WEBVTT - Selects: How Clowns Work 0:00:00.920 --> 0:00:04.160 Hello, everyone. Are you scared of clowns? I'm not. I 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:07.160 think clowns are pretty fun and awesome. But a lot 0:00:07.200 --> 0:00:10.120 of people are scared of clowns. So we explain why 0:00:10.640 --> 0:00:13.319 because there is a reason. And we talked about all 0:00:13.320 --> 0:00:18.480 things clowns in this episode from April, and it's called 0:00:18.840 --> 0:00:28.320 How Clowns Work. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a 0:00:28.400 --> 0:00:37.320 production of I Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:37.400 --> 0:00:39.960 I'm Joe, Joe. There's Chuckles. This is Stuff you Should 0:00:39.960 --> 0:00:43.800 Know the podcast, and there's Jerry. She has a regular name. Hey. 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:47.000 That was pretty good. Thanks. They could have also this 0:00:47.040 --> 0:00:49.440 could also be like how late night talk show hosts 0:00:49.440 --> 0:00:53.200 work too. Yeah, Krusty the clown was on my mind 0:00:53.280 --> 0:00:54.960 during a lot of this. I thought that was your 0:00:54.960 --> 0:00:59.720 Steth Meyers. No funny guy. I did he say that? 0:01:00.800 --> 0:01:04.200 It was just completely ludicrous joke. I haven't watched this 0:01:04.280 --> 0:01:07.000 show yet. I haven't even I like the guy though, 0:01:07.240 --> 0:01:10.080 good guy. I don't watch anything but Conan. Yeah, I 0:01:10.080 --> 0:01:12.880 don't even watch Conan really. Yeah. I do want Hodgemans on. 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:14.880 I record it, you know, and then watch it the 0:01:14.959 --> 0:01:17.600 next day. Yeah. I don't stay up the whatever time. 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:20.560 I canna say geez, I guess you don't go to 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:25.800 Early Bird for dinner anymore either. Yeah, you have to watch. Hey. 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:29.959 Speaking of Conan, big shout out to Brian Kylie, Rob 0:01:30.040 --> 0:01:34.080 Kuttner and Dan Cronin when seth Meyers. No, they are 0:01:34.120 --> 0:01:36.959 writers for Conan and they treated me to launch. That 0:01:37.120 --> 0:01:40.919 was very nice at Warner Brothers. Thanks for inviting me, guys, 0:01:42.160 --> 0:01:45.319 and uh, Conan. If you think we get neat fan gifts, 0:01:45.360 --> 0:01:47.640 you ought to see the stuff Conan gets. Oh, man, 0:01:47.720 --> 0:01:50.240 like what well there was? Well, I met the master 0:01:50.360 --> 0:01:53.400 baiting bear guy who I won't reveal his name he 0:01:53.520 --> 0:01:55.360 probably should, but he's the guy that's done it all 0:01:55.400 --> 0:01:58.720 these years. And someone sent him like a four ft 0:01:58.760 --> 0:02:06.040 tall treat round can carved bear them bear. Really Yeah, 0:02:06.080 --> 0:02:07.760 it was beautiful. I got pictures all this. And then 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:11.560 Conan has a life size Lego Conan that someone sent 0:02:11.639 --> 0:02:13.959 him that's pretty neat, and a life size a hundred 0:02:13.960 --> 0:02:16.680 thousand dollars worth of Legos probably is. And then a 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:21.040 life size ConA made of pencils that was really neat looking. Yeah. Wow, 0:02:21.280 --> 0:02:22.880 So they just had the stuff. I was like, man, 0:02:23.680 --> 0:02:27.120 I mean, I like our little photoshop stuff, but you know, 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:30.200 Cooper needs to step it up. Nice life size lego 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:33.200 Josh and chucking it would be kind of cool. Anyway, 0:02:33.360 --> 0:02:34.720 I just want to say thanks to those guys. They 0:02:34.720 --> 0:02:38.960 are awesome and they're supporters of us. Thanks guys, Yeah, 0:02:39.080 --> 0:02:42.720 supporters of you at least. And they're clowns. That was 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:46.400 a great segaway, Dude, great Is that why you thank 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:52.320 them in this episode? Sure? Because they're clowns. That that 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:57.000 was good. You've scared of clowns. I'm not scared of clowns, 0:02:57.919 --> 0:03:01.120 not at all. I mean the scary clowns that are 0:03:01.160 --> 0:03:04.320 supposed to be scary and horror movies are creepy, of course, 0:03:05.040 --> 0:03:07.800 But like, I don't have any kind of a phobia. 