passing through his or her head etc. It helps reduce the ever-present temptation to be 'interesting'.**

The premise
One Action, as an Enforced Performance exercise - is based on the absurd idea that you are a prisoner in a regime where you are forced onto a stage and given the task of 'entertaining' an assembled audience (are they your tormentors, their assembled family?***). Your well-being (or that of your loved ones) is at stake. 
 
The prisoner is only allowed one action. For example, walking. In my controller voice, I say: ‘The Prisoner will Walk!’

How to make this interesting? When you have ‘nothing’ what have you still got?

Nothing is not nothing
In terms of the human body, what have you got to work with? Rhythm, breath, expression, doing, pausing, clocking (both audience reactions and guard), thinking, reacting, allowing the emotion of the moment, (rinse repeat, no particular order – that is based on awareness) – plus, trajectory and position in space. Plus planes of space. As a side note, this exercise also shows the importance of being able to work the stage area strategically. More on that perhaps in another post.
 
Work the predicament
Keep it simple, go step by step. The techniques of Red Nose Clown – looking, noticing the reaction, using curiousity, repeating the action, possibly a further repetition (choosing the right moment to repeat).
Gaulier said that the clown is always asking questions (e.g. ‘Did they like that? Will they like it again?’). Here the Dark Clown notes – ‘They are laughing – is that a good thing? Or a bad thing? Now they are not laughing. Oh no, what does that mean? They laughed at my desperation. What kind of people are these? What will happen if this does not go well? Is the guard looking at me funny? When will this be over?’ interjected by little beats of emotion – e.g. startle response, panic breathing, stifled sob, weeping.
 
Other one action prompts could be: coughing, sniffing, vomiting, singing, hopping running, looking, not speaking (make us believe that you are not speaking; prove it to us),measuring, pointing, yawning.
 
I have yet to use the ‘not speaking one’ –  it appeals because it is an 'impossible' instruction.
 
Optional extra - The Guard
To help players feel the High Stakes, in some exercises e.g. this one, I ask for someone to embody a guard. I find a water bottle that is half full. Held by the neck, a plastic bottle**** makes a satisfying audible, rounded thud in the left hand. The guard stands over on stage right – only just in the stage picture. They stand three-quarters on to the audience, feet apart and vigilant, the bottle resting on the palm of the left hand. The bottle is in place of a baton.
 
Side note: I am careful always to discourage people from over-investing in the role of the guard. The real work and point of interest, I remind people, is the person in suffering mode, the person standing in for the guard is serving the student who is doing the Dark Clown work. I also give this context to help the guard to be vigilant (it’s the Dark Clown version of complicité!). The guard could easily find themselves in the position of the prisoner. The guard needs to be as interested in the state and reactions of the audience and the overall success of their task. The guard is using the same key skill we focus on in the Peekaboo exercise – ‘are the audience getting closer to or further away from laughter?’ plus – ‘how is the prisoner doing in achieving that?’ I instruct the Guard that they can make only one thud with their ‘baton’ during the piece, so they have to choose their moment well. If the baton thud is over-used, then then the performer in prisoner role can work a beat of panic, but each subsequent beat will not raise the stakes, because after two, without any follow through, it presents a hollow threat. Also, and importantly, if the baton thud is over-used, it deprives the ‘prisoner’/player of the psychological anguish of not knowing when enough is enough and also of the horror of culpability – they themselves are forced to take the risks and make the decisions. 

 
* Enforced Performance is a term I use for Dark Clown scenarios using a prison or captive scenario and in productions, such as The Maids. 

** Keith Johnstone famously recommends resisting being interesting. Avner the Eccentric says 'be interested, not interesting.'   

***  These are thoughts in the head of the performer who is tasked with imagining themselves in the predicament - the actual audience is never asked to play a role.
 
**** As most of us bring re-usable water bottles now, I keep one for this specific purpose.

Sobbing for the fun of it
To prepare for this exercise, there are two steps.
First in full group I give a short demonstration of me talking about a happy day, but while sobbing. ‘Choose a happy moment, a real one – no you don't have to choose a moment that is very precious, just a nice simple happy day.'
​ 
The group pair up and take it in turns to do this task.
 
After each turn there is usually a lot of laughter. Most people can remember an instance of crying in childhood and at some level enjoying the rhythms of one’s own demonstration of injustice. Not that the laughter is about any kind of insight, it is mostly just a response to a release of energy, or the fun to be had in being given permission for rhythmic vocal play.
 
List your possessions
Step two. Find a new pair partner. (I find it advantageous to keep the energy circulating in the room).

This time, the first one to try the exercise will list their possessions, just as they come to mind, actual possessions, starting with something small. Each thing named needs a small piece of mime or gesture and the object needs to be created and or placed somewhere specific in the air around the performer, i.e. to the or right or left, higher or lower. For example: a pencil could be held up vertically, or measured between two forefingers; hands could make four quick tiers for 'towels'; a pillow could be held in two curved hands and given a little shake. People can use pantomime blanche, where a rectangle drawn with forefingers can represent a TV. Or it can be quick mime i.e. typing fingers on a keyboard for laptop. Each time each object is mentioned, the accompanying gesture needs to be in the exact same place. 

Their partner’s role is to put pressure on them, hector them (to help create a sense of High Stakes), asking 'What else?', ''What else have you got?', and once there are a few things, the partner will shout 'LIST!" - and the do-er of the exercise must list in exact order each thing they mentioned complete with the exact gesture and location in space. Of course any mistakes are to be welcomed. If there is brain freeze, the perfomer can make a sound to voice their anxiety. Dark Clown work represents the Marginalised Emotions. Any dithering or tongue trip can be voiced. If they can't remember the list or get something out of order – great! The doer can feel the embarrassment or other emotion of the wrong gesture or wrong order and to express that with inflection of voice, breath and/or gesture. 

Swap - the other partner lists and the first do-er hectors.
 
The Consumer Guilt Scenario – basic setup 
Now – the Consumer Guilt Scenario. The group line up chairs ready to sit and watch as audience. This is a solo piece. I ask who is willing to be the first player and I add more information: 'Imagine that you are standing before some kind of Tribunal (think of ‘self-criticism’ in the Stalinist era, or a less violent version of a ‘struggle session’ during the Cultural Revolution in China).'
 
The player needs to invest in something at stake – even if it’s at a simple level of nervousness and uncertainty as usual in any panel interview: 'What will the outcome of this interview be? How many items must I list? Is my list long enough? Is my list too long?'

Remember, Dark Clown uses a High Stakes to release the impulses for Marginalised Emotions. I play my part in offering stimulus to raise the stakes.
 
