Tag: Clowning

Starting with a yearlong course at École Philippe Gaulier, the world’s premier clown school.

Clown School Day 19: Joy Qua Joy

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In which Our Hero sees two people restored to their original shine.

“Raise your hand if you haven’t yet felt the sort of pleasure on stage that we’ve been talking about since Le Jeu began,” said the teacher at the end of class.

Two people raised their hands. Then a third, more tentatively.

The teacher sent the first to stage—a friendly but unassuming British man.
“Who in this class do you find attractive?”

He chose two women from the front row. It’s a testament to the oddness of this school that this no longer phases me.

“Go backstage,” the teacher told them. “When you enter, you’ll walk center stage and tell us about your three weeks here—while these two beautiful women kiss you.”

While the Brit was backstage, the teacher whispered to the rest of us:
“When he enters, we’ll stand and cheer.”

When he came out, our cheering lit him up.
Then the women appeared.

If you’ve never seen a reserved British man caressed by two beautiful women, I recommend it.

Every time they kissed his cheek, he said “thank you.”
But the thank-you was a shield—a polite dismissal of feeling.

“Stop commenting,” said the teacher. “Stand still and speak directly to us.”

The more pleasure he allowed himself, the more beautiful he became.
The more he shared his pleasure, the more fun we had.

Why can’t we live like this all the time?

The Catholic Church doesn’t benefit from people being happy.
Nor does the Israeli military.
Nor the American economy.
Pick an institution; few thrive on pure joy.
We don’t want people too sad, but not too happy either.
Even parents—who want the best for their children—don’t usually mean pleasure qua pleasure.

That’s what makes clown special.
Clown is the direct transference of joy.
You practice finding joy and sharing it.
You learn to see the stupid.
See the stupid—and become stupid.

Because joy for its own sake is stupid.
Doesn’t a happy idiot chuckling in the corner grow smelly from lack of bathing, then die from lack of food?
Yes. This is joy qua joy.

But if you’re a closed-off British man who says “thank you” out of duty, not feeling—
or a muscle-bound weightlifter who loves film but hates actors for being too touchy-feely—
maybe you need some joy qua joy.

Both students left the stage with a new understanding: that pleasure shared openly is rewarded instantly.

Maybe a teacher shamed you for holding hands with your girlfriend in eighth grade.
Maybe a friend mocked you for calling them beautiful.
Maybe a parent slapped you for slurping your soup.

Whatever the reason—come to École Philippe Gaulier.
We’ll teach you to open, to feel, to share joy.
We’ll celebrate you for it.

And then you can return home—one more candle of joy.

Maybe it’s burning in an ocean of darkness.
I hadn’t noticed.
I was too busy laughing about the time a beautiful woman kissed me.

Am I funny yet?

Clown School Day 18: You Must Play the Game

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In which Our Hero misquotes Shakespeare.

“This above all: to thine own game be true.” —Hamlet, Act 1 Scene 3.

It’s very easy to forget the game.

But the game is the most important thing.

Some performance is only game. Tennis, for instance, is only game: and look how much money that earns.

The Rehearsal

My scene partner and I rehearsed today. We lacked pleasure because we had forgotten the game.

The original game was simple: I make my partner lick a thing. Like when children find a bug and dare each other to eat it.

It wasn’t fun anymore. We knew it was coming. We knew he would do it. There was no tension, no conflict.

So we changed it.

Now, we begin with a eulogy for a piece of the space: “We are gathered here today to say goodbye to the power outlet.”

Then we play rock-paper-scissors.

The loser, as a ritual of farewell, must lick it.

As the scene escalates, so do the lickables. The floor. The bottom of a shoe. The teacher.

We didn’t have a game. Now we have a game.

The game? Rock-paper-scissors.

But with stakes!

The Farce

In Improv class, I realized the rule applies to everything.

We played a farce: a train compartment. One person enters, perfectly normal except for one grotesque tic. They repeat it. Then a second person enters, takes pleasure from that game, and — after a long time enjoying their tic (longer than you think) — adds their own tic, heightening the first. Then a third person. Then a fourth.

The game is simple: take the game from the person before you, heighten it through your play, and pass it on.

Simple is nice.

Simple is hard.