0:03:07.880 --> 0:03:11.519 What's it called the official phobia clurro phobia, right, which 0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:15.880 also includes um it's unofficial, by the way, the real thing. Um. 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:19.720 It also includes things like costumed characters like Mickey Mouse 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:23.000 and um, stuff like that. It's not just clowns, right, right, 0:03:23.040 --> 0:03:25.280 So it's a The d s M, which is the 0:03:25.360 --> 0:03:30.919 infallible Bible of psychology and psychiatry, UM has an entry 0:03:31.000 --> 0:03:34.880 for fear of clowns, lumped together with other childhood fear 0:03:34.920 --> 0:03:38.600 of costume characters that one I can I can identify 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:40.480 what I think I ran away from, like snow White 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:42.360 or something at Disney World when I was a kid, 0:03:42.400 --> 0:03:45.800 And there's just always been something about somebody being dressed 0:03:45.880 --> 0:03:48.840 up in costume that I've found unnerving. I'm gonna scare 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:51.320 a lot of kids. I'm not overtly afraid of clown sure, 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:54.920 but just costume people. And I get that, like I 0:03:55.360 --> 0:03:58.640 get like, you know, what are you hiding kind of thing, 0:03:58.720 --> 0:04:01.440 which I think is in arms the basis of color 0:04:01.480 --> 0:04:03.880 a phobia. Yeah, and a lot of the show, it 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:05.640 turns out it's going to be about that because it's 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:08.480 one of the most interesting parts of clowning. But um, 0:04:08.520 --> 0:04:10.680 one guy later on in this article put it, it 0:04:10.760 --> 0:04:13.400 makes sense. It's like some clowns are just not great 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:18.560 at it, and you know, well, like yeah, like lungeon 0:04:18.600 --> 0:04:20.640 a kid or something. And he says, they seem like 0:04:20.640 --> 0:04:23.680 they're on the attack. And he said a big part 0:04:23.720 --> 0:04:27.159 of teaching clowning is to teach personal space and like 0:04:27.839 --> 0:04:30.400 how to not come at a kid because they think 0:04:30.440 --> 0:04:33.640 you look weird exchange, and if you come at him 0:04:33.680 --> 0:04:37.160 like too fast, then it's it might scare him. And 0:04:37.520 --> 0:04:40.680 especially these days to like clowns today are still following 0:04:40.680 --> 0:04:45.240 a tradition from the early to mid twentie century. Kids 0:04:45.279 --> 0:04:49.360 today aren't really hip with the mid twenty century. They're 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:52.679 not into like mid century modern like art or design 0:04:52.760 --> 0:04:55.000 or anything like that, and so clowns are about as 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:58.040 creepy to them as like an old wooden toy, right right, 0:04:58.080 --> 0:05:00.880 It's just awful little, it's uncan ex don't get it. 0:05:01.320 --> 0:05:03.279 And as a result, there's this two thousand and eight 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:07.640 UM study to the UK that the BBC reported on 0:05:07.760 --> 0:05:10.920 that found that most of the children in this study, 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:15.000 I think there was like two fifty population sample UM 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:19.480 feared and or disliked clowns. Yeah, most of the kids 0:05:19.480 --> 0:05:22.360 in the study. That's a lot of sad clowns, yeah, 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:25.120 and a lot of scared kids. So I think the 0:05:25.160 --> 0:05:27.240 point is to just keep clowns and kids away from 0:05:27.279 --> 0:05:30.560 one another. All right, are you ready to go back 0:05:30.560 --> 0:05:42.440 in time? Yes, happen the old way back machine. It's 0:05:42.480 --> 0:05:45.400 London and it's eight oh three, and there's a man 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:49.960 named Joseph Grimaldi, and he, for all intents and purposes, 0:05:50.400 --> 0:05:53.640 has just invented the modern what we now think no 0:05:53.880 --> 0:05:59.160 as the clown yeah, very purposefully too, got the white makeup. 