Transparent teaching
I let the group know that when I raise my voice or speak harshly, that I am taking on the role of a power figure. The player of the moment is invited to pretend in the proposed predicament as well as they can, knowing that they also need to avail themselves of any moments of naturally arising impulses and to give them shape and sound. The work on the course leading up to this exercise lays a lot of ground work, so course participants know what the methodology is and why things are happening. They have also had a preparatory talk laying out the aims and ethos of the work.
 
When I give a sharp command, the aim is to startle the physiology – most people’s intonation will rise when given a sharp instruction, some people stutter (these form part of the rhythms and timbres we play with as 'Dark Side Play'). Those who have worked with Gaulier or a Gaulier-trainer Clown teacher, will know that the teacher's interventions in role as grumpy Clown Professor are there to give the (Red Nose) Clown a skip in their step, or to release an emotion (the Red Nose Clown’s unmasked humanity which we love to see), or to allow the Clown to release some élan, to ‘save the furniture’ (save the situation).
 
As stakes-raiser, I say, or shout ‘What have you got?’ And they are off.
I switch to my coaching voice to remind them to give clarity and simple precision to each item they mention. 
 
The mechanics of responding to the audience within the Predicament
From the start of the course, I have been encouraging the participant to look and see (‘when you look, remember to see’). The other way I phrase this is to emphasise ‘noticing’. Each audience reaction can feed the performance of the player.
 
The performer needs to work the audience as a comedy player needs to work / respond to an audience, while in their imagination, they see and respond to the audience as the panel.
If the audience laugh, it is useful to imagine that perhaps they did not understand, perhaps some of the ‘panel’* don’t speak your language - this gives the opportunity for the player to repeat it (exact timbre, rhythm, volume, using proprioception) you say it again (usually another laugh occurs) - the player can then allow this to unnerve them and therefore take the opportunity of a further repetition (as if due to nerves), and say the thing a third time (usually someone else in the row of watchers/class audience with laugh then  Rule of Three). Then the player can react with anxiety to the fact that they are being laughed at. This serves two purposes: a/ the logic of the predicament - 'is laughter a good or a bad thing?' serving the stakes and performed emotional state of the player and b/ the comedy craft - 'laughter an interruption that must be dealt with’ as Avner the Eccentric says.
What, in this moment, does the interruption do to the figure in the improvised predicament? Does it put them off their game, shame them?
Ongoingly, there is the pressure to keep more items coming, and of course to ramp up the rhythm by responding to the command: ‘LIST!!’
 
Raising the stakes again - the importance of imaginative investment
Ok – let’s go back to the set up for the exercise – because there are a couple more elements to it.
 
The name of the scenario is Consumer Guilt. I remind the player of the moment that they can begin the improvisation crying or they can work the items / list game first, then do the list citing or break out into sobbing as a counterpoint / contrast / escalation. I remind the player where necessary to avail themselves of different rhythms and timbres.**

Combined with this, I invite us all to reflect on our privileged lives and the obscenity of what we own in comparison with many in the world.
 
To activate this further - one more thing is set up. I mention the ghastly earthquake in Haiti, and invite the player to see, over to the left (metaphorically, In their minds eye) – a little grandma - to imagine a poor little aged woman who has lost everything … every thing … I say. She is there, naked, under a piece of plastic supported on sticks, next to running sewage.

'Ok now – what have you got?'
 
Every so often, if people are not allowing the emotions of guilt and shame to surface, I prompt them to look at Grandma.
 
And to say: ‘I’m sorry Grandma.’ And to say it: 'Again!'
If needed, I invite them: ‘can you sob a bit?’
'List!! What else have you got?! Look at Grandma, say: "Sorry Grandma."'
 
If people can segue into sobbing, a further level yet can be added where they look up, appalled at themselves and say ‘oh god!’ and play with what timbres and rhythms of that game - or use 'oh god' as punctuation / counterpoint / alternation with the game of listed objects interrupted by the apologies to Grandma.
 
Trouble shooting - noticing and sounding the arising emotions
People can, understandably enough, focus on coming up with the next item. There is zero need to come up with anything interesting, there banal the better. People tend to be task-oriented rather than being-oriented. What's key in clowning in general is noticing, accepting and including any passing emotion that may arise. While the list is necessary and important to get a rhythm going (as well as provide the content for the contrast, the obscenity of plenty and the picture of inequality), what we really enjoy are  the little flinches, the flecks of pain that read in the eyes of the player who is immersing into the pretended (but heck let’s face it fully grounded in reality) Predicament. Any anxiety about a delay in finding the next item, or fear of not being able to think, or nerves about standing in front of other - all these are impulses to be experienced. All Clown students would do well to allow themselves to express the micro-emotion of the moment in sound and movement. Wonderful, strange, little quirks can affect the face or the voice under even a modicum of stress.
 
Resistance and the accidental extraordinary physiological response
People sometimes resist looking at Grandma. (Thereby cheating themselves of the opportunity to escalate their playing energy).
Working in Holland in January***, despite several reminders ‘Look at her!!’, the player was resisting doing that.
‘Look at her!!!!’, I insisted, and she did start to turn her head ... but before her neck fully turned, it snapped back. It was this wonderful, compelling, unplanned flinch of aversion!

We laugh with delight or incredulity or just plain surprise when the Red Nose Clown does a spontaneous something that is quirky and fresh-minted from the impulse of the moment.
For me – that involuntary flinch was a similar gem - eliciting a gasp of Troubled Laughter.

These unbidden gestures (accidents of the moment and of physiology) are the nuggets of the joy / pain / catharsis of the Dark Clown. The wonderful performer who plays The Seal in the ‘Eco Horror’ scenario shown in the Dark Clown documentary (Hospital Clown Faith Tingle) has done the Clown & Dark Clown course three times. She surrenders her physiology to the imagination and the impulse of the moment. In Dark Clown the impulse can be an ongoing (pretended) stress situation. Once, doing the ‘Horror Is’ exercise, she invested magnificently in imagining her phobia/object of dread and her forehead veins bulged and danced in a compelling way. And because her rhythms were in place, laughter was released. A sound could be made in a moment of witnessing stress – cathartic nugget.

Let's go back to the player in Holland and that wonderful flinch! What we saw in that moment was a human who would not look. Her very body resisted the direct command. It was such a human response – we all know in ourselves that knee-jerk will, that aversion, that refusal to look at pain - those moments when we really do not want to look on hurt or ugliness, when we want to live our lives as we have arranged them, not accept responsibility for others, and not have our status quo threatened. Arrogance and fear mixed – how is that for a Marginalised Emotion! And I love it all the more because it is not coming from reason, it's coming from the body's primal instincts, the Amygdala response (if talking about the Amygdala in that way is still good science).
 
