Michu's Wedding!!!

So- my memory has been refreshed!  The Spec the year my classmates joined the Blue Show was the second year of the Michu's Wedding tour.  According to Bill Ballantine in Clown Alley, 16 class of 1976 graduates joined the Blue Show.  And only 6 clowns from the Class of 75 were rehired for a second year . . . In all, 28 of my class mates went to work for RBB&B (6 to the Red Unit and 6 to Circus World).  And to this day, I'm disappointed that I wasn't one of them . . .

But thanks to Harvey and Bill, I was back!  I remember buying a lot of stuff at the hardware store, almost daily trips, and many nights hanging out at the motel, where an amazing number of clowns sought refuge from the train . . . but all too soon, it was over again.  The show opened in Venice, and I was about useless to Harvey and Bill, forever sneaking off to watch from wings, covered in sawdust and paint, but no spangles.

I remember watching Ned Way (how much does a ned weigh?) borrow handcuffs from an off duty cop doing security and cuff himself to a railing at the end of the seats, just as the spec began.  Then just as his place in the grand parade was marching by empty, he freed himself, left the cuffs dangling and jumped into place.  Years later, when I moved to Deltona, I found out that Ned lived here, but he was involved in some sort of Christian ministry, and I neglected to seek him out because I didn't want to be involved in anything Christian.  Go figure.  By the time I'd been born again, Ned had left the area, so that night in Venice, handcuffed to the railing, was probably the last time I ever saw him . . .

The show left Venice, but I stayed.  Harvey and I went back one more day to clean up.  And truthfully, I don't think I've ever seen a space emptier than the circus arena was when we arrived the next day.  Looked something like this . . .

Greg DeSanto, Director of the Clown Hall of Fame, Baraboo, WI (his photo, shamelessly lifted form Clown College Facebook page)

Except there was no clown.  There was nothing.  It was empty and forlorn, with nothing but the quickly fading ghosts of glitz and glamor, of sawdust and spangles, to remind a person of the spectacle that had so recently swelled the rafters with music and applause. 

Once again, the Circus shut off, like a tightly twisted tap, without even a drip to remind one of its former glory . . .

Prop Shop . . .

The World English Dictionary defines "serendipity" as "the faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident "  It states further that the word was "coined by Horace Walpole, in 1754, from the Persian fairytale The Three Princes of Serendip, in which the heroes possess this gift." And all this time I thought it was made up by Jiminy Crickett . . .

But, English trivia aside, running into Richard Fick at Winn-Dixie that night was about as "serendipitous" as it gets.  I had just quit my job at the Hall of Fame (after only a week), and had no idea of where I was going to go, or what I was going to do next.  I think I gave him a ride back to the train, but I could be making that up.  I do remember the next morning, I went to the arena with Richard, and just walked in with all the other 1st year clowns, acting  like I belonged there just as much as they did . . .

Talk about luck!  I walk into the prop shop, and there's Harvey Copeland and Bill Ballantine all in a tizzy about how much there is to do and how little time there is to do it in.  They need stuff from the local hardware store, but they need to be at the arena and "hey! Bruce could go to the store . . ."

So they give me a list, and a blank purchase order, and off I go.  I found everything on the list, then copied the list onto the purchase order, completed the transaction and went back to the arena.  Later on I got complimented by the comptroller for being the only one from the clown department whose receipts actually matched what was requested on the purchase order . . . never told him that it was really the other way around.

By the end of the day, I had a job, and a motel room, courtesy of Bill Ballantine and RBB&BCSI. (Now there's an idea for a TV show . . .)  Oddly enough, I have no recollection at all of what was in the show, and I saw all or part of it probably more often than any other edition.  What I do remember is the frenzy of activity from early morning to late at night.  I believe it was the second year of whatever edition it might have been, and more than half of the clowns were from my recently graduated class.  What it felt like, more than anything else, was coming home.

I went to sleep happy that night . . .

Illustration . . .

What we did when the 5-Man Bike broke . . . (8/23/83)

Random Thoughts . . .