0:05:59.200 --> 0:06:02.000 They still call clowns Joey's yeah, because that was his 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:04.760 character name. That's a nickname for clowns. Oh. He was. 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:07.840 He huge, like not only did he invent clowns, and 0:06:07.920 --> 0:06:12.040 like today still they they you know, tip their clown 0:06:12.080 --> 0:06:17.040 hat at Grimaldi for inventing the clown he um. In 0:06:17.120 --> 0:06:20.080 his day he was huge. There was a legend that 0:06:20.279 --> 0:06:23.240 supposedly an eighth of the population of London had seen 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:26.880 him on stage. There's a lot of people and still 0:06:26.920 --> 0:06:31.279 today on London's East End there um as a church 0:06:31.640 --> 0:06:35.839 that has an annual mass in his honor and everyone 0:06:35.960 --> 0:06:40.760 comes in full clown makeup and costume to church. For Grimaldi, 0:06:41.480 --> 0:06:44.080 he was a big deal. He was very very famous 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:46.560 for the time. He was a very well known person. 0:06:47.279 --> 0:06:49.520 And he had a contemporary too at about the same 0:06:49.560 --> 0:06:53.960 time in France named de Brow, and both of them 0:06:54.000 --> 0:07:00.720 oddly were um they had really kind of sad backstories. Yeah, 0:07:00.760 --> 0:07:02.920 we'll get to that. That's sort of lends itself, I 0:07:02.960 --> 0:07:05.479 don't mean to get ahead of ourselves. That lends itself 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:08.440 to the dark underbelly of clowning and why it might 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:15.120 have this reputation. But what clowning really sprung from was uh, 0:07:15.200 --> 0:07:20.360 from the beginning of time almost there were jesters essentially 0:07:21.320 --> 0:07:24.760 um and all types of all all over the world 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:27.720 and all cultures. Yeah, it seems to be universal. Um. 0:07:27.920 --> 0:07:30.840 There were at least as far back as the like 0:07:32.040 --> 0:07:40.400 bc UM in Egypt, in China there are already jesters, uh, pranksters, clowns, tricksters, 0:07:40.520 --> 0:07:43.920 something of that ilk mischief makers. Yeah, and and in 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:48.080 totally disparate societies that never met one another, like um 0:07:48.120 --> 0:07:52.200 in Native America. Different Native American society has had some 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:54.760 version of the clown or the jester. Yeah. During a 0:07:54.880 --> 0:07:58.720 natural Navajo ritual, chance they would clowns would come into 0:07:58.720 --> 0:08:03.840 disrupt performances, bump into the dancers, Pueblo clowns they would 0:08:03.880 --> 0:08:05.880 have a sacred offering and they would come bouncing in 0:08:05.960 --> 0:08:08.320 and and kind of mock what was going on and 0:08:08.680 --> 0:08:11.960 maybe like to elude sex act in the middle of 0:08:12.680 --> 0:08:16.760 very serious ceremony to the gods. Yeah, it was the spirits. 0:08:17.360 --> 0:08:20.280 That's a that's a big deal. That's an an unusual 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:23.640 role for someone to play. Sometimes they were considered shamans, 0:08:23.760 --> 0:08:27.200 like they were imbued with some sort of power as well. Yeah, 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:29.840 they were. They were held in high esteem. The same 0:08:29.920 --> 0:08:34.559 thing went on in Japan with the Taikomochi. Right, it 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:37.320 means drum bear, drum bearer. Uh. They were in the 0:08:37.320 --> 0:08:41.079 red light districts and apparently uh in the late sixteen hundreds. 0:08:41.120 --> 0:08:44.800 Their deal was when the when the party starts to wane, 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:47.439 they were to bounce in and like get the party 0:08:47.480 --> 0:08:50.360 started again. Hey hey yeah, And they were actually the 0:08:50.400 --> 0:08:54.000 original geisha. They were men and they were later replaced 0:08:54.040 --> 0:08:56.760 by women. But the Tychomochi were the original versions of 0:08:56.800 --> 0:08:59.920 the geisha, and the Taychomochi in the red light district 0:09:00.080 --> 0:09:03.800 actually ended up there because this period of peace settled 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:07.680 over Japan. Because prior to that they were court jesters 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:11.160 and also like military advisors. So once they weren't needed 0:09:11.200 --> 0:09:13.000 for that, they ended up in the red light district, 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:17.880 like let's get this party party started. Yeah. So in India, 0:09:18.200 --> 0:09:20.959 the the official jesters there were a member of the Brahmin, 0:09:21.080 --> 0:09:24.360 which was the highest social class. Right, Yeah, that's where 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:27.080 that's the class that up. Who's a member of? Oh? 