Shame - another memorable moment
In December 2019, there was a wonderful iteration of this exercise. The player of the moment was a talented actor and dancer. 
In his list of possessions, he mentioned shower gel and a loofah. Something about this, about the way he said it, had a quality that attracted my attention. He is an intelligent person and was no doubt alert to the particular combination of privilege to be able to afford the healthy natural and rather exotic product (the obscenity of owning items which invest us with a touch of smugness) and also the vanity of it too - like the Beckhams, we exfoliate.

I said, 'Ok you are going to take that loofah and that shower gel and have a shower, and apologise to Grandma while it is happening' (Just so you know - I have a rule that course participants can choose to break and leave an improvisation if they so wish at any moment of their choosing). He took the invitation / provocation and began to shower (fully clothed, just to be clear!) and he did something I did not expect. He remained in relationship with (aware of) Grandma as he started to come showering, and then there was this little instinctual shift of his body and he turned the front of his body away from her. We saw a human being ashamed to have the luxury Grandma did not, ashamed to affront Grandma with his nakedness, and also ashamed on his own account of being naked in front of Grandma. So poignant, so ghastly. I am no stranger to the emotion of shame and it is so – I don’t know the word … liberating, reassuring, the opposite of alienating? Validating? Healing? Thank heavens for Brené Brown doing her risk-taking work in the field of Shame. To be able to see these awful moments of life in a ‘safe’ setting in the ritual space of theatre or theatre making or theatre training.
 
*To be clear, the player looks at and is tasked with reading the audience as 'panel' (while attending to their laughter and other responses according to the techniques of comedy craft, as audience). The audience when watching exercises or scenario improv’s are instructed to be a normal audience. When I say panel – this is the reality of the predicament of the performer. The performer is playing someone standing before a panel. The performer responds to the laughter and silences of the audience from within the pretended predicament. Occasionally one needs to coach participants sitting in audience (either in Red Nose or in Dark Clown exercises) to avoid the impulse to coach fellow course members - i.e. to call things out to them that you think they should do. The work at hand is training how to work a normal audience. If people are calling out as peers/would be coaches, how is that helping their fellows train to work a normal audience?
 
**When we do a very early Red Nose Clown exercise ‘Moving Around the Room Like’, I land this point: ‘Clowning is not intellectual. It is often a shape, phrase, sound timbre rhythm that we like … so much that we’d be happy to see it again … and again (the Peekaboo exercise reinforces this, so does the example of playing with a baby ‘LookatthePanda ….’). We see how laughter can wane or fail if people have not built sufficient proprioception skill to accurately reproduce the thing that happened just before the laugh. If they do it softer volume it’s a disappointment and can remove the possibility of a rule of three; if they forget what they did, tumbleweeds may ensue.

***'Comedy can make people aware of what is going on in a way that is easier to digest than the news. It engages people more. I got what I came for and I a lot more fun, playfulness and laughter than I expected, given the subjects are ‘dark’. What surprised me though, was how very alive I felt after the weekend with the Dark Clown.' - Course Participant Jan 2020 Utrecht

In October 2019, something was bothering me. It had been bothering me for a while. Br*xit. Writing this blog post in COVID-19 days, it seems a dim memory, albeit an event which is still unfolding.

I was hired by a Drama School. I had just a few days in which to teach a group of acting students Clown, and to also create a Clown performance.

The teaching was going well and on Day Two, as time was short, I decided to offer the idea that was visiting itself upon me. I would, as ever, ask for the students' improvisations, ideas and contributions but it's good to have a framework to glue it onto. I checked that they had no other ideas to put forward and that they found the idea appealing to play inside.  

Title: Klown-zit. It's a twist on, but not an allegory for Br*xit. It would also follow a recurring interest of mine in the marginal nature of Clowns, by which I mean Clowns under threat.* 

The Clowns are leaving - they have prepared this presentation as their last show, before taking themselves away and leaving us Sad Normals without them.

For the first show-oriented exercise, I divided the group in two and set them each to improvise a Clown Funeral (classic clown trope - there is a lovely take on this in the 1924 film He Who Gets Slapped). I thought I'd choose one improv or perhaps amalgamate the best ideas from either group into it. They were both strong ideas and the two groups had each worked well together. Great, a problem - two versions of a funeral, yes, we'll use them both and make that work!

One boy was ill and absent for a day or two and on his return, I wanted to find a way to let him feature. I asked the group if they could find a cardboard box - or any kind of box. Ultimately, on show night, he was stationed on stage as the audience waited for the show to begin, holding a shoe box, wearing smart black pants, a white shirt and a sombrero.

Sombrero Clown: Hello Madam, would you like to make a contribution?
You sir? Would you like to make a contribution?
All contributions welcome.
Thank you Madam. Thank you there. Thank you.
Whenever audience members laugh – he opens and closes the box lid to ‘capture the laugh’. The inside of the shoe box reads ‘Laughter Bank.’ He holds it like it's precious.
 
A group of clowns enter. They are singing the Wedding March. They carry aloft a bear who has a red nose and big shoes (red trainers on its feet). They gather in a small U shape around the bear which is now on the floor.
 
Clown with an air of authority: Any last words?
Spotted Clown: Words.
Minnie Mouse Clown: Words.
Clown with an air of authority: (a touch long-sufferingly) Thank you. Any more last words?
Pyjama-clad Clown: Yes. 
They turn to look at him.
Pyjama-clad Clown: Oranges … (they nod, with varying degrees of certainty) Dave …  (they nod as before) ... Knees. (they nod - either touched, or relieved it's over).

Another group enter, including two angel clowns – they are singing the Death March.
 
Minnie Mouse Clown: Oh no, we ‘ve been singing the wrong song!
 
They hold a clown aloft with a gurning death face (tongue out). She opens her eyes and winks at the audience as they cross the stage in front of the first group and resumes her death face. The Death March goes into double time. They place the Goofy gurning clown on the floor and circle sombrely. Someone places a rubber chicken on her chest like a flower. The angels throw tinsel. Group two start to cry. They huddle to cry. The first group of clowns, who have been feeling inadequate and wrong, are suddenly also overcome and join the crying circle too. 

The 'dead' clown raises her head - looks at the group. Her interest is piqued. She approaches, then is overcome, wailing louder than them all.

Clown with an air of Authority notices, congratulates the troupe of clowns: 'Well done, well done!' Shakes hands with Goofy, then turns to the audience to address them. He is flanked by Spotty Clown and the Goofy 'dead' clown.

​The Authority Clown:  Good Evening and welcome to Klown-zit.
A colourful cardboard sign with Klown-zit written on it is unfolded and held up.
 
One of the angel clowns who is actually quite curt and bossy takes over: 'People think that Clowns are stupid and can't do anything properly.' This prompts a series of ridiculous routines including spaghetti being cooked with one clown contorting herself into everything from sink to stove to kitchen table.

