Clowning for All Ages

TIM LICATA makes up one half of the onstage duo Plutôt la Vie, currently touring the Highlands and the North East with their show A Clean Sweep. Tim gives the Arts Journal the low-down on the show.

Plutôt la Vie was formed last year in Edinburgh by myself, Ian Cameron and Clark Crystal. Ian is the other half of this show on stage, and he is also our native Scot – I’m an American, Clark is Australian, and our director for ‘A Clean Sweep’, Magdalena Schamberger, is Austrian. We have all been in Scotland for quite a while, though, and we all feel very much at home here.

The idea behind this company was to develop more visually-driven performances, but with a playful feel and more of a European perspective on the ancient art of clowning.

In this country clowns are generally associated with children’s entertainment or circus, but there is a tradition in Europe of a more theatrical and more adult form of clowning. When people see the word ‘clown’, they tend automatically to think ‘children’s show’, and one of the things we are trying to do is to let people see that there is more to it than that.

The show works very well for children and is very playful, but it is very much for adults as well.

‘A Clean Sweep’ was developed with the support of the Scottish Arts Council and Dancebase in Edinburgh, and we also received a grant from the SAC to allow Ian and myself to study the European tradition of clowning with a teacher in Switzerland. He constantly stressed that we shouldn’t go out and try to be ‘funny’, and Magdalena has been reinforcing that as well. The humour has to come out of the situation and the movement rather than us trying to force it.

The two characters we play in the show are called Dustin and Walt, and Magdalena likes to see them as the keepers of the dust. The show revolves around their adventures with brushes of all shapes and sizes. I had the idea for the show lurking in the back of my mind for six or seven years.

“One of our interests was in creating a visual story without words.”

The inspiration came from an unusual source. I live in Edinburgh, and quite often I would pass a brush shop in Victoria Street. Every time I walked down there I would have to stop and look at these objects. I found them fascinating and actually quite beautiful, and I always had it in the back of mind to make a show with them.

We thought the medium of clown play would be an ideal opportunity to bring that about. Ian is a painter and visual artist as well as a performer, and one thing I hope will come across is that we wanted the audience to be able to appreciate the brushes as interesting objects in themselves.

We worked with Magdalena to develop that idea into the show. It is more subtle than standard children’s clowning. We commissioned music from a composer named Andrew Cruickshank, and that has become an even more integral part of the show than I first thought.

There is no dialogue, though. One of our interests was in creating a visual story without words. We started working with the brushes in all sizes and shapes, and part of our improvisation has been playing with the pictures and the visual rhythms they make. That surprising visual logic became part of the structuring process – rhythm is very important in that sense, as well as in the music.

‘A Clean Sweep’ can be seen at the following venues:

• Village Hall, Forgue, Tuesday 23 November 2004
• The Lemon Tree, Aberdeen, Wednesday 24 November 2004
• Fisherman’s Hall, Buckie, Thursday 25 November 2004
• Universal Hall, Findhorn, Friday 26 November 2004
• Village Hall, New Deer, Saturday 27 November 2004
• Village Hall, Cairndow, Wednesday 1 December 2004
• Achmore Hall, Lochalsh, Thursday 2 December 2004
• Sabhail Mór Ostaig, Sleat, Isle of Skye, Friday 3 December 2004
• Aros Centre, Portree, Isle of Skye, Saturday 4 December 2004
• Glenurquhart High School, Drumnadrochit, Thursday 9 December 2004
• Community Theatre, Fortrose Academy, Friday 10 December 2004
• Macphail Centre, Ullapool, Saturday 11 December 2004

© Kenny Mathieson, 2004