Kate Copstick: 'The church of the clown has never been broader'
Our comedy critic Kate Copstick meets a wide-ranging cavalcade of clowns performing at the Fringe this year
From court jesters and village mummers, via Pierrot and Pagliacci , through Grimaldi's circus rings strewn with the doors of exploded cars, it seems the clown in all its complexities has always, somewhere, been with us. Now though, the church of the clown has never been broader, and Edinburgh is offering communion with them all this year.
Dan Lees created both the Malcolm Hardee Award winners The Establishment and The Flop and if modern clowning has a Grand Master, he would be it.
“I think clowning, maybe in its purest form, is an ability to take the simplest idea and make an audience laugh," he says. "Basically this is because we are not laughing at the idea but at the idiot who thinks it is genius. Someone clever said, ‘a comedian tells a joke, a clown is the joke’. We laugh at the clown, and they are happy to be laughed at.”
There is, nowadays, so much 'me' in 'comedy' that there is less room for those laughs. Look at the comedy programme and so many shows are about me and my diagnosis of something or other, me and my issues, me and my problems.
For clowns, the audience is the thing, the laughter is the thing.
Having spent some comedy time doing spots at The Stand, Mr Twonkey was persuaded, “as an experiment”, to do the 2009 Fringe. His venue thought he was a children's show and put him on at noon, with his underwater circus and “far too many props”. It did resemble “a children's show gone horribly wrong”, says the man himself. Twonkey never saw himself as a clown like “all the ones who have been to the clown schools and have all the formats and techniques.”
Dan Lees doesn't see that as necessary, but most definitely useful. “I think the baseline is the likability of the performer.” he says. “Do we like them? Then the next step is to create a world they can play in. But ultimately charm is the baseline.”
Twonkey has charm in ladlefuls and plays in marvellous self-made multiverses that are not always appreciated by everyone. He was banned by The Stand in 2009 for covering the entire stage in treacle in a puppet related comic debacle. He also created the legendary single official performance of Twonkey's Custard Club which submerged the performance space, audience and performer in shaving foam, and destroyed his laptop.
“I hadn't thought it through,” he says. “If people start enjoying it and laughing I have a tendancy to keep going until it all ends in tragedy." And that is my kind of clown.
Lady clowns are rarer. Or perhaps they just come in different forms. Elf Lyons cites Marilyn Monroe as having 'phenomenal' clown comic timing in many of her early roles, “She used physical comedy because she wasn’t given as many lines as her male co-stars,” says Lyons.
The Fringe is showcasing increasing numbers of female funnies. Could the award-winningly hilarious 'Legs' of the Duncan Brothers have stood astride the Fringe in 2019 without the trophy-laden comedy talents of Julia Masli ? I suspect not. Julia is, of course, back in Edinburgh this year with Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha. As the title subtly indicates, it is very funny.
Elf herself has been entrancing Fringe-goers since Swan in 2017, but it was not an easy debut.
“The constant critique from - often male - reviewers was that it was ‘silliness for silliness’ sake’. Now, in 2025, those same comments are directed at male clowns by the same publications but as praise, not criticism. Because for men, that kind of performance is allowed and we are so much more used to men being silly.”
She is Gaulier trained, although, incredibly, not in clowning, and “I would never say 'I am a clown' because I wouldn’t have the audacity to, but I do say I use clowning. If someone says they’re a clown, they should be able to make me laugh immediately just from being.”
This is a high bar to set. “I still think it’s political for women to be silly," says Lyons. "It’s still subversive when we do it, and that pressure can push us to have to reveal trauma or tragedy at the cliched 40 minute mark in order to show we have earned the right to be there. Which is ludicrous. If I want to be an octopus, let me be an octopus, I shouldn’t have to have some tragic subtext to get there.”
This is, she says, why women make stronger bouffons (dark clowns). “They have more anger and more to say and more things to blaspheme against."
Talking of which, Narin Oz – well known part-clown part-bouffon, who describes herself as “an overexcited clueless child alien trapped in a sexy Turkish Cypriot adult body” is back in Edinburgh trying to reconcile her inner and outer selves in Inner Child(ish). And, in the tradition of suffering for one's art, in these days of rocketing accommodation costs, is planning to camp for the month.
As is Fulbright scholar and queer clown Edu Diaz. Although not in a 'freezing in a tent' sort of way. Clowning and magical realism are his things and A Drag Is Born is his show. The story of a man of advanced age, abundant body hair, and limited talents, who becomes Carnival Queen.
Typically, we wait ages for one truly queer clown show and then two come along. Self proclaimed “tragic fool” Cabbage the Clown's drag-clown debut hour, Cinemadrome, comes on digital wings of eight million adoring online fans. “A buffet of genres,” apparently. Look out for the popcorn.
Dan Lees: The Vinyl Countdown, Greatest Bits!, PBH's Free Fringe @ Banshee Labyrinth, 10.10pm, until 24 August
Twonkey's Zip Wire to Zanzibar, Laughing Horse @ Dragonfly, 8.15pm, until 24 August
Elf Lyons: The Bird Trilogy, Pleasance Dome, 8pm, 12-25 August,
Julia Masli: ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, Pleasance Dome, 11.15pm, 11-24 August,
Narin Oz: Inner Child(ish), Just the Tonic at the Mash House, 4pm, until 24 August
A Drag is Born, Zoo Playground, 6.05pm, until 24 August
Cabbage the Clown: Cinemadrome, Underbelly George Square, 9.45pm, until 24 August
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