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:29.240 Really did he say that? That's what his mom said 0:09:29.240 --> 0:09:32.720 when he thinks she thinks that who's married to Marge. 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:35.120 She goes, surely your children are aware of your brahm 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:42.440 in heritage embarkoes, so long as there's no follow up questions. Absolutely, fully, man, 0:09:42.520 --> 0:09:45.920 that's a good one. Your knowledge is way deeper than mine. 0:09:45.960 --> 0:09:48.760 For the Simpsons too much. I think I stopped watching 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:53.480 before you did too, but you still watch, right, Yeah, 0:09:53.520 --> 0:09:57.360 I fell off again, yeah, on again, off again. Um, 0:09:57.400 --> 0:10:00.800 all right. So we're in India and the Brahmin they uh. 0:10:00.880 --> 0:10:03.280 One of the things you'll notice over and over here 0:10:03.320 --> 0:10:08.880 with jesters is what they really are are satirists. And 0:10:09.000 --> 0:10:11.320 their job is too and they were the only ones 0:10:11.320 --> 0:10:13.839 that could do this really was to poke fun at 0:10:13.880 --> 0:10:16.400 the leaders. They would they would never bounce in and 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:18.400 talk about how great the king is. They would bounce 0:10:18.400 --> 0:10:20.920 in and talk about how fat the king is and 0:10:20.960 --> 0:10:24.080 make jokes about like how many meals have you had today? Well, yeah, 0:10:24.160 --> 0:10:27.640 and so there. Their Their role was to say, um, 0:10:27.800 --> 0:10:31.400 poke holes into the king's stupid ideas. Whereas the rest 0:10:31.400 --> 0:10:34.000 of the court would be like, oh, great idea, Um, 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:37.480 you should paint the Great Wall of China. Whereas the 0:10:37.600 --> 0:10:39.600 gesture would be like, yeah, that's a great idea. Where 0:10:39.679 --> 0:10:43.480 you going to get all that paint from your dummy. Well, 0:10:43.480 --> 0:10:45.120 speaking of China, I think they had some of the 0:10:45.160 --> 0:10:47.959 best names. Um, they have a great tradition of clowning, 0:10:48.080 --> 0:10:54.000 and they had legends named twisty pole. Uh, Baldi Chuny 0:10:54.600 --> 0:10:56.840 that's the name of the podcast. That's a good one. 0:10:57.280 --> 0:10:59.520 And this one I don't get moving bucket. I don't 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:02.600 get that one either. It probably makes sense in Chinese. 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:06.120 Another one I came across was newly polished mirror. Really 0:11:06.559 --> 0:11:09.040 was the name of a clown. That's no Bally chun though. 0:11:09.920 --> 0:11:13.880 Interesting uh. And then in Poland, Um, there was a 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:18.160 legendary jester named Stanzik and I looked up this guy. 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:22.120 He was. He was a legend beyond clowning. He was 0:11:22.160 --> 0:11:25.760 like the political satirist of his day. He worked for 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:31.440 three different kings and was very intelligent, political philosopher and satirist. 0:11:31.520 --> 0:11:36.240 That Uh, it's still like revered in Poland, as you know, 0:11:36.280 --> 0:11:40.120 a necessary thing. Yeah. Supposedly one of his most famous 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:43.440 stories was the king of Poland that he was working 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:47.679 for had a bear imported from I think Russia or something, 0:11:47.720 --> 0:11:51.800 maybe Prussia, and UM let it loose so he could 0:11:51.880 --> 0:11:54.600 hunt it, and the bear came back with the king 0:11:54.679 --> 0:11:57.360 and the court and the queen and like almost killed everybody. 