You have to feel the scene. Is it falling down? Are you talking over the game with “train compartment” nonsense? Are you heightening or dominating or smothering?

When everyone played the game, the farce appeared by itself.

When someone forgot, everything froze.

The game makes the show. Always has. Always will.

The Handstand

This morning, I flipped upside-down.

My first handstand (wall-assisted), then onto a peer’s back, who rolled me forward, turning us both into a ball.

A new game: gravity as partner.

I’d forgotten the joy of inversion.

The Father

My father arrived in Étampes today. He wants more than anything to see a class.

I’d love to have him: to share my play space. The school forbids it.

No visitors, no cameras, no phones. We even sign a “no recording” oath, like monks taking vows.

Why so strict?

Because clowning is vulnerable.

I’ve seen people bare grief. I’ve seen them make absolute fools of themselves (and not the good kind).

Once, a student scraped his false teeth along the floor before popping them back in. The room gasped. Disgust and horror.

Once, I yelled at the teacher. Their instruction felt like trash; maybe provoking me was the point.

This isn’t for YouTube. This is for us.

The school protects its game.

It keeps the outside world out, so the play inside can live.

The Lesson

The game is everything: the lick, the tic, the flip, the secret room.

When you forget the game, everything dies.

When you play it, life appears.

Protect the space so you can play the game.

Then find the game.

Release all else.

Play the game.

And when you lose it, start again.

That’s what makes it a play.

Clown School Weekend 3.2: This Place is Run by Clowns

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In which Our Hero concludes that brilliance is no match for a red nose.

About once every other day, someone at clown school does something spectacularly disorganized. I sigh and say, “This place is run by clowns.”

And it is.

—

Clowns are not, by their nature, particularly intelligent.

It’s not that they’re stupid.

It’s that intelligence and clowning live on different axes.

An intelligent person may learn the craft faster. But the desire to clown, the joy of it, might even be anti-correlated with intelligence.

Smart people tend to want control. Clowns surrender it.

Smart people tend to want power. Clowns seek to be laughed at.

And yet, in my March course, three of the 30 Americans were Yale graduates.

Plus a single from Stanford.

Just enough prestige to make the chaos feel ironic.

Of course, it helps to be rich enough to spend a year falling on your face.

Still, it’s a funny sight I observed in Thursday’s class:

eight clowns silently arranging themselves in order of intelligence.

The clown they insisted should be at the bottom later thought this was hilarious as he has a master’s degree.

—

Clowning is a craft.

Most work is a craft.

Hell, even medicine is a craft.

And mastery in a craft depends less on general intelligence than on dedication —

and on cultivating the right skills: openness, affability, lightness.

—

This is the first social hierarchy I’ve been in where people organize by skill in a single, very specific craft.

In college, you could be successful at any number of things — academics, theater, sports, journalism.

In elementary school, the options were fewer but still broad: maybe good at math, worse at English, class clown, or owned the good video games.

Here, clowns arrange by everyday charisma.

And charisma in life is decently correlated with charisma on stage.

Add to that: we’re learning charisma.

And the social life becomes pretty interesting.

It’s like a schoolyard where the only question is: how fun are you at play?

Clown School Weekend 3.1: Simple Precision

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In which Our Hero consumes a couple clowns

Last night I watched two excellent clowns on YouTube.

The first attempted to climb a staircase: first with one foot, then two, then using a harpoon as a pole vault, then trying a taller staircase. Always slipping backward, performing a kind of “moon-crawl,” moving backward while pretending to move forward.

The second performed built visual jokes around pop songs: a blend of clown, prop comedy, and puppetry.

Both chose a single simple game, then repeated it in increasingly heightened variations. With tight physical control, that was enough.

Stand-ups need new jokes to stay fresh. Musicians can live forever off one hit.

Clowns might belong to that latter category — one beautiful idiocy, endlessly re-played. Not note-for-note as a musician would, but a single comedic insight will take you far.

That said, if your art requires physical presence, your reach is finite.

Clown School Day 14: Some Days Ya Don’t Got It

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In which Our Hero fails honestly.

That’s three days in a row I’ve wanted to skip clown school.

And three days I’ve gone anyway.

Three days of long, heavy sleep:

11 hours, 9 hours, nearly 10 last night.