Unicycling is a difficult skill to master.  But once you have it, it’s a lot like riding a regular bike (one with two wheels), in that it’s hard to forget how.  Forget that you could flat out kill yourself learning.  I got a unicycle for my 28^th birthday (while I was in nursing school)—I still have it.  My brother-in-law restored it for my 64^th birthday.  And I can still ride it, almost as well as I ever could, which was never really all that great to begin with.   In the twenty years I spent in the circus industry, there was only once that I used it in a show . . .

On Circus Vargas, in 1983, midway through the first half of the show, they always did a “no-smoking” announcement.  Cliff Vargas, the owner/producer, paid a guy to build a bicycle built for five (no lie!).  One guy would run down the track right after the announcement with his head on fire, and five of us would chase him, in yellow rain coats and plastic fireman hats on the five man bike.  It was pretty funny, and it took long enough, but the bike was a piece of crap.  It was out of the show broken as often as it was in.

One day, when the bike was broken, Scott Parker comes up with an extraordinary idea—so, before the first show, we construct an oversize fire hydrant out of foam-rubber, about a fifteen foot long hose from dryer tubing, and a foam rubber nozzle with a bulb syringe inside that spits out water.  Then we chase the on-fire guy, still in yellow rain coats with fireman helmets, only now on unicycles—Scott in front with the nozzle, futilely squirting water at the guy, me in the middle holding onto the hose for dear life, and Greg McElwayne in the rear, carrying the hydrant on a six foot tall giraffe unicycle . . . and suddenly, pretty funny becomes a wave of uproarious laughter that follows us all the way around the tent.  We’d have willingly never done it any other way again.

But Cliff had paid a bunch of money for the five-man bike, and he wanted to see it in his show.  And it was HIS show . . .  Yet, somehow, for the rest of the season, whenever we played on pavement, as opposed to pasture, the five man bike seemed to be in need of repair . . .

From an audience point of view, clowns are supposed to be funny.  That means that when the clowns are finished, in a best case scenario, the audience should be rolling on the floor laughing their butts off.   And, after the Unicycle Chase, they were.  Worst case, they should at the very least be amused.  And after the five man bike, they were.  Sometimes, if they’re not actively seeking your head on a platter, then you’ve done the best you can do.  But from a clown point of view, “rotfltbo” is insanely better than “amused.”

From a producer’s point of view, while clowns are supposed to be funny, lots of times there are other considerations.  For instance, how much did he pay for the bike?  Or did they take long enough?  Not too long, and not too short.  Nothing worse than having the clowns finish before the next act is ready and having to call them back to fill the extra time . . .

The show world is full of mediocre unicyclists or jugglers who put clown make-up on and remain mediocre unicyclists or jugglers but are now mediocre clowns as well.  There are phenomenal jugglers who aren’t funny at all.  They don’t have to be.  There are phenomenal jugglers who are phenomenally funny as well, because they have learned, not only to juggle well, but to use their juggling skill in a way that evokes gut-wrenching laughter from a crowd.  The Flying Karamazov Brothers come to mind . . .

Scott Parker was a phenomenal unicyclist (at least to me—I don’t know what he would say about his skills). He may still be.   He juggled three clubs on it; he even jumped rope on it.  He rode forward, backward, and could rock back and forth in one place.  But way beyond that, he was flat out FUNNY!  I never watched him that I didn’t laugh, and I watched him a lot.

I think of the unicycle as a tool.  Your skill set is your tool box.  The more tools you have available and can skillfully use, the better prepared you are to do the job.  Nineteen of the twenty years I was in the circus, the unicycle stayed in the truck.  But the one year when I could use it, it was available.

Bottom line—it helped, but on its own, it wouldn’t ever have earned me a dime.

The Circus Hall of Fame . . .

I had just gotten home from an eight hour shift with Phil Planetta.  He was an old Italian guy who'd had a stroke.  I liked taking care of him because his wife was such a good cook  Every night, she'd make some outrageous Italian dinner, and after I'd fed him, she prepared me a plate for my dinner break.  But it would have been short lived, since he was running out of insurance.  Even then it was an issue . . .

But like I said, I had just come home, and my brother said, "you had a phone call today from Florida.  Some guy named Hanneford?"  And, truth be told, at the time, I had no idea who it was.  But I called him back.

And I left a couple of days later to go back to Florida to work for George Hanneford Junior at the Hanneford Family Circus at the Circus Hall of Fame on Highway 41 in Sarasota.  The pay was $100 per week and a place to sleep . . .

