The Art of Clowning.

Went to Cabaret Boom Boom last night. Thanks to Mothermouse’s immaculate planning we got the front and centre table of a packed village hall, at least it would have been if it wasn’t in the middle of Sheffield. It started erratically with a young woman dressed as a potato, a woman creating her dream date from an assortment of vegetables and a guy shooting a bat from a cannon whilst riding a kids trike clean off the stage; the sort of performances if you didn’t enter into them you’d be left outside a Siberian sauna shivering to death. At one point the potato, deep in its depressed character, stepped down from the stage and asked Mothermouse what it should do. Mothermouse, possibly the only therapist in the room and very used to such a question, was so flummoxed by this novel empathic relationship with a potato she could do little more than whisper, “I don’t know.” Then the professional acts. An excellent violinist who, at 6’3” and obviously way too tall for any orchestra string section, had opted for the more lucrative career of stand up playing, for which he was more adequately proportioned. He required a stooge and alighted on me as a fellow musician. I like the stage and done some clowning so settled into the second fiddle absent minded gullible member of the audience, a role for which I too am adequately proportioned. The crowd laughed and four gins to the wind Mothermouse was in tears; possibly in relief knowing I’m prone to butt-clenching flights of public failure. Intermission. Top of the bill was a comedian juggler. He too picked on me several times and took to calling me Allen because he thought I looked like Allen Titchmarsh. By this time I’d been on stage almost as long as a support act. As he took his bow to rapturous applause in nothing but a skimpy pink tutu, long story, he thanked Allen. Big mistake. The back of the room erupted with shouts of “It’s Brian”. So he ended up having to say, “I know it’s Brian, I was just making a joke that he looked like Allen Titchmarsh.” Walkley Community Hall might be five miles from where we live but in Sheffield we look after our own. And today my name is better known there than here. Very strange, and honestly I’ve played my own music gigs and left with about as much recognition as a fart in the night. So as Covid begins to leave us do value our entertainers. Not the TV ones, the ones with the craft to do it live in front of a live audience and give them a good night out.