0:11:57.840 --> 0:12:02.160 And um, the king later criticised stand Chick for running off, 0:12:02.920 --> 0:12:05.640 and stan Chick said, well, it was smarter than letting 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:09.839 a cage bear loose something along those lines, and the 0:12:09.920 --> 0:12:13.199 king was like, oh touche, and everyone laughed, and then 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:17.560 the bear eight the king. Uh. In ancient Rome, chuckers, Yeah, 0:12:17.840 --> 0:12:22.720 they used to call the court jester's stupidest stupidest Huh, yeah, 0:12:22.800 --> 0:12:26.520 that makes sense. Uh. Grimaldi himself came out of the 0:12:27.000 --> 0:12:31.880 rich tradition in Italy, um called the Comedia del Arte tradition. 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:34.920 And uh, this is in the fourteenth century, and it 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:38.199 was some people say these were like the first professional 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:41.520 actors in the world. We're coming out of Italy at 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:43.800 the time in this program, right. So at the time, 0:12:44.400 --> 0:12:46.439 you were basically if you were a clown or a 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:49.280 jester or something, you were probably a member of a court. 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:53.160 If you're an member of a Native American tribe or 0:12:53.440 --> 0:12:56.959 um in most parts of Africa, and you were a jester, 0:12:57.600 --> 0:13:01.840 you belong to the community rather than the specific leader. Um. 0:13:01.880 --> 0:13:05.200 But in Europe and China and Egypt and all over 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:09.840 wherever there was royalty, there was usually a jester of 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:14.560 some sort, right, But one of the ways that jester spread, 0:13:14.679 --> 0:13:18.760 especially saying in Europe, was from UM a jester being 0:13:18.840 --> 0:13:22.880 forced to hit the road first, stepping over the line, 0:13:22.880 --> 0:13:26.880 basically getting kicked out. And that's one way that it 0:13:26.960 --> 0:13:30.559 kind of spread. Clowning originally spread to the masses was 0:13:30.920 --> 0:13:33.319 you may run across the court jesters down on his 0:13:33.400 --> 0:13:35.600 luck traveling along the road because he's got kicked out 0:13:35.600 --> 0:13:38.040 of courts, like I got all this great material exactly, 0:13:38.080 --> 0:13:40.120 but he's still a jester. He's gonna make you laugh, 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:43.400 you know. Yeah, that makes sense, so that it's interesting. 0:13:43.480 --> 0:13:46.320 I think the king's tolerated to a certain degree, but 0:13:46.360 --> 0:13:48.600 if they're having a bad day, they're just like, all right, 0:13:48.600 --> 0:13:51.120 you're out of here, exactly. Yeah. And there's there's UM 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:54.560 at least some debate over whether how how much of 0:13:54.679 --> 0:13:57.439 the idea that a jester was the only one who 0:13:57.440 --> 0:14:01.720 could speak his mind towards the king UM. Not that 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:04.080 the idea was that more people in the court could 0:14:04.120 --> 0:14:07.120 speak their mind, but that the jesture couldn't even speak 0:14:07.160 --> 0:14:10.840 their mind. In some cases, there were some documented versions 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:15.440 like UM, the one in Persia Kareem Charay, who um 0:14:15.679 --> 0:14:21.400 told the king has the shahnzzardin apparently said is there 0:14:21.480 --> 0:14:25.520 a short of shortage of food? And uh Kareem Sharay said, yes, 0:14:25.560 --> 0:14:28.120 I see that, your majesty is eating only five times 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:31.000 a day. And he made this little bow tie spin, 0:14:31.440 --> 0:14:33.720 but he got the point across that, Yeah, it's a 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:36.600 shortage of food and you're not helping anything. You're cloister 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:39.120 it up here in your ivory tower. And um, you 0:14:39.160 --> 0:14:41.760 need to open up your eyes, your majesty. I'd like 0:14:41.800 --> 0:14:44.560 to see some of Baldi chunyus material. I would love 0:14:44.600 --> 0:14:46.840 to see that too. I bet he killed Oh bet 0:14:46.840 --> 0:14:50.120 he did as well, Chuck. So we'll get to what 0:14:50.320 --> 0:15:13.280 clowning is specifically right after this. All right, clowning, my friend, 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:15.720 is a lot of things, but what it is in 0:15:15.760 --> 0:15:22.680 all cases is exaggeration. Um, movements are exaggerated, your appearances exaggerated. 