NEW VAUDEVILLE YAMAS

I have a friend who describes the proliferation of the "New Vaudeville" approach to clowning as the "New Yama". His reason being that now it's just as generic, hackneyed, and uninspired an approach to clowning as the rainbow wigged, Simplicity-patterned, greasy, smeared makeup of the "yama yama" clown that hands out stickers at the car wash now simply repackaged to showcase how much money these performers have spent picking items out of the Dube catalog.

His assessment may not be true of everyone but it is essentially valid and is only gaining more ground with me as time goes on.

Dressing in gray, black or brown thrift store castoffs and topping it with a derby or porkpie to show how different you are from the typical convention, Shrine and Christian clowns that you are trying to distance yourself from makes sense only to other "New Vaudeville" clowns. The general public doesn't understand or care about the idea - or what you are doing with it. If anything, it only serves to distance you from your audience, for whom vaudeville (either old or new ) is a largely meaningless word.

It all boils down to character, without a strong character you have nothing. So if the costume only serves to make the character more accessible, more unique , more marketable... why look like everybody else?

When you think about it, it really makes about as much sense for a contemporary performer to wear a top hat as it would have for Buster Keaton or Harold Lloyd to work in the 1920s dressed as Joseph Grimaldi.

CLOWN ALLEY: Circo Atayde (1988)

IT'S THE SINGER, NOT THE SONG...

Naiseng, a longtime employee of the Archie McPhee Catalog people, gives his brutally honest assessment of some of the company's most popular products.

This really helps to illustrate just how a prop, devoid of a talented comedian's ability to "sell" said prop, can (and very often does) look completely stupid and totally useless in the cold light of day.

I think that I would prefer watching Naiseng either alone or without the condescending demeanor of the host. This pretty clearly illustrates the talent of someone like David Letterman, who could present the same material in the same way without giving you the impression that he was personally insulting the subject.

"Dying is easy; presenting ironically humorous online videos based on a foreigner's difficulties in comprehending an American hipster's pop-cultural sensibilities based on encountering a series of non-related items from a mail-order novelty catalog is apparently quite hard, or at the very least much harder than it looks on late night television."

ANDY KAUFMAN: Mighty Mouse (October 11, 1975)

Andy Kaufman performing his Mighty Mouse bit on the premier episode of Saturday Night Live (then called NBC's Saturday Night) on the night of Saturday October 11, 1975. I didn't see it that first night but I did see it when it was repeated during that first season. I was eight years old.

An absolutely perfect clown gag, just brilliant.

I have to place this one in a category with Buster Keaton's vase bit from Pest of the West, Ernie Kovacs' Nairobi Trio and Jim Henson's Mahna Mahna; a bit where the performer is locked into an inevitable action that the audience is fully aware of and totally expects. It's virtually the exact opposite of a traditional clown gag which is usually based on the element of surprise.

I could watch this a million times.

Side note: I watched Andy Kaufman punch Jack Burns live on ABC's Fridays while sleeping over at Eric Mischel's house.

SPREAD THE WORD!

It looks like most folks now know that things are back up and running here but we're still down in individual hits from where we were before the break.

Please spread the word and let folks know that things are back to normal here and all of the archives have been restored.

Thanks,
~Pat

MORE CIRCUS VIDBEL DATES

I'm not involved in every single date of the tour but I will be in these towns promoting the following upcoming shows:

May 25 & 26 Atlantic County 4-H Fairgrounds Egg Harbor City, NJ
May 27 & 28 Cape May Courthouse,NJ
June 6 & 7 Norwich, NY
June 8 & 9 Afton, NY
June 10 & 11 Whitney Point, NY
June 12 & 13 Frankfort, NY
June 14 Fonda, NY
June 15 & 16 Ballston Spa, NY
June 25 Goshen, CT
June 26 & 27 Riverton, CT

JULES TURNOUR: Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus (June 11, 1923)

CHIPPER LOWELL

My Facebook pal Chipper Lowell, son of 50s and 60s era Ringling clown Chuck Burnes, who reportedly KILLED last night at the Magic Castle in Hollywood.

HARPO MARX & MILTON BERLE: Kraft Music Hall (January 14, 1959)

Video and original comments courtesy of Gary Kaskel

Harpo Marx clowns with Uncle Miltie on The Kraft Music Hall starring Milton Berle broadcast January 14, 1959. Billy May conducts the orchestra. May also wrote and conducted the music on all the early Capitol Records' Bozo the Clown albums.