Three mornings waking early, wishing I could stay in bed forever.

What’s up with that?

I’m tired in a way that’s not physical.

It’s the exhaustion that comes from being seen — again and again — and still not finding what works.

The ache of caring too much about doing well, and not quite getting there.

Maybe it’s just the part of me that resists growth.

The part that wants to avoid the flop.

The part that whispers: stay safe, stay small.

But the show goes on.

So I go too.

In which two pairs of clowns succeed

I have a hypothesis about clowning: there are only two good moves.

The first is doing something good.

The second is doing something bad, and admitting it.

The second is just a version of the first: both are open, honest sharings of self.

Maybe that’s what makes someone funny: the willingness to be seen, and to be laughed at.

Open, but not grasping. Honest, but not pleading.

Just human: the funny little wriggly worm that we are.

Today, I failed.

I got exactly one reasonable-sized laugh, when I shrugged and said, “Some days ya don’t got it”.

It was the opposite of calculated, and therefore perfect.

My scene partner, though, was charming. I’m not good at charming a crowd.

One person, sure: I find what they care about and give them that.

But a crowd? That feels like crafting myself into someone they’ll love…

and that’s never been my thing.

Maybe that’s why I’m drawn to bouffon: the grotesque outcast who refuses charm, making you laugh by breaking the mold.

I don’t know how to play “charming” without feeling false.

Tall, handsome, strong, masculine — all that bland, moral ideal.

Heroes just seem so… plain.

My favorite sex-work writer once said something like, “When I do the girlfriend experience, I just give guys all the parts of a date they want, and none of the parts they don’t.”

It’s the same trick as charm: shave off the edges until only the pleasant remains.

The two American clowns who are alumni from this school that I’ve seen succeed are masters of the flop (one linked here).

They do things that don’t work, then admit it, again and again.

It’s delightful. Comic. But not powerful.

The most successful recent student, though — a Norwegian — is the opposite:

he does good things, and they work.

Maybe that’s cultural.

Maybe Americans prefer the flop because it’s relatable.

Maybe our comedy is just collective self-recognition in failure.

That’s probably why I’d rather play the fool, or the villain, than the flawless hero.

Today, two pairs performed brilliantly.

One was a seasoned clown with a German partner.

The clown failed, over and over, and acknowledged it.

The German played strong, stalwart, beautiful.

We laughed at one, cheered for the other.

Together they danced between laughter and awe:

Comic and Beauty, alternating in rhythm.

After five minutes, our teacher smiled and said, “Thank you for sharing your joy.”

I wondered how long the German had been performing — possibly decades.

And the seasoned clown has ten years under his belt, with awards to show for it.

I was glad to see them.

It helped to see the two paths clearly:

the clown who fails and admits it,

and the one who succeeds by doing good things.

Maybe both are forms of giving.

Maybe both are beautiful.

Maybe the German’s beauty wasn’t in his poise,

but in his openness — his unpushed caring,

his gentle invitation:

“I’m here. This is me. Go ahead: laugh at me.”

Clown School Day 13: Who’s The Laugh For?

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In which Our Hero learns to give himself away.

Is giving giving?

We created a mob on stage. One leader, fifteen followers. The leader was in Major: loud, powerful, commanding, tall. The followers were in Minor: following along with the Major’s game.

The leader’s task: move for the group. Then, if successful, speak for the group.

Here’s the kicker:

We — the audience — could easily see when the leader was playing for others and when they were playing for themselves. Too delighted by your own words? Too much for yourself. Too fast, too slow, too complicated, too boring? All of it = no good.

It was fucking cool.

It wasn’t just obvious when a leader played for themselves: we could even separate which parts they did for themselves. Some moved for themselves but spoke for the group. Others spoke for themselves but moved for the group.

Me? I moved for the group until I started speaking. Then I spoke for the group but failed to move for them.

The magnetism of a Major doing for others was inescapable. It drew us in — as the audience — as though they were playing for us, too.

I keep wondering what “giving” really is. Is it enough that someone is giving to someone? Or must they somehow give to each person? The latter seems impossible: no one can give individually to a 3,000-person crowd. But you can give, and keep giving, and keep giving…

—

I thought about that today when I found myself in a spat with a friend. They argued — accurately — that I’d been laughing for myself, not for them. And they found that objectionable.