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:25.360 That's why they wear big goofy suits and big goofy shoes. 0:15:25.600 --> 0:15:28.120 The makeup to makeup. Of course, a lot of people 0:15:28.160 --> 0:15:31.320 look at a clown and say you're disguising something. The 0:15:31.360 --> 0:15:33.840 point of clown makeup is quite the opposite. It's meant 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:37.840 to exaggerate the emotions that are already there. Yeah, like 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:41.920 the big, huge smile or frown, the big frown yeah. Um. 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:46.000 And I've read one pro clowns um description of what 0:15:46.040 --> 0:15:49.400 clowning means, and he said, clowns aren't actors. We're not 0:15:49.440 --> 0:15:53.640 supposed to pretend. What clowns do is exaggerate the the 0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:56.520 emotions that we already have inside. So if you're a 0:15:56.520 --> 0:15:59.440 really good clown, you're going to play up, you know, 0:15:59.520 --> 0:16:02.840 the the um anger at being rebuffed when you're trying 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:05.760 to get a laugh from somebody, or you're gonna play 0:16:05.920 --> 0:16:09.040 up your stage fight at performing in front of some people. 0:16:09.560 --> 0:16:12.120 Like when you see a clown like acting a certain way, 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:15.560 you're you're supposed to understand that what they're they're actually 0:16:15.600 --> 0:16:18.840 feeling that right then it's just being it's it's being 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:21.720 broadcast on a clown scale. Yeah. And part of that 0:16:21.840 --> 0:16:24.840 is for comedic effect, and part of it is uh 0:16:25.080 --> 0:16:29.520 quite literally because in a circus, uh, you have a 0:16:29.520 --> 0:16:31.440 lot of people and you may may be sitting very 0:16:31.480 --> 0:16:34.360 far away from you. So these big movements and the 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:39.600 slapstick um, which actually I never knew this slapstick was 0:16:39.640 --> 0:16:43.840 an actual physical tool. Never heard of that. Yeah, it was. 0:16:43.960 --> 0:16:47.240 It's like looks like a paddle with another paddle hinge 0:16:47.320 --> 0:16:50.680 to it. And back in the old days of the 0:16:50.840 --> 0:16:54.920 Comedia dell Arte in Italy, they would um strike someone 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:57.160 with this paddle and then of course the other paddle 0:16:57.200 --> 0:16:59.240 on the hinge would smack really hard on the on 0:16:59.280 --> 0:17:01.720 the wood and so they could hit someone, not too hard, 0:17:01.840 --> 0:17:03.760 but make a sound, huge sound like they had been 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:05.800 hit really hard. And that's where slapstick comes from. That's 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:09.880 the word slapstick. And um, we keep mentioning Comedia dell Art. Um, 0:17:09.920 --> 0:17:12.439 that's where Grimaldi came out of. And this was the 0:17:12.440 --> 0:17:16.280 original place where the clown really first made it onto 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:20.320 stage because remember when Comedia dell Art was establishing itself, 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:23.760 for the most part, clowns were relegated to court gester 0:17:23.840 --> 0:17:27.360 ship right yeah, and then mimes later, Yeah, we're relegated 0:17:27.400 --> 0:17:30.880 to parks. I guess so, right exactly. Um, So Comedia 0:17:30.960 --> 0:17:35.000 dell Art was this, um, this player production, and in 0:17:35.040 --> 0:17:38.000 the middle of it, or in different points, um, there'd 0:17:38.000 --> 0:17:40.199 be like a break or an intermission or something like that, 0:17:40.240 --> 0:17:42.879 and that would come like the jugglers and the baton twirlers, 0:17:43.200 --> 0:17:46.159 and there were also little skits and sketches and plays 0:17:46.200 --> 0:17:49.720 themselves that were intended for comic relief. And one of 0:17:49.720 --> 0:17:53.200 those is called the harlequin Aide, and Harlequin you recognize 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:55.760 Harlequin is one of the jokers, the jesters, that kind 0:17:55.800 --> 0:17:59.840 of thing. Um, there's actually a character in the harlequin 0:17:59.840 --> 0:18:03.800 Aie that was a clown, and Grimaldi originally played that character. 