When I first saw this at the Museum of Television and Radio in NYC I was floored by Harpo's "Shiner-esque" gestures intimating alchohol, cocaine and heroin use in 1959! And keep an eye on Uncle Miltie's left hand after Harpo plays the clarinet, as he prompts Harpo's final prop in the scene.

BABY NEWS

Artist's rendition of clown baby

(Actual baby will not be used to sell hamburgers)

The baby that we were told was "probably" a girl?

Yeah... not so much.



Most likely name: James Roane Cashin

Likely nicknames: Jamie, J-Ro, Jas, Jam and Pootie McDiapermuffin 2.0



Shane will continue to be known as Shane, Shanye or Il Piccolo Bastardo Rosso.

WHAT DO I WANT?

I'd like to see America build an honest-to-goodness circus building in New York City.

Not Madison Square Garden, not a tent in Damrosch Park or out on Coney Island but a real European-style home for the American circus; a building with no other purpose than to teach and present circus.

No hockey. No basketball. No rock concerts or ice shows. Circus. Only circus.

A place that Ringling could play in the spring and Big Apple could play in the fall. A place where New York could finally have it's own Shrine Circus in the winter. Something that could house a Clown College (were anyone so inclined to restart such a program) in the summer and host Cirque when they are in town.

A place that New York could invite the great circuses of Europe and introduce American audiences to a classical circus, devoid of the elephant rides, inflatable bounce houses and the 7 minute peanut pitches that keep American shows from trancending the carnivalesque.

Something that FINALLY says that we understand that the circus is an art form deserving of respect.

THAT is what I want.

Where should it be built? Right in Central Park

Can such a thing be done? Of course! Do it at night when no one is looking.

PETER SHUB: Solo Show

PETER SHUB: Interview

A clown is a mirror for the society. With these words, Peter Shub proposes a reflection to us on the figure of the clown. On the occasion of his participation in the Festival the International of Theater of Seville, the teacher of clown analyzes the keys of comedy, the contemporary clown and the importance of the laughter in the daily life: we are losing the capacity to laugh?

MYSTERY CLOWNS: Cirque Amar

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DREW RICHARDSON!

Drew The Dramatic Fool

The very happiest of 29th birthday wishes go out today to my good friend, co-conspirator
and one of the very best clowns anywhere in the world today, Mr. Drew Richardson.



FOREVER YOUNG

May God bless and keep you always,
May your wishes all come true,
May you always do for others
And let others do for you.
May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

~ Bob Dylan

COWBOY MIKE KEEVER: Get Well Soon

Information courtesy of Jimmy Graham

Cowboy Mike Keever is currently in the hospital with pancreatitus.

Here is his information:
Skaggs Regional Medical Center
PO Box 650
Room 121
Branson, Missouri, 65615
417-335-7000 room 121

Please call Mike only if you personally know Mike, otherwise I know that he'd love a card or to read your message in the comments of this post. We all love ya, Mike. Get better soon!!!

WAITING FOR GODOT

The cast (Nathan Lane, Bill Irwin, John Goodman and John Glover) of the Roundabout Theater Co.'s current Broadway production of Waiting for Godot...

THANK YOU!

Scott Saidel

Eric Mischel

We all owe a debt of gratitude to these two men, Scott Saidel and Eric Mischel, for getting clownalley.net back.

And to Facebook.

And the Old Bridge Township School System in general and the Lakeridge West bus in particular.


Neither of them are clowns.

I went to school with both of them.


When the blog disappeared Scott, who I hadn't seen since high school, sent me a very nice Facebook message telling me that he'd Googled my name one day, discovered the blog and how much he'd enjoyed it. He knew that Eric, who we'd both gone to school with, worked at Google and suggested contacting him.

Eric and I had been very good friends in middle school. We'd slept over each other's houses, played Atari, rode bikes... typical middle school stuff. I went to Eric's Bar Mitzvah. His father gave me the best lesson I ever got on how to throw a baseball and my very first, and best, stock tip ("Just put your money in the bank.")

I sent him a Facebook message and Eric, who I hadn't seen in 25 years really went above and beyond to get things back up and running here.

So, the old adage really is true: there is no friend like an old friend.

If you appreciate having the archives here back please take a moment to thank Scott and Eric because without them this would very likely have been gone forever.

Thank you guys!

We are back!

