A Conspiracy Of Clowns

Been doing a lot of research for QUACK! and other shows (more on this later), and this has involved seeking out a number of the great clowns in history, and them also present.

George Carl (1916-2000) was a pretty flippen amazing clown and visual comedian.  This classic routine of his, involving just himself, a mic stand, a harmonica, and his costume, must surely go down as one of the greatest acts ever.  You might recognise him as one of the Parker brothers in the great 1995 film Funny Bones - his first screen role, incidentally, at the grand old age of 79, where his character performs many snippets from the following routine.  George, we salute you!  Awesome.

I flippen love this!  Ever heard of Slava Polunin? He’s a great Russian clown who’s been touring the world for years and years with his famous “Snow Show”.

Anyhoo, great master and clown that he is, he’s just announced a new venture.  This one with the modest aim of creating what Derevo leader Anton Adassinski calls, “the biggest project of the 21st Century”: The Tower of Human Foolishness.

Basically, it’s this structure four pillars of 690,000 tons each which will rise 11,720 metre high tower to the sky.

Its base will consist of circus tents and hooded carts brought here from all over the world, as well as 32 temple buildings: from the log huts of the Old Believers to the Masonic “Khruschev’s concrete panel constructions”. They all, as symbols of the religious mess, will be used as foundations of the tower and will be frozen forever in highly transparent liquid kevlar glass.

The pillars themselves will be constructed of Thermit Aluminium by DuPont so that it can sway back and forth a distance of up to 300 metres at the top.

Why? I hear some ask…well, apparently at the top of the tower a Hand Palm will be constructed, where everyone who made a contribution can curl up and hold a tiny thread for approximately five minutes. That’s what they say.  This thread will dangle down from the satellite named CHIME which is scheduled for launch in 2014.

The CHIME is connected to a smaller satellite that holds the other end of the thread approximately 500 kilometres above CHIME’s orbit. This far end of the thread is not isolated and serves as an antenna to receive the Unknown.

5 minutes of holding the thread — this is The Very Essential, what the famous Russian scholar Dmitry Likhachev described as follows: “Laughter, mysterious laugh is the last thread, connecting a Human being with the Universe. When it’s torn, the cranes will be shouting…”

Brilliant.  More power!  Mo’ fire!  Please let it happen!

(You can contribute too - go to www.derevo.org to find a fund to donate to)

And, as they say - HURRY!  Don’t you want to hold the thread?

Wow.  OK, I know I promised to write up the process as it’s been happening, but man oh man it has been such an intense rush of discovery and exploration that it’s been nigh impossible to find a moment to reflect on the search.  Better to just go with it.

Let’s get some smoodgy stuff out the way.  I have been really fortunate in my life to experience some great teachers.  With the greatest of respect for all of them though, Giovanni is quite simply a master.

Hardly batting an eyelid or without too much concern, within minutes he swept the 13 of us up and has held us enthralled the past 5 days.  And that’s not to imply he’s disinterested – on the contrary, he is able to give, to every single person in turn, his utmost focus and generosity as he expertly guides us to personal revelation.  As more than one person has said with admiration: there’s so much learning going on.

So far, it has been such a rejuvenation of personal creative energy and passion.  I’ve been feeling quite low ever since we closed at the Baxter (I suffer horribly from post-production blues), and have been staring down the barrel of creating 2 brand new works for festival and feeling creatively dead.  But here comes new life, stirring in the changing of seasons.  It has been truly amazing to participate on this course.  And if I were a younger guy, with fewer commitments and responsibilities…man, I’d be applying for his school in a heartbeat!

Today is the final day where we continue to play with our clowns that have been midwived by Giovanni.  I can’t believe the week has sped by so fast.  I wish we could slow down time and make this last much longer.