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:07.119 And that character was um, kind of a bumpkin, a 0:18:07.240 --> 0:18:10.040 rustic rube. And as a matter of fact, the word 0:18:10.040 --> 0:18:13.280 clown supposedly comes from a sixteenth century German word for 0:18:14.240 --> 0:18:18.040 like a country bumpkin. Um, So that was the original character. Well, 0:18:18.040 --> 0:18:21.320 Grimaldi came along in about eight hundred and started playing 0:18:21.320 --> 0:18:24.840 this in the pantomime, which was that break in the 0:18:24.880 --> 0:18:29.520 Comedia dell Art relief exactly. And then the Harlequinade was 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:33.639 a a little mini play that was a panomime in 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:36.119 the Comedia dell Art, right, And then the clown was 0:18:36.119 --> 0:18:39.199 a character in the Harlequinade, and Grimaldi played it. But 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:41.959 he said, you know what, I'm not feeling this country 0:18:41.960 --> 0:18:46.280 bumpkin thing. I think this guy's actually highly sophisticated, very smart, 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:51.360 hilarious embody. And he started to play the character like that, 0:18:51.840 --> 0:18:53.800 and all of a sudden, the clown went from a 0:18:53.840 --> 0:18:57.159 minor supporting character to the reason that people were coming 0:18:57.240 --> 0:19:00.640 to the Comedia dell Art Productions the pan mine. Yeah, 0:19:00.680 --> 0:19:03.920 so they were stealing the thunder of the legit actors. Yeah. 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:08.040 And from that moment, the clown went from specifically a 0:19:08.119 --> 0:19:11.639 rustic country boob to the clown that we start to 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:16.280 understand today with face pain and like colored hair and everything. 0:19:17.320 --> 0:19:19.040 Did you just laugh because I said boom, No, I 0:19:19.160 --> 0:19:22.160 just rustic Country Boob sounded like the name of like 0:19:22.240 --> 0:19:27.399 my memoir or something. It just struck me as a 0:19:27.480 --> 0:19:32.120 nice titles. I just want a small, small royalty when 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:36.680 you publish those, Okay, except I would be Rustic City Boob. Yeah, 0:19:36.800 --> 0:19:39.800 you know, sort of play on that whole thing. Yeah, 0:19:39.880 --> 0:19:44.199 that big it's even better man Sharknado and now the 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:48.040 title for your memoirs, You're on fire. Um So clowning. 0:19:48.240 --> 0:19:51.240 One thing that you'll also notice the clowns do a 0:19:51.280 --> 0:19:53.200 lot and this is not every clown, but a lot 0:19:53.200 --> 0:19:58.240 of clowning involves um play violence like slapstick. Yeah, Like 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:00.560 they're hitting It's like the three students, they're hitting each 0:20:00.600 --> 0:20:03.520 other a lot they're knocking each other down. Um, A 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:07.480 big clown thing to do is to like disrupt the 0:20:07.880 --> 0:20:11.560 the legit act, Like we're clowns and we're gonna do 0:20:12.200 --> 0:20:14.800 uh this neat thing where we all hold this ladder 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:17.560 and climate and then another clown will come in and 0:20:17.840 --> 0:20:20.720 bust the ladder down and everyone will fall and it's 0:20:20.720 --> 0:20:21.960 all part of the act. But a lot of the 0:20:22.040 --> 0:20:25.760 Navajo clowns, yeah, same thing basically to disrupt the act. 0:20:25.840 --> 0:20:29.560 That's that's happening through violence, or they may just be 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:32.440 jerks and like smell my flour oaps you get a 0:20:32.480 --> 0:20:35.119 squirt in the face. So if you're paying attention to 0:20:35.880 --> 0:20:41.159 a group of clowns in their routine, you'll actually notice that, Um, 0:20:41.200 --> 0:20:44.760 there's usually a very clear line of command. Yeah, there's 0:20:44.760 --> 0:20:47.280 a hierarchy for sure. There actually is. That it depends 