For my final year project of my third year on my Drama and Theatre course at York St John University, my peer and I devised, directed and produced a clowning production that was a social commentary on the loss of community in local areas due to the closure of pubs and working men’s clubs. Our thought behind the performance was the very real occurrences of closures of hubs of communities that are a home-away-from-home for many; these closures see people losing a sense of reality when not having a real sense of community and social life from day to day. A reality close to both Jamie and I, we wanted to tell a story in that could create a format to ask questions and inform audiences as well as entreating and engaging people to give them a full understanding of the pleasure pubs can give people by bringing all types together in a mutual understanding and acceptance to bring sympathy and empathy to a topic near and dear to both Jamie and I. Our clowning show cantered around a pub that had much seen better days called ‘The Armageddon Arms’, and focused around four characters who were locals to the pub. With anarchic tendencies and shenanigans, The Armageddon Arms tells the earnest story of a local publican house that is the centre of a dying community. And even though the locals had tension and strives, our story exhibited the light-heartedness of hurt and anger they were feeling and commented on the fact that their togetherness was what made them strong; they were less than without their weekly connection.
Why create an anarchistic piece? This is an excerpt of a piece I wrote in our catalogue document:
‘Anarchism = Clowning.
A collapse in society is what we want, what our cause needs and has been screaming out for. We want our community back, not the government telling us what our community should be through their corrupt, right-wing media meant for working class, ‘little-Britain’s’ to digest and then spit out hatred that hasn’t come from their minds, but because it’s from their mouths, the government can pass their bill, their laws, like it was ‘our’ idea, when all along the idea came from them.
Clowning = Anarchism.
And we need anarchism to make our statement. Our lives are the ones that change. Our voices. Our freedom. Our community!’
Co-creating and directing the Armageddon Arms was an extremely rewarding experience for myself as an artist; working with my talented cast, we created a piece of theatre that exuded fun and celebration of life through the murky lens of an old boozer, our four clowns all played a role to create such a sense of community and dysfunctionality also. Each clown had a role to play so that the piece would build into its anarchistic climax which symbolised the never-give-up attitude of the communities our clowns were representing and the togetherness and fight of what those communities have within them.
Throughout our process, Jamie and I wanted to really collaborate with our cast and create our characters through our casts clowns.
The Clowns:
- Kev: Getting all of the clown’s negativity but still being the positive light in the pub and only ever tries to make Jan happy
- Jan: Getting frustrated with everyone else but taking it out only on Kev, never giving him the time of day
- Tod: Playing on his incapability to get what he wants from Bev and mastermind his plan to influence everyone to do what he wants.
- Bev: Not being able to do his job as barman because he is catering to Tod’s needs.
Once we knew our characters motives we were able to let our cast play and really be in the moment which is where our cast found their presence as their clowns and, watching it, you could really see the passion and fun of the piece through their performances. All I wanted from this piece when I set out on the journey of creating it, was to share the passion and joy I have for clowning with others; clowning is such an expressive and meaningful artform that can speak about the dark side of life through humour and provocation which I believe life needs more of. I believe Jamie and I achieved sharing our passion for clowning and I couldn’t be prouder of the show we created.
