Review: LONDON CLOWN FESTIVAL: OPENING CABARET, Soho Theatre

And here we go again: the London Clown Festival returns for another run of bizarre, brilliant and occasionally bonkers shows until 26 July. The event was started back in 2016 by Dan Lees and Henry Maynard and, with Lees and Amee Smith now at the helm, artists this year include Luke Rollason (above), Ella The Great and Neil Frost.

This has been a great year for clowns. Spymonkey have lost half their company after the tragic death of Stephan Kreiss and the departure of Petra Massey but proved that they can still bring a house down. The giant Pierrot figure and singing sensation that is Puddles Pity Party returned to Soho Theatre after almost a decade away. In April, Doctor Brown took time off from his acting career to resume terrorising audiences.

This latest Festival is split between Soho Theatre and Jacksons Lane - London’s two greatest champions of circus and clowning - plus an immersive “Clown Tarot” on 14 July which promises 22 performers taking over three floors of the Betsy Trotwood pub. If the opening night is anything to go by, expect the unexpected.

With able support from Lees and three other musicians, five acts took to the floor. Introducing them was compere Riss Oblenski as drag king character “Michael from HR” who, when not providing ample evidence that improv is to comedy what sarcasm is to wit, attempted to resolve several fictional audience complaints through the medium of song.

Of the acts, two stood out. The most explosive by far on the night was mime artist Furiozo, the self-proclaimed “Polish thug clown”. The dressing gown, boxing shorts and mouthguard set up his brutish persona from the off and, after failing in combat against a six-inch-high teddy bear, he makes expert use of finger guns to "hold up" audience members in a convincingly menacing fashion. His only mistake was to pick out a very shy collaborator to help him with a frenetic firefight and cops-and-robbers chase; you get the feeling that Timid Of Athens would say boo to a goose but only after receiving written permission.

Another mute performance took another direction to express themselves. Like the brilliant Dickie Beau, Frankie Thompson’s three exquisite set pieces showed why lip sync can be so powerful when applied to the spoken word. Christopher Hitchen describing a sexual fantasy involving Margaret Thatcher was a shock to the senses, Scone Lake - a mashup of the Tchaikovsky score and various GBBO judges pronouncing on the unfortunate dryness of the baked good - was a slice of Cassetteboy-style comedy genius only topped by the coup de grâce of hearing the privileged pronouncements of a 12-year-old Jacob Rees-Mogg on money, women and political ambitions. Thompson throws 00herself around purpose and poise across the small space, her powerful acting bringing her subjects to life.

Clowning - like most of the cabaret world - flies under the radar of the mainstream press unless referred to pejoratively: barely a week goes past without a journalist or critic metaphorically calling someone a clown or something a clown show. That’s a shame as this is an art form that thrives on innovative stagecraft, playing with theatrical conventions and challenging societal norms. Clowns can be terrible (Cirque du Soleil is a prime example) but, at their best, they can be as enthralling, disturbing and emotionally fulfilling as anything on Shaftesbury Avenue.

London Clown Festival continues until 26 July.

Photo credit: London Clown Festival

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