The curt Angel: ... And some people think Clowns are Scary ...
​PJ Clown has a moment of terror when his shark slippers come alive. He runs around the stage and clings to another clown for safety - when he looks up, Spotty Clown is doing her best impression of the balloon-holding 'Pennywise'. The moment is defused by the balloon being released and farting round the room.

The curt Angel: But mostly people think clowns are just a big Joke.

​The clowns come in pairs delivering lame jokes (one does the set-up and the other
does the punch).
A man goes to the doctor because he has a clown growing out of his neck.
- The doctor tells him, “Don’t worry, it’s nothing serious.” Boom tish
Why don’t cannibals eat clowns? - Because they taste funny. Boom tish
How big is a clown’s hard drive? - 50 Gigglebytes. Bada ba flop
Two cannibals captured and killed a clown. - They made a laughing stock
out of him.
What’s left of a clown after a bear attack? - Just his funny bone.
Clowns can no longer afford their balloons… - Because of inflation.
Did you ever hear about the unlucky clown? - He tried ten times to make
​the audience laugh, but no pun in ten did. Get it? No pun in ten did … No pun in …
 
What is the gooey red stuff between an elephant’s toes?

... Slow clowns.

There is an act that combines juggling and percussion with a metal tea tray.

There is a sweet interlude when the PJ clown and Minnie Mouse do a version of the leaving song from The Sound of Music with the Teddy bear animated like a puppet: "So long farewell, adieu adieu adieu ..."

Authority Clown returns with his henchmen.
So - we bring you all of this (indicating the stage) - music, surprises, colour.
Will you miss us?
Because we're going now.
Klown-zit means Klown-zit.
We've had enough.
We see the way you look at us. We hear you thinking:
'Their hair is too big, their shoes are too big.
Their voices are too squeaky.
Their clothes are all wrong.'

He starts to speak as if in a big tunnel and the henchman clowns make an echo effect.
People think Clowns (clowns clowns clowns)
Are chaotic (otic otic otic)
But it's you, (oo oo oo)
the Sad Normals - (ormals ormals ormals)
You (oo oo oo)
are the Chaos (aos aos aos)
Bringers (ingers ingers ingers)
and 
we 
are going (going going going)

Carousel music starts to bleed in and they make a double circle, beautifully gliding up and down like gorgeous horses on their shining brass poles ... after a few circuits, they peel off and leave, still in merry-go-round mode ...

The lights dim - the Sombrero Clown is last to leave - he pats his laughter bank as if comforting it and hugs it close as he goes.

Applause.

Bright lights up and joyful circus music and the clowns cascade one by one back onto the stage with a dazzling display of acrobatics (and the odd rather lame roly poly). In a line they wave, and lead again joyfully off with kicks and kisses

The first time I was told to 'Sing as if your life depended on it' - it was in a workshop situation, happily, not IRL - 
and I gave it my best shot.
But I remember, at the moment of hearing the instruction, feeling dumbstruck and demotivated.
For most of us in the Western world, our lives are blessed to the degree that having to actually sing for one's life is something difficult to imagine. 






​High Stakes Predicaments and Marginalised Emotions

You are standing in a hole you were forced to dig. It is wartime and it is clear this is going to be your grave. War films I saw as a child had heroic behaviour. The clown can be courageous but the clown is mainly there to show human failure. In Dark Clown terms, failure is less of a personal failing/flaw but a result of circumstances being so strong and oppressive that we are forced to jettison our own values and dignity. Later in this post I will describe an exercise I call 'Selling Yourself Out to the Enemy'.

With the Red Nose Clown, we enter Clown State and the spontaneous play follows (having greased the wheels with exercises enlivening the body and derailing the control brain, of course).

With the Dark Clown, I set up predicaments for people to imagine themselves in - Predicaments with High Stakes, so as to help people release imaginatively into the Marginalised Emotions. On a the Clown & Dark Clown workshop, before we approach the Predicaments we prime the body; visit the Emotional Zones with voice and breath; and open up awareness of patterns of rhythmic play. 

A Dark Clown Level Two Course Participant reflects

On an early Level Two Dark Clown course in Oldham 2012, I inaugurated a couple of what were at the time new exercises. One Course Participant from that course answered my recent* questionnaire* and wrote this:

'Dark Clown is an exhilarating opportunity to embody devastating emotions and to admit the inadmissible in a safe environment. Two experiences stand out for me – one I watched and one I performed. I wept with deep humiliation and guilt as I laughed, whilst watching an exercise where a workshop participant was being asked to recount what he was going to have for Christmas dinner to a child in famine-struck Ethiopia.

How could it be possible to experience two such contrasting experiences at once? How freeing it was to be able to admit to experiencing emotions that would be condemned by my upbringing?

The one I performed was the following: I was playing my cello in a concentration camp and not only my life depended on it, but so did that of all my fellow inmates. And a small detail - I did not have any instrument to play either. I relive this from time to time. I remember feeling authentic rage at the abuse of me, my instrument, my art and the co-sufferers for whom I was responsible. That experience shone a laser mirror into my soul - reflecting back a sheer and bitter bloodymindedness - of which I can now feel proud.’

Saving Private Ryan - the Steam Boat Willie Scene 

There is a scene in Saving Private Ryan - I sat and transcribed it from the film (you're welcome!)

A German prisoner with a shovel standing in a hole is handed a cigarette by his American captor. He inhales, looks at the cigarette appreciatively.

German Prisoner: American? I like America - Steamboat Willie. Toot toot!
 
Steamboat Willie’s American …
 
More soldiers come with their guns at the ready. He stops smoking the cigarette he was given.
 
Ich bin gar nichts fertig. Es muss noch mehr tiefer geworden. (trans: I'm not ready. It's got to be much deeper.)
 
US Soldier: That’s what you think.

One soldier grabs the Prisoner.
 
German Prisoner: Nein (it’s a sob)
 
He jumps back in the grave and starts to dig vigorously.

 ... noch nichts fertig ...
 
He looks at gun and begs:
 
Please…

Resumes energetically digging.

I like America! Fancy Shmancy, go fly a kite, Cat got your tongue, cool beans! Betty Boop, what a dish! 
Betty Gable, nice gams ... sings: "I say can you see, I say can you see, I say".
... Fuck Hitler ... FUCK HITLER!

'Selling Yourself Out to the Enemy' Scenario

Giving the example of this scene from Saving Private Ryan, I asked the group: can you think of  a person or group whose values are in opposition to yours?