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:50.200 on You can tell who's in charge before the show 0:20:50.280 --> 0:20:54.520 even starts based on their makeup. Actually it's it's um 0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:57.480 delineated by that. Yeah. So first you've got the white 0:20:57.480 --> 0:21:00.280 face clown, which Grimaldi was one. So is are the 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:02.960 clown who will talk about later. Um, but the white 0:21:02.960 --> 0:21:05.280 face clown is the one who's in charge and going 0:21:05.320 --> 0:21:08.560 back to the three stooges, They actually um get across 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:11.440 the hierarchy of clowns pretty clearly. So the white face 0:21:11.480 --> 0:21:15.280 clown is mo. Absolutely, he's still a clown, um, but 0:21:15.440 --> 0:21:19.560 he's Boston the other ones around. He's as signing job. Yeah, 0:21:19.600 --> 0:21:23.320 and he might be the the most um hostile out 0:21:23.320 --> 0:21:26.200 of all of them. And then after that, and again, 0:21:26.240 --> 0:21:29.720 the white face clown has completely white paint all over 0:21:29.760 --> 0:21:33.480 his face and head and neck. Yeah, fringe counterpart you're 0:21:33.520 --> 0:21:35.400 talking about, the clown that he created was a white 0:21:35.400 --> 0:21:40.440 face clown. Um. The perrot p i e r r 0:21:40.560 --> 0:21:43.320 O t pro sounds good and that's a kind of 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:46.640 clown as well. But the pierrot is a white face clown, right, 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:48.880 So the white face clown is in charge of he 0:21:48.960 --> 0:21:51.359 or she is at the top of the heap. After 0:21:51.440 --> 0:21:54.800 that you have the August clown. The August clown is 0:21:54.840 --> 0:22:00.199 the one that um Usually they have that sloppy ver 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:06.960 sized um outfit, huge like suspenders hanging on hanging even 0:22:07.040 --> 0:22:11.160 bigger pants up. Um. The makeup is probably like flesh toned, yeah, 0:22:11.240 --> 0:22:13.960 but like the eyes will like be super arched and 0:22:14.080 --> 0:22:18.000 like the smile will be really big and red. Probably 0:22:18.000 --> 0:22:21.000 a big red nose, although I think them the white 0:22:21.040 --> 0:22:23.399 face clown can have that too, But if you have 0:22:23.440 --> 0:22:25.920 a white face and an August clown next to each other, 0:22:26.119 --> 0:22:28.840 the August clown's red ball nose is probably going to 0:22:28.920 --> 0:22:31.480 be a little bit bigger, and the August clown is 0:22:31.600 --> 0:22:34.879 um definitely the one who takes orders from the white 0:22:34.920 --> 0:22:41.800 face clown, but um also a little more um hilarious maybe, 0:22:42.240 --> 0:22:47.840 so like the August clown would be um maybe Larry, 0:22:48.080 --> 0:22:51.200 probably curly though, because you get he's kind of a boob. 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:54.840 You know, he's not a rustic country boom, but he's 0:22:54.880 --> 0:22:58.680 just you know, kind of fun and lovable and and 0:22:58.720 --> 0:23:03.080 he's still taking orders. What about shimp? Chimp completely breaks 0:23:03.160 --> 0:23:06.840 this whole analogy apart. So with the augusta clown, it 0:23:06.960 --> 0:23:12.399 was um invented by a man named lu Jacobs, and 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:15.879 there was there was a team, Albert Freatellini and Lu 0:23:16.040 --> 0:23:19.359 Jacobs a clown team, and Fredellini was also part of 0:23:19.359 --> 0:23:22.800 the Fredlini brothers, and he was the one who invented 0:23:22.800 --> 0:23:25.119 the red nose. Oh yeah, I thought it was pretty interesting. 0:23:25.200 --> 0:23:27.480 Yeah it is, yeah, But then then we have the 0:23:27.520 --> 0:23:29.600 tramp or the hobo, right, that's the next guy. Yeah, 0:23:29.680 --> 0:23:32.240 that one was invented by a dude named Emmett Kelly, 0:23:32.280 --> 0:23:35.600 and he actually invented the sad hobo clown, which you 0:23:36.040 --> 0:23:38.720 can immediately bring to mind. I would imagine just hearing 0:23:38.720 --> 0:23:44.600 sad hobo clown, the downcasts, frown face, the stubble like 0:23:44.680 --> 0:23:49.119 five o'clock shadow. Yeah, the tattered tweed jacket patches, and 0:23:49.440 --> 0:23:53.520 the bendel bendel bag on the stick. So Emmett Kelly 0:23:53.600 --> 0:23:56.800 comes up with the sad hobo clown and that's become 0:23:56.880 --> 0:24:01.160