Countywide : Clownship Is Not All Fun, Games

Thirty clowns stood in a hotel conference room Friday, trying to learn how to juggle.

Some were gracefully tossing and catching scarves, creating a wonderful whirlwind of color. Others looked like crazed kittens trying to catch butterflies as they flailed away, getting their hands and scarves tangled into a Technicolor knot.

Other clowns were down the hall, learning the best ways to make white makeup whiter and red makeup redder, while others were getting tips on ventriloquism.

It was all part of Clowns of America International’s regional convention, which is running through Sunday at the Anaheim Plaza Hotel. More than 250 people have come to the convention, which features workshops on balloon animals, magic, puppetry and physical comedy.

“It looks like it’s easy to be a clown, but it takes a lot of hard work,” said convention lecturer Frosty Little, who spent 23 years with Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus before retiring in 1991 as its master clown. He said it takes years to acquire the timing and skills needed to be a top-notch performer.

“You really have to want to be a clown if you want to be a successful clown,” Little said. “I don’t know how many people have told me they want to be a clown because they hear the circus train goes to California. They aren’t going to make it.”

There are more than 30,000 full- and part-time professional clowns in the country, according to Clowns of America, ranging from those who perform in the top circuses to the sometimes clown who attends back-yard birthday parties.

Many of those at the convention Friday were beginning clowns, and they eagerly soaked up whatever Little and other experienced clowns would tell them.

“You need to learn to read what a child’s projecting, because some of them are scared of clowns,” lecturer David (Shorty) Barnett explained to one visitor. A Houston engineer, Barnett has been a clown for 15 years. “If I run over and yell, ‘Hi, I’m Shorty’ at a kid who’s scared, he might mess his pants. So, if I run across a kid who is scared, I’ll stand to the side, act shy, wave to him. Before long, he’ll come to me.”

Some traveled from as far away as British Columbia to improve their clowning, which becomes something of an obsession for some of its practitioners.

Retired teacher Martin (M&M;) Mellon, 78, of Venice began clowning in November and has become something of a regular at local clown classes. He said one thing he learned at the convention was how to approach hospitalized children.

“You don’t want to say, ‘How are you doing,’ because they’ll tell you and it will bring you both down,” Mellon said. “You want to say, ‘I’m glad to see you,’ and then they’ll be glad to see you too, and you can go from there.”

Ten-year-old Dustin (Dusty) Tillman of Huntington Beach got the clowning bug two months ago when a friend of his mother’s asked if he would like to be a clown in the Seal Beach Fourth of July Parade.

The fifth-grader was learning to apply his own clown makeup and talked of maybe one day joining the circus. “It’s fun because when I dress up people come by and look at me,” he said.

Back at the juggling seminar, lecturer Brenda (Flower) Marshall was telling her students there are six keys to learning the art: “Practice, practice, practice, patience, patience, patience.”

She told the students to master juggling scarves before advancing to balls because the scarves float and are easier for a novice to control.

And don’t give up, she said, because almost anyone can learn to juggle three objects or even more.

“I visited the circus school in Russia and I saw a girl there juggle 10 grapefruit,” Marshall said. “I just stood there going ‘Ahhhhh.’ ”