The week turned out to be seven days.  (The Hannefords worked! Twenty years later I worked for them again, at the Swap Shop in Ft. Lauderdale.  Their week was still seven days!)   The place to sleep turned out to be in my van in their yard in Nokomis.  George had gotten my name and number from Harvey Copeland, Clown College Prop Teacher and Certified Artistic Genius.

This is George Hanneford Jr . . .

And Victoria, on his left (Mrs Hanneford) and Kay Francis (his sister), on his right.  This is a publicity photo for their perch act, "The Georgians." (See?  I knew I needed publicity photos . . .)  As I understand it, this was a sensational act, booked on RBB&B for four years in the sixties. But this act had already retired by the time I came along, so I never got to see it.   Pat Cashin has a video posted here that shows part of this act, starting about 1:38 . . .

And you can read more about the Hannefords here , and here.

 

And this is the Circus Hall of Fame . . .

It was about 22 miles from the Hanneford Family home in Nokomis, FL.  Everyday, they got up, loaded up elephants, horses, ponies, Dianne, Cathy and George III and drove to work, unloaded, did two or three shows, loaded back up and drove home to Nokomis.  Most of the show was the Hannefords.  They did trampoline, the riding act, the liberty ponies (white ponies, each named for a city in Michigan) and the elephants.  Dianne did a gorgeous single trapeze act, ending with a barefoot, no gimmick, swinging toe-hang. 

The clowns were Alfredo Landon and the one and only Dougie Ashton.  And me.  Alfredo was the first clown I ever saw stick a flower in a soda straw, hand it to a lady in the audience, then leave her holding the straw as he spotted another lady nearby . . .  And Dougie Ashton is, to this day, one of the funniest clowns I've ever seen.  They both worked in the show. 

But not me.  I worked in the lobby.  This was also in the lobby . . .

This is the other side . . .

If you look closely, you can see it in the window in the picture above.  It generally got more attention than I did . . .

I also worked out on the street corner. Where I fished in the sewer grate.  Business was terrible.  My job was to flag down cars and get them to come into the parking lot and thence, the show.  I was one of the first ever human signs . . .

Here   is an article about the opening and closing of the Circus Hall of Fame, last performance May 27, 1980.  It lasted three years after I was there.  I only lasted there a week.  I think George was relieved when I told him I was leaving.  I think what happened was that right after he hired me on the phone, during the week it took me to get there, Dougie showed up looking for a gig, and George hired him.  Can't say I blame him . . .

This is Dougie Ashton . . .

When I got to Sarasota, Dougie was there, and George didn't need me anymore.  I'm not sure he ever did.  So, I worked that one week, got my $100 and left.  I went toVenice to shop, and ran into Clown College class mate Richard Fick in the Winn-Dixie.  The Blue show was in rehearsal . . .

And my life took a turn for the better . . .

Back in the attic again . . .

So there I was, back in Connecticut, living in my brother's attic, just as if I'd never left.  Definitely not the place I wanted to be . . .  I went to work for a home health agency in New Haven, since I still had my RN license, and worked day to day wherever I was assigned, but my heart was soo00OO! not into it.  I had been to  Brigadoon!  I'd tasted my dream!  How could I go back to being a townie?

I was terrified that I was going to wake up one day in my forties and discover that the best I'd done was to live an ordinary life, which was just completely unacceptable, considering the extraordinary experience I'd just lived through, courtesy of The Greatest Show On Earth!  I was supposed to be a CLOWN!  I HAD to be a clown.
But how? 

Finding work in the circus wasn't one of the things they taught us in Clown College.  In fact, I'd heard that one of the reasons we-who-did-not-get-contracts also did not get diplomas was so that we couldn't misrepresent ourselves as having ever been TGSOE employees or affiliates.  Given the stress in our "certificates of appreciation" on our non-contracted status, the veracity of this assumption seemed  reasonable at the time . . .

But I knew that professionals in any area of show business had publicity materials.  I'd seen enough movies to have some sort of rudimentary understanding of how things worked . . . or so I thought.  So I hired a professonal photographer . . . well, ok, so my mom had a friend from work who took pictures . . .

This was the best one . . .

