CMU School of Drama


Friday, September 12, 2008

At the New York Clown Theater Festival, Classes on How to Be Silly

NYTimes.com: "In the face of uncertainty, some people go to church. Others dive onto their analyst’s couch. The next time life gets confusing, how about a clown workshop?"

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is like OSWALD for grown-ups except I don't think I could ever get up the nerve participate with people so passionate about these things. I think its great that with the world how it is, people still put the effort into making others smile.

Anonymous said...

I didn't realize how serious, and how much of an art form "clowning" can be. I guess it makes sense though, if you're going to do something, why not really get into it and get the most out of it emotionally and physically. I also didn't realize how much training goes in to "rewiring" the brain to let yourself clown around.

arosenbu said...

I think its really cool that "normal" people can take clowining classes. There was a period of time when I was going to become a hospital clown, and desperately wanted to go to clown college. Upon hearing that it was closed, I was still interested in clowning. One of these workshops would have been really interesting to me, and I'd still love to take clowing classes. Maybe we should get a class at Cmu?

NatalieMark said...

This sounds amazing. I would love to go to one of these classes. Learning to embrace the parts of yourself that society frowns upon is an important lesson that should permeate our culture.

Anonymous said...

first of all, i agree with alana, it sounds a lot like wolf's colon for big kids in that you're never quite sure what the right answer is going to be. you want to succeed and touch the sock, but the people who actually did touch the sock were the ones who were less funny.
the other thing i really enjoyed about the article was the mention of the holy fool. i love the character of the fool from when Doc talked about him in foundations but never really thought of a modern clown as being as important as the classic fool.

Anonymous said...

I did like Eliza and Alana think of Wolf's Colon the second I saw the headline. I'm surprised they didn't pt us on that list of schools who have a mandatory clown class I'm pretty sure we do... I think it's really funny that this article talks so much about how in this time its good for clowns and it's great comedic relief and what not. Personally I think its becasue we are so American. We enjoy making fun of people, like our President and all political figures just turn on the news show with the #1 ratings, The Daily Show. Honestly America sickens me and it's ridiculous that we need to mock people and be silly in order to get satisfaction.

Chris said...

Like Liz, I didn't realize that clowning was so scientific. It is really cool that there is so much work put into making yourself into a child. It seems that releasing your inhibitions is the first step in beginning to clown around.

Our society is under so much pressure to succeed that sometimes we need to relax and chill (yes, I know, I am the last person to be talking about this). Clowning allows you to do some soul searching while laughing at yourself and making others laugh at each other.