The Course Participant I quoted earlier threw her hand up. 'The Taliban! I'd like to do the Taliban!'
So she did. The improvisation went something like this:

I love your approach to justice! I agree with you. Women should be covered up, women should not speak - not like me, now, speaking to you. Gah! Speaking to herself, shouting: SHUT UP! See?! And women, women should be covered, Yes, Silent. Silent! SHUT UP! 
And invisible! Yes!
She held her hands in front of her face, she desperately tried to hide her uncovered areas.
Speaking about herself: Gah! Disgusting! beating her own bare arms: Disgusting!
Western women are disgusting! Let me show you - Beyonce, yes? Skimpy leotard. Give me a machete, I'll show her! Take that, Beyonce!
She waved an imaginary blade about as if hacking at Beyonce. Gah! Take that! More hacking.
Singing: 'Single ladies' No! no singing. Death - death to western women ... Death to Beyonce!
She held her arms out pleadingly:
I can help you. Gahh, my arms sorry about my arms - I'll chop them off, look ... look ... look!
Death to women who speak! And think! Gah! Beyonce! Oprah, Mary Beard. More hacking. At the imaginary women, at her own arms.
​'Who runs the world?' You! You the Taliban. I'll ... I'll grow a beard, yes! Let me join you, please.  Please?
​Please!

See here the many comedy craft games involved to make this Dark Clown scene work (aiming to generate laughter even while generating a believable portrait of desperation and fear): physical games, the games of repetition (of words, of movement motifs), the game of solution/new problem and the breath and emotions all employed with variety and calibration i.e.responding to the audience (reacting hopefully or anxiously to laughter or other audience reactions as if responding to the reactions of the enemy). All with the aim of generating  the experience of Troubled Laughter for the workshop audience.

The talented comic performer Trixie Mattel said in an interview somewhere: 'Comedy is the intersection between specificity and exaggeration.'

The more vivid and specific the predicament is, the more the Dark Clown player can launch off into the Marginalised Emotions and flights of fancy caused - not by wonder (as for Red Nose Clown) - but through the imaginative investment in a high stakes predicament and the cathartic joy of employing and enjoying an agile vocal and physical play to depict extreme desperation, fear, alarm.

The Dark Clown performer needs a good predicament,  and then to be able to Mine the Predicament - choosing things to say that make logical, emotional, dramaturgical sense; things that will keep the audience on the hook. To Mine the Predicament, the Dark Clown performer also needs to find agile changes in rhythm, timbre and emotion in relation to the audience's reactions, or in reacting to the previous thing they themselves did. Things can be extraordinary (in extremis, we do not cry or flinch in socially inflected ways), but the suffering must be believable - there can be no sense of the clown enjoying shocking us by appearing to relish the pain or enjoy the exaggeration for its own sake. As soon as the Dark Clown performer comments on or adopts a self-indulgent grotesquerie, the audience is let off the hook, and the laughter is no longer a Troubled Laughter - i.e. a laughter born of / or containing conflict.

* The questionnaire is for 'graduates' of the Clown & Dark Clown course  and or the Level Two Dark Clown course. Any 'graduates' reading this I welcome your contributions! Write to me and I'll send you the questionnaire.

'Pretty girls in nice gowns - no.'

I was approached by the remarkable performing artist Ines Lua to direct a production of Jean Genet's play The Maids in Oporto, Portugal in 2013.

Playwright Jean Genet wished for the play to be performed by men. Here I would have three attractive young women to play the two maids and their employer, Madame. Although there is plenty of self-loathing in the play, there are also evening gowns and maids uniforms and I wanted to avoid any possibility of the audience's attention being de-railed from the bleakness of the situation portrayed. So I thought - Enforced Performance is the way!

I was introduced to the writing of Jean Genet when I was seventeen and a strong imprint was made. Genet inspired me with his underdog stance and his aesthetic of degradation. For those who do not know, Jean Genet was wrongly accused of theft when he was a boy in foster care. He decided that he would make the active choice to live as a thief, and wrote a long-form poem and a novel while in prison. He sought out and introduced himself to Jean Cocteau, who was impressed by Genet's writing and not only got Genet's first novel published, but, enlisting the help of Sartre and Picasso, petitioned the French President to save Genet from life imprisonment. Genet never returned to prison and spent the rest of his life as a writer and as a political activist. Theatre maverick Lindsay Kemp created his production Flowers, inspired by Genet's novel Our Lady of the Flowers.)

I offered my concept to Ines Lua and Micaela Miranda (co-producers) - that the piece be set in a women's prison. They, and the actor playing Madame (Lecoq-trained actor Sandra Salome) agreed.

Play within a play

When the Marquis de Sade was confined within the asylum Charenton, he was permitted to create plays using the inmates, to which members of the public were invited, as memorably explored in Peter Weiss' play 'Marat/Sade: The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade.'

Of course, setting something in a location (or time period) is not enough - you need a clearly articulated and delivered game. So - imagine a regime* presents plays for the public, performed by actual prisoners. For the prisoners, first night nerves combine with the humiliation of public scrutiny, plus uncertainty - what will happen if they do not perform well? Backstory: female cellmates are separated and rehearsed separately. 

​I had to check with the young company as to their budget, because performing in a black box would not do - we needed the audience to be presented with a space they (the audience) could believe (with the support of suspension of disbelief) was as secure as a prison space. Their set designer came up with an ingenious solution: there would be two angled walls, and a flat as a back 'wall'. The soundscape would provide loud metallic door slams to make viewers believe that unseen doors could be opened to admit the prisoners onto the stage area, and securely slammed and locked behind. All the furnishings - a bunk bed SL, a lidless toilet SR would be clearly bolted to the grey walls which were painted to appear sturdy. Also clearly bolted to the SR wall was a shallow little belle époque console, and above that a gilt-framed oval 'mirror'  (just the frame, as a mirror could of course be broken and used as a shiv). There was a peep-hole which connected to the guard's station and above that a surveillance camera pointed into the cell and streaming live feed to a monitor visible above the guard's desk. See below for a space plan.

​The audience would enter past a guard. She had a tiny office or station just inside the theatre doors.  She would solemnly nod at them, perhaps frisking the odd person or asking to see inside their bag. (Ideally she could have also pointed at a poster saying 'Do not speak to or hand anything to the prisoners', but we did not have the resources to do everything, and what we had worked well enough).

​A little bit of Implicating the Audience

As the lights lowered there were musical theatre announcement chimes, then a soft and pleasant voice said: 'Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen. The performance of "The Maids' by Jen Genet is about to begin. If your mobile phone rings during the performance, the actors will stop - and wait for you to finish your call. Alternatively, you can opt to switch off any electronic beeping device. Thank you. Please remain seated for the Security Test.' This was followed by a a loud sound of crackling electricity - lights flickered, and an orange lighting strip embedded into the floor blinked - all giving the illusion of a kind of electric forcefield between stage action and auditorium. 'Teste de segurança terminado.** Attention guards, open the doors.'