At a minimum, they were fair (jury’s still out on them being right ;). Maybe I’ve found too few people laughing for me, so I learned to laugh for myself. Whatever the reason, it’s unhelpful — on stage and in friendship alike.

That’s why I’m here at clown school:

because I’m a guarded, frightened, closed, selfish, winning-focused person

trying to open up.

—

It’s hard to give and share and open and keep giving in this ever-present openness.

First-year classes are often “weeder” classes — designed to weed out those who aren’t a fit. In college, I lasted one day in Theater 101 before switching to philosophy. Theater 101 was dry history; philosophy had rigor and use.

I wonder if theater students who truly love it endure that drudgery because they care so much about reaching the next level — the acting classes, the real thing.

Here, too, I’m pushing through the bullshit, the trials, the endless tests: chasing skill.

The teachers keep throwing more at you, more and more, just to see who will break.

Those who break aren’t meant to be clowns.

And maybe I’m not meant to be one either.

So I’ll grab what I can from this pressure cooker,

gather the small diamonds I find,

and fuse them with other gold I’ve picked up along the way,

to form

my own

crown of jewels.

Clown School Day 12: If Only You Knew What Makes Me Laugh?

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In which Our Hero is a total grumpypants.

You only want some of my joy. You don’t want all of it.

Not the part that finds fascination in injuries at the Olympics.

Not the part that laughs when someone fumbles at a task they’ve been doing for months.

Not the part that goes for blood in silly games.

You only want some parts.

—

School is cultural honing: a repeated sheening and shearing and shaping of an impressionable child into the kind of person we want.

Graduate school is self-imposed honing.

Clown school is emotional honing.

—

Half of this school is calibration: make it light, make it pleasant, make it generous.

Half is tactical: learn the mechanics and try them out.

And the final half (yes, I know) is experience: stage time with a real audience who loves this peculiar art.

But what if I don’t want to be calibrated?

What if I like my joy?

What if I’d miss the parts of it you call cruel?

—

A friend recently said something that ruined my joy at watching this video (includes a severe gymnastics injury). I used to find it fascinating. Now I can hardly watch.

Is that a loss? Once I received a fascinated joy. Now that joy is covered with a patina of sadness and pity.

Why do we do that to each other: sand the edges off one another’s laughter? Isn’t there a terrible beauty in the Olympian moment: a lifetime’s work undone in one leap? It’s comic, in the oldest sense: man plans and God laughs.

The funniest part, perhaps, is the commitment to the bit. This athlete may never walk again. That’s deathly serious. But he hurt himself with flips and spins, in a contrived game, for which the prize is mainly collective fiction (a title, which brings fame and glory). Is that not fundamentally comic? For me, it’s the same humor I saw in the nod of a hotel receptionist in Bentonville, Arkansas. I commented that the front page of their local newspaper was about high school football. She nodded solemnly, explaining, “It’s very important.”

No, it isn’t.

And yes, it is.

With the receptionist, I let her continue her joy.

While my Olympic joy is now covered with dry rot.

Now, when I rewatch, I can barely locate that joy. It’s smaller now, covered in a “But you shouldn’t…”

—

We choose the games we play. I’ve chosen clown school.

And yet, when peers see me on the street, when they ask what video I’m watching on my phone, I hide. I make a joke. I assume they’ll hurt me if I’m honest.

It’s hard to be honest and open.

So hard. Since it’s been so aggressively sanded away.

That’s why I’m here.

Because people don’t generally value openness, or honesty, or play.

We value these in contained scenarios. But an intensely raw emotion, honestly expressed? Best put a lid on that, missy!

—

I generally don’t find the world a nice place. I don’t think openness is generally rewarded. People can be vicious outside the boundaries of their games. That’s why games exist: to make behavior safe.

Within a game (religion, law, sport), there’s form. There’s play. Simplicity. Meaning.

Outside, there’s a new game:

The honest negotiation between what we’re told to laugh at

and what still makes us laugh.

I’d like to laugh at you when you’re being an idiot.

I’d like to laugh at me when I’m being an idiot.

Have you considered joining me?

It’s funnier over here.

And if not,

I’ll take

my ball

and go home.

