When did clowns become monsters, and can they make a comeback?

Brisbane theatre maker and clown Andrew Cory is well aware that to the vast majority of kids, a clown means a scary monster that comes out at Halloween.

He’s on a mission to reclaim the funny tradition of clowning from creepers like Pennywise and The Joker, and is launching the Brisbane Clown Festival to prove it.

“You can’t escape the horror clown meme,” Cory says. “And the other meme is kids’ parties with balloon animals. I was quite surprised that Australians still have a very retrograde understanding of what clown is.

“I’m trying to bring back the joy and celebration of the human heart – the clown of compassion, the laughter of compassion.

“Clowns fall over, they make mistakes, they do the wrong things. We celebrate human awkwardness, or failure.”

Brisbane Clown Festival is taking over the final weekend of Wynnum Fringe with three days of performances and workshops.

There are two clown galas planned: the Brisbane Clown Cabaret, and the adults-only Burlesque Clown Cabaret.

An acclaimed clown from Melbourne, Jeramaia Detto, is performing a solo show with his lovelorn character Giuseppe, while local clowns Tyrone and Phoebe Manning star in their own shows.

There are also workshops for adults and kids, and even a clown parade through the streets of Wynnum.

“I think clown is making a comeback,” Cory says (he uses the singular ‘clown’ when referring to the genre). “Maybe that’s because of the world at the moment being so terrible that the innocent laughter of clown is a refuge for people.”

Cory trained in Europe with the late master clown Philippe Gaulier, whose students included Emma Thompson, Sacha Baron Cohen and Geoffrey Rush.

He teaches clown as part of the acting course at Griffith University, and is the resident director at Bluey’s World, co-developing the attraction’s interactive tour for children.

“One of the themes of Bluey is the power of creative play for young people and their carers and parents.

“The comedy of clown takes you back to the kind of space when you were a young kid and you didn’t know the rules, so you just made it up.

“I ran a clown school many years ago and I started noticing that I was getting people coming along who were lawyers and doctors and cops – normal people. They weren’t wanting to be professional clowns, they wanted to reclaim play in a kind of an innocent space.”

Cory has been running the bimonthly Brisbane Clown Cabaret nights at The Cave Inn, and their sellout success convinced him it was time to launch a festival.

Partnering with Wynnum Fringe made it a reality – with an actual circus tent, the Augathella Spiegeltent, to perform in.

Tom Oliver, who invented the Wynnum Fringe during COVID and has grown it over the last seven years, recognised Cory as a kindred spirit.

“The clown community in Brisbane hasn’t really had a platform in the last few years, until Andrew’s really pulled this all together,” he says.

Many people find traditional clown makeup disturbing, and many clowns in the festival don’t wear it.

The killer-clown trope that kicked in after the arrest of 1978 serial killer John Wayne Gacy, and the 1986 publication of Stephen King’s It, hasn’t helped matters.

Cory says the artform has a tradition going back to medieval court jesters and village idiots, evolving into vaudeville and the early Hollywood of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and the Three Stooges.

He wants to make Brisbane a “clown town”.

“That’s my aim, that Brisbane becomes a destination for national and international clowns.

“Heading towards the 2032 Olympics, I think clowns are a really viable cultural product because a lot of it can be nonverbal for people for whom English isn’t the first language.”

And for the sceptical coulrophobes out there: you may innately understand clowning without realising it.

“People go to Cirque du Soleil. People go to see Slava’s Snow Show. You know Mr Bean…

“Come and enjoy the absurdity. Absurdity is a refresher. Not only to laugh at ourselves, but just to be wildly creative.”

Brisbane Clown Festival runs July 10-12 at the Wynnum Fringe, 166 Bay St, Wynnum.

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