​Black out lights up and loud airhorns, the sound of batons thumping along corridor walls, doors opening and closing*** (rhythm) and a female prisoner in an unattractive uniform (I think we chose a kind of catering uniform), arrives on stage as if she has been shoved - staggering and falling. She orients herself - bright lights, she sees the audience, feels self-conscious, looks about in disbelief (clear clocks) at the replica of her old cell presented as stage set. A second prisoner is also thrust out, less violently.

High Stakes

​The two prisoners regard each other - the horror of being surveilled - by the guard SR, by the audience. Imagine the way prisoners look at each other when they are being watched, careful not to endanger themselves or each other. In torture realms, uncertainty is part of the torment. You are never sure what the rules are, what the duration of time will be, what will be coming next. The trope of embarrassed non-activity at the start of a show has been done beautifully by a number of clowns (and Beckett) ****.

Here their anxiety is ramped, their breathing is activated. Their eyebrows are each telegraphing each other - it's like a Mexican standoff. The second prisoner (Micaela/Claire) makes a gesture of urgency to her comrade. Ines/Solange is looking intently back at her, after all, Claire has the first line. So Micaela/Claire speaks, in anguish 'Those gloves! those eternal gloves!' Ines/Solange starts, looks at her bare hands, panics, looks at the audience, then sees, laid out along the front of the stage a row of plastic bags - like evidence bags in a police station, the props are contained within them. Ines/Solange flings herself to her knees, crawls back and forth urgently along the front until she finds the correct bag, claws it open and frantically tries to get on the rubber gloves. The fingers are not fitted right and flop about. (real emotion plus touches of the ridiculous). 'Everything that comes out of the kitchen is spit.' Ines/Solange is nervous (the prisoner playing Solange is not a trained actor*****) and on reflex she spits onto the floor.  Horror for Micaela/Claire. The classic clown trope of problem-solution-leading to new problem leading to new solution ad infinitum; the Clown's Sisyphusian predicament. Ines/Solange starts to scrub frantically to clean it. 'So stop it!' By reflex, and in keeping with the principle of comedy nudges, Ines/Solange does one more scrub. 'Go!' Ines/Solange, has a problem ... there is no escape (clock audience, video, entrance)  ... and solves the problem by standing with her face to the wall.  

Two lines were cut but, we follow Genet's stage direction where Micaela/Claire goes to the 'mirror' and touches the unfamiliar and absurd dressing table and the fake, securely attached flowers in the securely attached vase.  (We played Claire as more vulnerable, traumatised, given to hypnotic moments. Ines as Solange had a vigorous, nervous, courageous, protective quality).
Micaela now must say the lines 'Claire, Claire are you there?' as if her fellow player were not in view.*****

At this moment we had the prison guard (Sandra Salome) shunt open the peephole (it makes a sound). Ines/Solange is startled as the slit is right in front of her and she is eye-to-eye with the guard.
Sandra/Guard (stage whisper): 'Turn. Around.' Hesitating, Ines/Solange does so and Micaela/Claire says: 'Ah, you're back.' (For Ines/Solange this is a playing moment similar to the disorientation played by Pedrolino in Commedia dell'Arte, when everyone is pretending that he is dead).

​... and so forth. Important at the start to a/ clearly establish the situation and b/ creating some comedy using contrast, rhythm 

Believable yet exaggerated 

The Prison Guard had an old-school cartoon jailor large ring with keys around her waist. Her costume had a pleated skirt, like some ghastly headmistress.
She also has a thermos - I must have seen a film where a petty official had a thermos on their desk. (I's an intuitive choice - but if I seek to elaborate - although she is obnoxious it also brings a feeling of; she's harmless. Or does it? Somehow the thermos is creepy. She is too comfortable with her thermos - the obscenity/chilling reality that a jobsworth is a figure of power ... the banality of evil). The Controller in Hamlet or Die had a thermos. (Spoiler alert: more than being a predilection of mine, the thermos turned out to have plot ramifications.)

Plot Twist - use everything

So the prisoners are reciting the play, performing it as best they can - they notice at one point that that surveillance camera is off - they investigate and find a something and realise that these are their actual usual bunkbeds. They start to hunt in their hiding places and discover a vial of pills.

The Madame is due to return - guess who it is? The prison guard. She wears a wig hat and feather boa over her uniform. She suspects something is up and is violent with the prison playing Solange, pushing her around and forcing her head into the open toilet basin. A beautiful red satin dress also gets pushed in to the toilet. 

The plot of Genet's play has the sisters doing a role-play ritual that is intended to end with the death of one of them, via the preparation of a poison tea. In this version of the play, they sisters manage to place the drugs in Madame's thermos (she carries it with her, of course).

Follow through

Madam realises something is up and makes the prisoner playing Claire drink the tea. The guard leaves.
Death is here and she is watching us.' says Solange.
'Let me go', says Claire.
Micaela/Claire takes to her bunk.
Solange continues, distraught - a moment comes when there is no reply. Solange repeats her line, waits then says (inserted line) : 'don't worry darling, I'll do your part.'
Solange finishes the play, reciting both parts, poignantly.
C: Let's finish with this, Solange. I can't bear it anymore. Leave me alone.
S: I shall continue, on  my own, alone my dear? Don't move .... (she clock that by now Claire is completely inert ... but continues - out of grief, out of fear, out of divine hopelessness? 
The prisoner playing Solange tears off her prison uniform and strips to her knickers.
During the 'condemned to be mourning for my maid' speech she goes to the toilet, retrieves and puts on the damp red dress mentioned in the text: 'It's the red costume of criminals' ...
She is looking at the audience in disbelief as they continue to watch.

One evening Ines was having difficulty getting the red dress on and lost her way in the text and she started improvising. She looked at the audience, really eyeballed them across the now gently glowing 'force field' strip. It was brilliant!
'Oh you think it's funny do you? You sitting there in your seats and me here in my knickers!'
She used some of Genet also: ''Who, who is going to make me shut my mouth up? Who will be brave enough to call me "my child" ... I served. I did the appropriate gestures to serve. ...I smiled at you ... I bent over to clean the floor' (these sections of text wonderfully appropriate to our adaptation), ending Solange's soliloquy with: 'We are lost, Clara'.

And continuing, the dialogue all being spoken by the sole survivor.
'Clara you may serve the tea ... My lime tea, I ordered you, Let's finish with this ... this house is poisoned ...'
And she finds the damn thermos and drains it and licks the inside of the cup top, continuing: 'Madame should have her Lime tea ... Madame is having her Lime tea ... for she needs to sleep ... don't you interrupt me again ...But madame ... I said, Tea!'

And she crawls onto the bunk, spooning her dead fellow prisoner. 

Leaving it in their laps

Announcement by the same sweet-toned female voice at the start, a little more firm and official sounding now : 
Ladies and Gentlemen, a peça terminou ... the play is finished. Please leave the vicinity. Thank you for choosing our play and good night.