I just couldn't understand it.  I was a product of Ringling Bros Barnum and Bailey Circus Clown College!  I was a trained professional, taught by the best in the business!  Why didn't all that training, all that knowledge, just burst through the lens and scream "you NEED THIS GUY on YOUR show!!?" 

How could I look so horribly amateruish?

And this was way, way before backyard photographers had digital cameras that let you look at and post on line what you'd just photographed, even before you went back in the house.  So it was a couple of weeks before I even got to see the results.  Shoot, this was even before there was "online . . ."

His second effort was his attempt at "art." He tried a double exposure . . .

Apparently, I had only one facial expression at the time.  Note the vague sillouette of Bruce the Clown without make-up, kind of from the nose down, that Bruce the Clown with make-up is super-imposed over . . .

Mom's photographer was thrilled with his work.  I was appalled. 

There was a whole envelope of similar exposures and poses.  He even included the negatives, in case I wanted to have 8x10's made of any of his work

Mostly, what I could see from his work was that his work wasn't going to get me any work of my own.  These were the two best out of a 36 exposure roll of 35mm film, and the only two I still have.  But it wasn't his fault.  He could only take pictures of what was in front of him . . .

This might have been my first experience in realizing that lots of times, a person's perception of reality is way different than reality itself.  I mean, I knew-- I ABSOLUTELY KNEW that Bruce the Clown looked way better than what I saw in these photos . . . and yet, every time I ever looked at them, even today, I was disappointed . . .

I never made any 8x10s.  I never sent a single copy of any of these to anyone.  I never even showed them to anyone (until I posted them here . . .)

Fortunately, I didn't have to . . .

Post Graduation Blue Show Blues . . .

Early in the morning on November 21, 1976, Dean Ballantine began the shuffling of students back and forth to the arena, students that the Misters Feld wanted to talk to about continuing on as first year clowns on the Greatest Show on Earth.  I wasn't one of them.  Bill went out of his way to be gentle, but there was no softening of that blow.  I had not been so arrogant as to have expected to be contracted, but neither had I given up hope. 

When he told me that I had not been selected, it was the biggest disappointment of my life.  It still ranks among the top disappointments of all time for me.  The previous eight weeks had been the most intense, most enjoyable, most action-packed and adventurous time I had ever spent, and BAM! Just like that it was over.  Like a faucet that turns off so tight that there isn't even a drip.  It's just done.  There isn't any more.  The End.  And you don't know if it'll ever turn on again . . .

This is Detroit.  He was Wilson Dahne's dog.  He looks like I felt that morning.  Detroit was at Clown College everyday.  Mostly, he slept.  When he woke up, he'd look for Willy.  Until he saw him, it was like he wasn't sure he was ever gonna again . . .   That's what it felt like that morning.  I didn't know then that I'd be back at clown college a year later.  I didn't know that I'd spend the next twenty years as a clown in the American circus.  I didn't know if there'd ever be circus again in my life . . .

There were those few who didn't get called who nevertheless found their way over to the arena and waited in futility for the Felds to finish and come down the stairs and explain why they hadn't been selected; there always were.  But they never got their answers.  What could the Felds have said?  "We didn't pick you because we picked the others . . .?"  They had made their decision, and it was theirs to make.  Clown College was pretty much free to the students.  To have any sense of entitlement for having completed it seemed way over the top.

The people who got contracts got diplomas.  The people who didn't get contracts got certificates of appreciation, detailing how much we should appreciate the opportunity we'd just had . . . I wish I still had mine.  It would have fit right well just about here . . .

But its long gone. And I did appreciate, more than I've ever been able to say, what an awesome opportunity Clown College was.  I still do.  But on November 21, there was nothing left to do but leave.

So I left.  I gave a ride to some others to Orlando, then went to Jacksonville where I'd left a bunch of furniture in a storage unit, loaded up my van and drove to Connecticut.  Strangely, when I got there, the Circus was in town.  So I gathered up my god-daughter and went to the New Haven Coliseum where the Blue Show was playing.  During a walkaround, Prince Paul Albert came up into the seats where I was sitting, and I told him I had just finished Clown College.

"So when are you joining the show?" he asked me . . .

Prince Paul Albert, a long, long time ago . . .

It was all I could do to keep from crying when I told him, "I'm not . . ."