The word “clown” can bring to mind two things: Ringling Bros. and fear. But it doesn’t have to, says actor and director Justin Cimino. When working with college students, he says, “I start off every [semester] with, ‘This is not circus clowns—nothing against them. This is not a scary clown in the sewer—nothing against ‘It.’ ”
As a teacher of the Christopher Bayes method of clowning and commedia dell’arte, Cimino shows his students that “there are shades and facets of clowning that focus on more than being funny,” he says. “My students have given me the feedback that this kind of clowning gets at the full spectrum of human emotions.” As such, clowning can help you become a better actor. Here’s how.
Clowning makes you fearless.
Clowning, nearly by definition, calls for silliness and risk-taking—which leads to bravery once you’ve done it enough.
“People will say, ‘I’ve gone up solo in front of a room and made a complete fool of myself,’ ” Cimino says. “Now, I think I can do anything.” Suddenly, performing a dialogue with a partner or even delivering a Shakespearean soliloquy doesn’t seem so stressful.
Clowning taps into your vulnerability.
To get into the proper mindset, Cimino says, “we revert the actor back in time to rediscover their ‘little one,’ who is also their clown. It’s the you before you were socialized.” In transporting you to that childlike place, clowning makes your motivations and reactions more genuine—even in dramatic roles. “In ‘Poor Things,’ it’s what Emma Stone won the Oscar for,” he points out. “The premise of that film is pure clown.”
Clowning teaches you to commit to the bit.
The thing about children and actors’ “little ones” is that they fully believe in their make-believe. “The ‘little one’ is always an expert on whatever they’re playing,” he says. “The ‘little one’ can have a fierce belief, like ‘I am a king’—with the flimsiest, stupidest costume pieces they found in a trunk in the basement.” That kind of confidence and imagination directly translates to how you commit to your choices in a performance.
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The “little one” has big feelings. “Before you were socialized, you screamed as loud as you wanted. You said whatever you wanted. You were much messier. You were freer,” Cimino says. With clowning comes “an openness, a bigness of physicality” that allows for tantrums and reactions that “in the acting world, in the imaginary world, we need to be able to access.”
Clowning has you thinking with and beyond the costume.
Clowning, like much acting, is a lot of internal work. “When you are finding your true ‘little one,’ there is no costume,” Cimino says. In his classes, it’s only at the end of the second level that you get wardrobe: the red nose. “No hair, no painted face, no shoes,” he says. “But the red nose is crucial. We call it the world’s smallest mask.” Inspiration may come with that small addition, like a knob that helps you dial in your clown’s unique personality.
Clowning preps you for auditioning
Since clowning is all about risk-taking, it may help you stand out in auditions: “It can encourage you to step outside the box, to make weird and wild choices,” Cimino says. “Let your true self or your ‘little one’ show through for that role, and it could be what differentiates you from the millions.”
Plus, as Cimino plainly puts it, “clown work changes our relationship to failure.” He likens auditioning to the little one’s experience with a playground slide: “The ‘little one’ goes up, so excited. Comes down, has a blast. Gets to the bottom and skins their knee. A second later, they go, ‘Yeah! Let’s go again!’ ”
Justin Cimino is an actor, director, and instructor who teaches clowning at the Terry Knickerbocker Studio in New York City. He is currently the artistic director for Zara Aina, a nonprofit organization that brings theater to at-risk communities in Madagascar and the United States.