Pictured above: Governor's Honors Program Theater Performance and Design Majors 2014
"We play in the ridiculous to discover the sublime." - Philippe Gaulier
In the summer of 2014, I had the opportunity to participate in the Governor's Honors Program. The Governor's Honors Program (GHP) is a residential summer program, in the state of Georgia, for gifted and talented high school students who will be rising juniors and seniors during the program. It takes place for a month and during that month students have a major and a minor that they participate in. Majors range from english to vocal performance. I was fortunate enough to be one in thirty students in the state of Georgia who was selected to be a Theater Performance major. During my time at the program, I was exposed to the beauty and art form that was... clowning.
What is clowning? What is a clown? In the most simple terms, a clown is a "beautiful idiot." A clown cares only about pleasing the audience. They will do anything for applause and to bring a smile to those watching. Before I go any further in this article, I have to thank Mike Funt. This man taught me everything I know about clowning. Mike is an instructor at The Clown School and director of touring at Four Clowns. He is a well-known actor who I had the opportunity to study under. Mike taught me what it was to be a clown. Clowns wear all of their emotions on their sleeves and they truly live in the moment. It is an art form that has existed since the days of Native American folklore and has persisted in current media today.
Through clowning, I learned so much about myself as a performer and a person. It taught me to confront my fears and to just allow myself to try everything. There was no fear of failing because a clown will try anything if it means pleasing an audience. During my time at GHP, we participated in various exercises that helped me become comfortable with who I am as a person. There is one activity that we participated in that will forever be engraved in my memory. It was an early morning and we were all stretching on the floor when Mike came in and asked, "Do you guys want to do something easy today? Or something hard?" All of us laughed and shouted out for the hard option. Then Mike revealed a full length mirror. He informed each and everyone of us that we were to go up to the mirror and state three things that we like about ourselves.
Ex: Victoria Esposito, you are smart. Victoria Esposito, you are worthy. Victoria Esposito, you are loved.
This exercise took almost two hours. So many people would get up to the mirror and find themselves drawing a blank because they simply did not have any nice things to say. The amount of tears that were spilled that afternoon are ones that I will never forget. When you put on a clown nose, it's like those fears are now just a characteristic of the character that you are portraying. It allows you to embrace your flaws and truly accept who you are. Clowns are not hiding behind the nose as current media would suggest, but rather they are pleasing the audience and finding themselves. Through the ridiculous act of putting on the red nose, they are allowing the audience to laugh with them. One of my colleagues puts it perfectly:
"Clowning, to me, is an art form that gives. You give all of yourself, losing all inhibition to please your audience and give them a good laugh." - Alexa Echevarria
There were four types of clowns that we identified as at the end of the program. These types were: happy, sad, angry and nervous. I always thought that I would be a sad clown because sadness was the emotion that I was most comfortable presenting to an audience. Through exercises and finding myself, I was confused to find out that I was a "mischievous" clown. My director had me play Puck from A Midsummers Night's Dream in our culminating performance. He stated that my essence was excitement and that I embodied the word of "play". Performing as Puck is an experience that I will never forget and I am glad to be classified as a mischievous clown.
GHP was a time where I got to expand my horizons as an actress and where I got to find out more about myself as a human being. I learned that I need to embrace my flaws and that love is the most important emotion that anyone can feel. An unconditional love for what you do is what a clown is all about and I am so blessed that I had the opportunity to partake in that. Next time you see a clown nose in the store, I highly advise picking it up. You might surprise yourself at how much you explore and learn about yourself.
Attached is our culminating performance: "Clown in the Moonlight"
