4 Clowns

Art/Works Theatre as part of the Hollywood Fringe Festival

Reviewed by Amy Nicholson, L.A. Weekly

June 22, 2010


Here be four clowns—Sad Clown (Alexis Jones), Angry Clown (Kevin Klein), Nervous Clown (Amir Levi), and Mischievous Clown (Quincy Newton)—and as an announcer intones, they've lived, died, and resurrected, never changing, since "Before the earth trespassed across the sky." Odd, then, that creator Jeremy Aluma then shows us the terrestrial agonies that shaped them: bad moms, torturing older brothers, horny schoolteachers. It's clown catharsis as each directs the rest to re-enact their childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and death in scenes that are skilled and true. Aluma may be saying that human pain is at once particular and universal; what's certain is his cast is gifted, including musical director Ellen Warkentine as the one woman orchestra in the wings.

Art/Works Theatre, 6569 Santa Monica Blvd. An Alive Theatre production. www.hollywoodfringe.org/learn/content/257.
 

 
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