Fucking Clowns
The Internet would have you believe that the fear of clowns or to give it the common name “Coulrophobia” is not a real fear. Wikipedia itself, the bastion of internet knowledge for the lazy student too pissed to go to the library, claims that Coulrophobia is not even a recognised condition. Well that must be true, I read it as an unsubstantiated fact on-line!
So given this, explain to me why the fuck I was sat in the middle of the Bay Theatre this evening, trembling with apprehension knowing that with in moments, two clowns were about to take to the fucking stage? I should point out that Clowns are not nice, they are not friendly and they are certainly not the sort of creature you want hanging around your children. Just look at John Wayne Gacy! I am actively fearful of clowns, I really dislike them and I consider them to be on a par with child murders, dictators and demonic creatures when considering who do I want to go to the pub with after work!
Yet this evening I found myself sat in the Bay Theatre as it went dark when one of the most horrific looking clown bastards stepped onto the stage, enter Dik! With sticking up yellow hair, a grotesque painted face and awful clown clothes, Dik was everything that makes me shudder and want to hide under the mattress and not just the duvet! Dik then locates his friend who is in a box on stage. What emerges from that box is the creepiest child murdering maniac clown you have ever seen, complete with wild orange hair and a vile orange beard. At this point my heart rates was leveling out at a tranquil mildly frantic.
Meanwhile sat next to me was my friend, or at least the person I thought was my friend, and she was laughing at this horrific show with the sort of delight shown by children who enjoy stamping on ants! There is something very wrong with people who think that clowns are nice. Do these people not own televisions, have they not seen “Killer Klowns from Outer Space”?
The story being told is a discussion on the nature of being trapped or being set free, it asks the important question of who are the puppets in life and who are the puppet players? Given the slightly deep nature of the play, you have to ask the ultimate question for this event. Why use fucking clowns? Every one knows that clowns are evil, have they not read Stephen King’s “It”?
The play itself is very funny, there are some fun moments of Slapstick humour, there are also some moments of anal clenching fear when the lights turn up and the two clowns choose victims (or most likely willing participants or well placed stooges) from the crowd to which they play with. One moment that very nearly had me in tears of laughter was a rehashing of the infamous lift fart scene from one of the Pink Panther movies, on this occasion they chose to pick on a member of the audience to have the fart moment. Another hilarious moment came with the brutal voice of the evil puppet that controls Dik and Adam asks why there is a woman on stage. Adam claims that this rather innocent audience member is the love of his life, where upon the evil demonic voice orders him to “Tell her to Fuck OFF!”. The absolute brutality of the moment was eclipsed by the evil hilarity of it and the woman quickly jumped back to the relative safety of the audience seating.
The finale of the show was harrowing, it jarred me enough to force me to clamp my hands over my eyes in horror. This was because there is only one thing worse than a fully costumed up clown and that would be a completely naked one! It would be unkind to comment upon their stage presence while naked, but one may guess that the back stage of the Bay theatre is not particularly warm. This is not a show for the younger members (sorry!) of your family because explicit full frontal clown nudity is not something that you want your children to see until they are at least old enough to own a driving license and that is possible still too young!
The question though is this, given how much I hate and detest clowns, would I recommend this show to anyone? Yes I would, it is darkly clever, often creepy and also very funny. My friends laughed, the majority of the audience laughed, I laughed occasionally when I was not hiding in terror of the clowns on stage. So yeah, go and see Coulro Phobia while it tours, you wont be disappointed, but you may be a bit freaked out because let’s face it, clowns are evil murderers, just like in Stitches.!