Black out.


* hm, one of the things that bothered me about Bouffon was that is was meant to poke fun at the beautiful people - I guess this model works where upperclass (wealthy) people are in the audience. In my experience of Fringe theatre there will be a good amount of your audience who are other performers (i.e. not really a privileged class) - of course we can all benefit by having our faults and privileges mocked. I wonder if this is why the idea of 'enrolling the audience' appeals to me. Jon Davison came and witnessed day two of my Clown & Dark Clown course years ago and said - 'so you put the audience in the role of the oppressors'. I was not sure at the time that that was correct, or possible. I feel that an audience know who they are - they are the ones who paid for their ticket and then walked in. Someone has to accept a role to play it, I thought. But perhaps what Jon meant was simply ascribing them this role, not synonymous with asking them  to play the role.  You can jolly audiences in to taking part, as many clowns and cabaret artist do. (Or entrance them into taking part as Lucy Hopkins did in her transcendent show 'Ceremony of Golden Truth').
As I reflect on the dramaturgy of this production of The Maids and also Hamlet or Die, I went to efforts to let the audience know what the situation was. The audience find themselves 'cast' as an audience witnessing oppression for their entertainment. It is not that I wish place the audience in the role of perpetrator. No. I aim for the audience to find themselves in a situation which they find unsettling and repugnant - and while they know it is 'only a play', due to the 'suspension of dis-belief' effect' they can experience conflicted emotions ('I witnessed it therefore I am complicit' or, as happened in Hamlet or Die 'I sang along with the Controller and afterwards I felt so bad.')
**actually, the whole play was performed in Portuguese. I can find no translation in English that satisfies as much as the use of the word 'terminado'.
***actually, on a page of notes for the sound designer I see I have written very specifically: 'aruga aruga (2 secs gap) aruga aruga (2secs gap) aruga aruga (2secs gap) aruga argua aruga argua aruga argua SLAM!!!!)
****The wonderful Australian clowns Los Trios Ringbarkus spoke with nervous high-pitched voices: 'Our band hasn't arrived yet ... so ... we'll wait.' And they got chairs and sat and faced the audience uncomfortably.
*****The actor acts a prisoner who is not an actor, trying to act the role of Solange, currently in role as her sister 'Claire' - phewph.

Slave Clowns in some heartless regime are forced to perform - they are kept as some kind of underclass serving as roustabouts - rigging the equipment for the star acts, and cleaning up afterwards. That was the concept for the 2013 show, Strange Forces. Lynn Gardner tweeted ‘Peta Lily directed show at Circus Space last night was terrific. Clowns like wounded refugees from a post apocalyptic Beckett play.’ 

I taught for a few years at Circus Space (which then become NCCA - the National Centre for Circus Arts). For the school's annual graduation show there was a tradition that the first year students were led by a director to provide the 'links' - short ensemble acts to cover for and accomplishing the rig and de-rig necessary for the different disciplines of the various acts: Chinese Pole, Slack- or Tight-wire, Arial Hoop, Straps ... and so on. This is akin to the role of the Clowns in traditional touring circus where they would come on to discharge the tension created by the more dangerous acts. I also think of the Rodeo Clowns who come on to keep the show action going and the crowd engaged when things have gone dangerously awry.

'What is the world we are creating?' is a question to be considered in any performed production.

The opening scene had low light and later, bleak, blue-green tinged ilumination. The sound score contributed with a desolate-sounding drip and an occasional electrical fizz - we are in a large unfriendly space with, perhaps, puddles and exposed electrical wiring, occasionally some flickering due to power surges - due to punishment happening somewhere off, unseen.

All the clowns were dressed in white - unified, but with variation in detail. Disposable decorators' overalls suggested both institutional garb and chem-haz gear. Their hats were in fact disposable shoe covers. ​The designer for the Slave Clown 'links' was circus design specialist Andie Scott. 

A tall and small clown pair (the small one riding a child's tricycle) do a sad circuit bearing a sign to announce the show title. We hear a squeaking of the tricycle wheels.

Next came a single clown, pushed out on to the stage from stage left. Then a white rope is flung and flops to the floor. The lone clown looks at the rope, the audience - all with dread. She picks up and shoulders the rope, taking lunging Volga bargemen steps. The rope extends and tautens. Next comes a shuffling bunch of humanity - terrified slave clowns lassoed inside the rope, making their way across the stage. One at the back starts to collapse, but they must, must keep on going, like Jane Fonda carrying her dead dance partner in They Shoot Horses Don't They?  The whole process is made more difficult, but them manage to exit, with him being dragged behind, their anxious faces to us, hoping we don't notice too much. 

This was followed by a circus parade - traditionally this would be circular, inside the space of the circus ring. In this staging it was a linear procession (evoking the regimenting of prisoners rather than a festive celebration - even though, originally, there was the deathly circle of the coliseum). Each prisoner had small costume details or props - one dressed as a lion, others juggling, one repeatedly pulling a dead rabbit from a hat.

First act: Chinese Pole was followed by two clowns pushed out. One has a buzzer and is being forced to inflict electric shocks on her partner. Clowns hurry on behind, dragging the inert body of the clown who collapsed earlier - one of the team steal the buzzer to shock him back to life as they cannot do it without that extra man. The revived slave clown manages his part of the de-rig, then takes another bad turn and must be dragged off - there is an image of this moment in the slide show here. Meanwhile pillow-case-headed slave clowns (you can see the pillow heads in the slide-show mentioned earlier) drag on a body in a sheet - opened to reveal a twisted body - a loop is placed round the ankle of the body which is winched up - this is the next performer (the wonderful Lydia Harper, now touring with Cirque du Soleil), who performs her cloud swing act, which ends in a poignant neck spin.

This shows a dramaturgical opportunity dilemma. The purpose of the evening is a show-case for graduating students so it was not possible or appropriate to inflect the actual  acts. We certainly established that there was a hierarchy where the performers of the featured acts were of a different order to the slaves. If this had been a production where the remit was for all the content of the piece - one choice could have been to make the acts even more glamorous and elaborate in their visuals e.g. bejewelled and feathered costumes. Another choice could have been to make each act a life-or death trial in some way (such as Lydia's entry and finish allowed for). Also there would have been an opportunity here - what might have been a good game for the implication of the audience? Might a slave clown have been sent out with a kind of geiger counter to measure he applause after the featured acts, and then looked at a dial and reacted in a number of ways - e.g. at first, just a general agitation to set up how important it was to get an accurate recording (or risk punishment), on another occasion - a head shake and a concerned look at the way the performer had exited; another time measuring clown might appear late and only catch the tail end of the audience reaction and look with appealing eyes to the audience who might only partially clap - reacting to what ever the audience did with desperate hope and ultimately their expression would read culpability as well as anxiety - they might well leave with a sob ... etc.

