The short-lived 1969 Ringling Firehouse Gag, produced by Danny Chapman and featuring graduates of the very first Clown College class..
I can't make out any faces other than my friend Michael Karp being hit in the kisser with the swinging ladder on the left and Dalton Dearborn taking it in the back of the head on the right.
Mr. Karp, PLEASE give us the story on this one!!!
2 comments:
I am fairly sure that Eric Braun was in that gag. Try calling Kent Tyler?
Right you are...I believe the clown on the left IS Eric Braun...with (L to R) me, Jim Houle and Dalton Dearborn (sp?)...
It was a very successful gag, actually, and the props were very well constructed; it was taken away from us before Baltimore (I think) due to (according to Performance Director Bob Dover then) time problems...It did run long...
I actually came up with a finish for the gag that Producing Clown (and "Dean"--I guess that was his title; CC was much more informal the) Danny Chapman told me was one he had never seen...
I wore TWO fireman's outfits in the gag...I ripped off the outer one inside the house after I ran up the ladder swinging an axe and fell through the roof.
As the gag ended with a final explosion, I threw myself out of the side door and fell to the mat. The costume I was then wearing looked like it had been set afire--all tattered and blackened at the edges. I then ran after the firetrck--sometimes catching it by its rear bumper and being dragged from the arena.
It cost me $10.00 a week to tip the lighting guy so he would aim the spot at me so the gag could be seen...
Chutzpa? I never even cleared the gag with Danny before trying it out! He was a kind man, very generous, and just let me do it...
There's lots more about this gag, but time and space grow short--as even Einstein would admit!
More later....
--Michael Karp
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