POODLES HANNEFORD : Gracie's Estate Creates Scholarship Fund

Article courtesy of Don Covington

CIRCUS PERFORMER ESTABLISHES SCHOLARSHIP FUND

Post Star
Glens Falls, New York
April 15, 2009


LAKE GEORGE - Gracie Hanneford made a career as a circus performer, like her family did for generations, before moving to Lake George in the 1950s.

Before her death in 2006, she wanted to create a scholarship in memory of her father, Edwin "Poodles" Hanneford IV, a seventh-generation circus performer.

So she contacted Rosemarie Earl, a guidance counselor at Lake George High School. She told Earl her will would include a donation to provide Lake George students with scholarships, but she never mentioned the amount.

It was not until a few years later, after Hanneford died and her assets were sold, that the Lake George Scholarship Association learned the gift was more than $900,000, the bulk of Gracie Hanneford's estate.
"When I got the letter from the attorney, I was flabbergasted," said Jim Mathis, president of the association, which doles out scholarships to Lake George students and graduates each year.

Earl, who is also on the association board, said families will sometimes donate money to honor someone. A $1,000 gift is a common amount, and she originally thought Gracie Hanneford's donation would be around $1,000.

"I thought it was wonderful," Earl said, of the bequest. "It's going to be there, really, forever. If we give away the interest of that money, the principle will always be there."

Hanneford put stipulations on the money.

Known as the Poodles Hanneford Scholarship for the Performing Arts, awards will be given to qualifying students who intend to study subjects such as theater, film, television, radio, music, literature, screenwriting, journalism and circus arts.

Lake George graduates now enrolled at a college can apply, too. Students can continue receiving the scholarship if they show they are still studying the written or performing arts.

Gracie Hanneford never attended Lake George schools. She came to the area with her family in 1956, after a career as a horseback rider in her family's circus act, an act that was part of several top circus shows in the early to mid-1900s.

After moving to a home on the east side of Lake George, her family set up a dog act at Frontier Town, the former theme park in North Hudson.

Later, Hanneford moved to California for a time but eventually returned to Lake George.

She served on the altar guild and was a vestry member at St. James Episcopal Church, and she was part of the Glens Falls Hospital ladies auxiliary, according to her Dec. 20, 2006 obituary.

Her father, Poodles, was born in a circus wagon in England in 1891. He began performing at 5 as a bareback rider, turning his skills into a career that took him across England and to Ireland before bringing his act to circuses in the U.S.

He was known as Poodles the Riding Fool, a clown who set a world record by making 26 consecutive running leaps on and off a horse, according to a press release from the association.

Poodles was inducted into the Clown Hall of Fame in 1965. He died two years later.

Now his name will carry on for years as the scholarship helps students pay for college.

The association received a portion of the endowment from Gracie Hanneford last year and used it to give two scholarships of at least $1,000 each, Mathis said.

Mathis said the association could give out as much as $20,000 from the Hanneford fund this year. Students have until next week to apply.

The Hanneford fund is the largest at Lake George High School. The association raises money each year for scholarships and hands out other awards through other bequests.

The Hanneford endowment is among the largest recent bequests to local schools for scholarships.

At the Hadley-Luzerne High School, officials two years ago were shocked to receive $1 million from the late Alice Harris, a former student who later owned a grocery store in Lake Luzerne and often loaned money to students so they could pay for college.
The Harris fund provides scholarships to students who cannot afford college.

Other local high schools have numerous scholarships created by area groups or businesses, along with those made in memory of others.

Some scholarships are given to students who study a particular subject.

Queensbury High School once received $50,000 from Sarah McEchron, a Queensbury teacher when the district was made up of one-room schoolhouses.

Only the interest from the McEchron bequest can be used, with the money going to students who pursue teaching careers, said Kathy Fisch, Queensbury's director of guidance.
High schools like Granville, Hudson Falls and Saratoga Springs have similar scholarships, but none from bequests as large as the Hanneford fund.

Peg Earl, the mother-in-law of Rosemarie Earl and a friend of Gracie Hanneford, knew Gracie was interested in the performing arts and wanted to honor her father's legacy. But Peg never imagined her endowment would approach $1 million.

"She wanted to keep her father's image alive as long as she could. To tell you the truth, I couldn't believe the amount myself," she said.

While Peg Earl said she could only assume that most of the endowment came from the sale of Gracie Hanneford's home, Gracie was a frugal person.

"She was one of those people who never bought a new car. She always bought a used car," Peg Earl said.