​While the cloud swing was being de-rigged, the Pillow heads make a return. A height-adjustable black screen is quickly erected and when the slave clowns step aside we see Little Man - he so sweet natured and happy, the expressions of the slave clowns is a nice Contrast. As with a doctor about to deliver a bad diagnosis, the pillow-heads cannot participate in his optimism. One slave clown advances with a barber-striped stick tipped with red feathers and tickling begins, resulting in suffering and eventually the existential, unanswerable cry of 'why? why? why?' (In Ancient Japan, this was a genuine method of torture - kusuguri-zeme: 'merciless tickling').
A cue point within the 'Little Man' scene set other slave clowns in traction setting up a table for the next act - juggling. One slave clown was given a tiny bellboy hat to wear to assist the performer by delivering her prop suitcases and collecting her coat. This act leaves some mess and an operational vacuum cleaner inside the headdress of a costume made to look like a small elephant comes on to clear.

A rope act follows, ending in a heel hang. The next link featured a clown with goggles and a whip and the entry of a tragic-looking unicorn (pantomime horse). In this reality, even a magical beast is degraded. The whip cracks force the unicorn to raise on hind legs and then to endure the humiliation of  a nervous slave clown throwing juggling hoops onto his horn. In Dark Clown all options are painful - the fails cause fear of punishment and the successful throws hurt the soul of the slave clown (and the unicorn).
​
The set-up for the following act is accomplished in the background. (A delightfully upbeat act by Tom Ball who plays a boy scout - the act starts in a tent, he climbs a ladder like some kind of scout task up to a high trapeze - beautiful). 

​The unicorn dolefully returns to support an acrobatic interlude in solving tutu-ed slave clowns.
The stage is set with hoops for a hula hoop act to follow (the consummate Helen Orford).

The long-suffering unicorn is tempted on with an apple ... he is reluctant but allows himself to put his faith in humanity once more. Once more, humiliation as the hula hoops left on the floor are slung around his neck. As he exited, one slave clowns sang an 'orphan' song accompanied but another on a ukulele while a third clown came on quietly up stage and yo-yoed.

At the end of the song, the interval play out music - Tom Waits 'Satisfied' (an upbeat song about death).

To welcome the audience back there was a scene of three terrified (yet highly skilled) slave clowns performing acrobatics to totalitarian music. Unless you were there, you'll never know. It was hilarious.

Tightrope act. Then three slave clowns dance/contort in three isolated spotlights (one is dressed as a skeleton) to cover de-rig of tightrope and rig for straps. Also, the collapsing clown is dragged across the stage, clutching a juggling club (my notes don't carry all the detail of this running motif - which built to a lowkey payoff).

Staps act.

The slave clowns nervously build acrobatic tableaux - they quiver with the strain of holding their positions while one hapless slave clown must make a painstaking squeaky tricycle journey across the wide length of the stage (meaningless activity is a spirit-breaking exercise in political camps) to deliver a juggling club at the furthest end as the final detail.

A rope act, which ended with silver PVS film dropping from the ceiling. Nelly vac makes another entrance to help hoover that up. The littlest tuttu-ed clown crosses with a brush also followed by the unicorn wrangler and her whip. Bag Heads dance, not no good reason (I love working with ensembles - once can generate a lot of material - I always ask people what skill they bring and it's wonderful to try to honour everyone's contributions). The Nellyvac, having cleaned, does a tinselly poo onstage (ah the pointless-ness of life). The 'elephant' wrangler takes out a plastic bag of course to clear up  the elephant's mess.

The wonderful Matt Green does a juggling act - it is reminiscent of Beckett's Act Without Words - his hoody is on back-to-front so he is working blind some of the time. He loses clubs, throws away clubs, reaches for clubs that don't arrive and then clubs thrown on him (as if an assault by fate).

At the end of the act clowns come on singly to clear the clubs strewn about. Here the slave clowns came together in couples and slow-danced. Two central clowns take focus and move apart as if pulled by external forces (other clowns subtly place a crash mat), ready for Ben Browns lovely aerial hoop act, with an atmosphere of pining.

Andie Scott had used a scrim at the back. In a dramatic change of mood, with an impressive soundscape chord, we see a through the scrim where a kind of 'Wailing Wall' is revealed - a vertical vision of hell. Against the bare brick wall we hung white hoops and ropes - all the slave clowns were writhing there in agony and despair. My intention was to evoke something like Hans Memling's The Last Judgement.

​Suddenly in tutus and balaclavas come the clowns dressed like Pussy Riot. Their very can-can kicking liberates and enlivens the clowns who descend on to the stage area and raise up the Pussy Riot dancers and leave, triumphant. 

Fizz, drip, desolate lighting - two clowns enter, enthusiastically pumping placards ... their pace, energy, mood slows and drops as they see they are too late for the revolution .. and they sadly set the scene for the next act.

They place a chair for the harpist who will play live to accompany a stunning and moving acrobatic balance duo about love and interdependence.

​To finish the evening on a high - there is a triumphant celebratory juggling arcade with exuberant acro - the slave clowns are free after all.

I was invited by Clown Power to have a chat with a gaggle of female clowns from Oz and UK on Sunday 29th March - you can eavesdrop here: 

We five clown practitioners from different backgrounds gathered to speak about how it is to be a female clown. The panel members were:  

• Sue Broadway is a director, academic and teacher of circus and physical theatre. She also performs as a clown, compere, eccentric juggler and Vaudevillian. She’s interested in the intersection between Clown, feminism, aging and caring and is wondering where next.
• Debra Battton is a Performer  / Director of Circus and Physical Theatre based in Melbourne, Australia. Debra is interested in experiments with theatrical forms including Circus Dance Text and Improvisation. She has over thirty years of professional experience including leading Legs on the Wall as Artistic Director for ten years. 
• Maggie Irving is a clown, teacher and researcher with a ‘Practice as Research’ PhD in becoming a female clown. A Clown Doctor! Passionate about clowning in everyday life, and bringing the art of clowning into stand up comedy, business and beyond.
• Peta Lily is a prolific devising performer who often uses autobiographical material in her work; clown-informed, mixed with spoken word, song and gently wry satire. She  directs, leads independent workshops & is a Visiting Lecturer at leading drama schools in London. 
• Holly Stoppit is a facilitator, performance skills teacher, theatre director, dramatherapist and clown academic, specialising in live, interactive, improvised and devised performance. At the heart of all of Holly’s work is a desire to promote creative discovery and connection through play.

The discussion was chaired by Vicki Amedume from Upswing Aerial and produced by Dave Spathaky for Clown Power.
This is the first of a series of discussions between clowns, to find out more join the Clownpower Facebook group here.