Clowning Around

I keep reading about how people find clowns scary, how their painted faces terrify children and how some people find them so disturbing they've become clown-phobic, punching any red nosed bastard they see squarely in the face. Personally, I've never found clowns frightening. I mean, how on earth could someone with no dress sense, big shoes, poor miming abilities and who keeps falling over possibly be scary? It's not as if they could stalk you in those bloody shoes. And even if they did go psycho and try to stalk and murder people, what are they going to do - custard pie their victims to death? No, my problem with clowns is that I just don't find them funny. Their infantile antics - kicking each other in arse, throwing buckets of water, driving exploding cars - don't raise the slightest of titters from me. I'm sure I'm not alone in this. I'm sure that nobody finds clowns funny. Oh, I know that at the circus the whole audience seems to roaring with laughter every time someone gets squirted by that water-spitting flower they all have on their lapels, but they're probably terrified that if they don't laugh, the clowns will cut their throats. Or kidnap their children. Or release the lions and tigers into the audience.

I've never found clowns funny, not even when I was a child. Especially when I was a child. Indeed, my dislike of the bastards can be traced back to a 1970s BBC children's programme called Right Charlie, a half hour format which 'showcased' the 'talents' of 'popular' clown Charlie Cairoli. Watching that programme was sheer hell. Thirty minutes of pratfalls, custard pies and just plain stupidity as Charlie and his clown pals went through the same tiresome routine, week in, week out. Their escapades were only relieved, as I recall, by the appearance of one Norman Barrett (dressed as a circus ringmaster) and his performing budgies. Yes, budgies. They did things like tightrope walking and riding bicycles. It really was agony to watch - both the budgies and the clowns, I mean. They just weren't remotely funny, not even to a child whose sense of humour one would expect to be less developed. The whole thing looked as if it had been made on a budget of £2.50. It probably had - those clowns were probably so glad of the work they did it for the free sandwiches and tea. Significantly, not only did these clowns not make me laugh, they didn't scare me either. If anything,I felt sorry for them, their act seemed so desperate, and they seemed so sad.