—

“The child not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth” —African proverb.

Clown School Day 11: The Joy of Gibberish

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In which Our Hero finally speaks his native tongue

I did it! I clowned! Wahoo!!! !!!! !!!!

Here’s the sitch:

Our head teacher asks for five people who don’t speak Chinese. I step forward. She plays a Chinese song and we’re told to mime along. Then she turns down the music and says: keep going. Continue the song, in this language we do not speak.

I have been preparing for this my whole life.

I’ve always loved imitating sounds. Not faces, not gestures, sounds. The cadence of languages, sirens, shower water hitting my rubber duck. It’s always been a private delight.

Today I let it out. I imitated the music of a language I don’t know, and loved it. The audience loved it too.

It gets better.

On Friday I asked our teacher how to tell when something works. She said: you have to look at the audience and see.

I already knew that, but I needed to hear it from her.

So today I looked. I saw the joy light up their faces. One woman — the same who’d argued with me on Thursday — beamed with glee. My roommate was glowing, proud to see me not only succeed but to know I was succeeding.

And so I kept playing. Kept singing. Kept sharing that joy.

Good news: I have a skill people love.

Bad news: in America, this skill is considered offensive.

Five years ago at a rodeo in Wyoming, I was doing a southern accent for fun. My travel partner told me it was unacceptable. She thought I was mocking. Maybe she was right; maybe she wasn’t. Either way, I stopped.

Now, at last, I’ve found a place where the same instinct — my delight in sound and voices — brings laughter and connection instead of tension and fear.

Sometimes I wander around the house doing silly voices. Usually, people shut this down. But in clown, it’s beautiful.

Or maybe it’s always been beautiful, I just need the right place to perform.

🤡

[My travel buddy of the last two years would like to add this note about me: “I’ve also noticed when traveling that you [Julian] pick up the accent and speech pattern of folks you chat with. I often worry that folks will find it offensive, but, tbh, I think they don’t usually notice and seem to like it.”]

Clown School Day 8: Nice, Simple, Social

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In which Our Hero makes a friend!

Once in a blue moon, you meet a person who feels like someone you’ve known your whole life. In my case, today’s was a trans, autistic, lesbian philosopher with eerily similar experiences to my own. Dinner started at 7 p.m. and ended at 11:30, including a long, leisurely walk around the park.

My goals at clown school are threefold:

  1. Learn the practicalities of clowning
  2. Learn the theory of clowning
  3. Make friends I’d like to spend time with after clown school

It’s nice to move forward on #3.

Notes from clown school today:

  • Blindfolded ball pickup: Walk toward a ball with eyes closed, then pick it up. The key is counting the right number of paces, then walking normally even when, near the end, excitement floods in.
  • Chair swap game: Don’t let others rattle you. Don’t move until you have agreement.
  • One structure of game: One vs. Group. A bunch of people beating up on one idiot (à la Monkey in the Middle). Perhaps funniest when all are idiots.
  • Some people are more confident than they are right. One classmate especially.
  • Idiots trying very hard at something they’re terrible at → very funny.
  • Smart people tease each other; idiots conspire.
  • Regardless of external intensity or internal emotional intense, I must still speak in a BIG, BOOMING VOICE.
  • Idiots playing smart games → lots of apologizing.
  • A conspiring group mirrors fighting over limited resources; one-on-one intellectual duels mirror fighting for extraneous desires or abstract pleasures like honor.
  • Teaching hunch: if someone ends on a mistake, they dwell on it, therefore learning faster.
  • When the major/minor switches → fixed point.
  • A “miser for pleasure” hoards joy inside instead of sharing it.
  • Loud creates an impulse. The important part is the impulse.

Clown School Weekend 1.2: Phoning It In

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In which Our Hero phones it in with a brief reflection (it’s the weekend, after all)

I started memorizing lines this weekend. The school doesn’t care what the words mean: only that you say them exactly right. It’s strange to memorize language as sound instead of sense.

I’ve been using a first-letter mnemonic I found on YouTube, which works surprisingly well. Combine that with the top-secret trick of practicing right before bed and again first thing in the morning, and the lines get codified much faster.

That’s all for today. Tomorrow begins Week 2 of Clown School. Onward! 🎭