Clowning going buggy whip?

Well, Frank Avruch died a couple of weeks ago.

Frank was a local TV personality, best known for having spent a decade or so playing Bozo on local TV. Not only was he Bozo for Boston kids, Frank was the first nationally syndicated Bozo. So if your hometown didn’t have a Bozo of its own, your Bozo at one point was likely Frank Avruch.

It is hard to find anyone who has a bad word to say about Frank Avruch. By all reports, he was a genuine mister nice guy, and I always enjoyed the post-Bozo show he hosted that showed and discussed classic B&W movies. So I can forgive him for having played a clown.

Although I have vague memories of finding Clarabelle, the clown on Howdy Doody, funny – I was like five, okay? – even as a child I found something weird and creepy about clowns.

I watched Bozo, but I didn’t like Bozo.

The show first aired when I was in fifth grade, and my friends and I were already too jaded to pratfall for Bozo-ish humor. Instead, we made fun of Bozo, singing a reworded (clever us!) version of the Bozo ditty.

Bozo, Bozo, never laughs, always frowns
Bozo, Bozo, very unfunny clown

And by clown standards, Bozo actually wasn’t half bad.

I am, of course, not alone in my negative feelings towards clowns. I’ve read that the pro-clown/anti-clown numbers run about half and half. (One more example of a country divided.) And I’ve also read that most children fear clowns. Thus, decorating children’s wards in hospitals with clown pictures and letting clowns with time on their hands come in to visit and cheer up the kiddos can have the opposite effect.

And clowns, it appears, have more time on their hands these days.

This has been a terribly sad time for clowns, those purveyors of happiness whose recorded history dates back to ancient Greece. Last year was possibly the pits.

Clowns witnessed the shuttering of venerable Ringling Bros., the largest and latest of circuses to close. The layoffs of regional Ronald McDonalds. The movie “It”? Don’t get them started.

It has been one packed clown car of woe. 

And it comes on top of decades of portrayals of depressed, malevolent and downright crazed clowns in movies and on TV, not to mention in real life: Krusty on “The Simpsons,’” Zach Galifianakis on “Baskets,” Twisty on “American Horror Story,” the Great Clown Scare of 2016, Insane Clown Posse, Heath Ledger’s Joker, Jack Nicholson’s Joker, John Wayne Gacy. (Source: WaPo)

With all this as background, it’s no wonder that the recent World Clown Association convention in Minnesota was not exactly a barrel of laughs.

Oh, there were some lighthearted elements

Exhibit booths featured the latest in rubber chickens, oversized pants, magic tricks and latex noses.

But clowns were advised to be careful. No whiteface in public. Too close to Pennywise.

Attendees lamented that their gigs (and income) were down. Hospitals don’t want them coming in and scaring the patients. (They’re still welcome in nursing homes, apparently. One more reason to stay out of nursing homes.)

Many clowns are responding by removing the greasepaint permanently. Some even make it a point to advertise that they don’t wear makeup. Face painting for kids: yes! Face painting for clowns: hell, no!

Yet for other clowns, the makeup’s the thing. It’s what frees them up to be their true selves.

It’s difficult for me to understand why someone would want to reveal their true self as a weird and creepy person that at least half the population shrinks from but, hey…

In any case, employment opportunities are shrinking. It wasn’t just Ringling Brothers folding its tents. There was McDonald’s getting rid of its regional Ronald McDonald program, an initiative that may have employed as many as 300 clowns around the country – some of them making a decent salary and benefits.

And there are no better days ahead.

“Young people have not been excited by clowns,” says Richard “Junior” Snowberg, a World Clown Association founder and a retired professor. “They’re more excited by entertainment on screens.”

Yet another reason to admire and root for the young ‘uns.

Me, I think that when the final send out of the clowns happens, the little children, and us clown loathing adults, will no longer suffer.

I do actually have plenty of sympathy for those whose livelihoods go by the wayside. I’m sure there were plenty of folks who wanted to keep making buggy whips. And working as switchboard operators. Not to mention having sympathy for (and fear of) the 3.5 million truck drivers who at some point in the not all that distant future are going to be removed from the driver seat by autonomous vehicles. It’s tough to have the occupational rug pulled out from under.

Clowning, however, is different. Maybe because it’s not something that’s necessary – as buggy whips and switchboard operators once were – but merely entertainment. Entirely voluntary. (I was going to write “a nice to have”, but not in my book.) And maybe because half the population can’t stand clowns, which I doubt was ever the case with buggy whip makers or switchboard operators.

Clowns are trying to put a smiley face on things.

“Clowning will never be what it was, but I know it will continue to go on and on,” [former Ringling Bros. clown Tricia] Manuel says. “We’ll survive the closing of the circus. We’ll survive scary movies. There’s something in the human spirit that wants to make people laugh and be happy. Once you do it, you have to do it — even though it might not be the popular thing.”

Agreed that “there’s something in the human spirit that wants to make people laugh and be happy.” But there really are less weird and creepy ways than playing a clown. Then again, maybe this is just me. When it comes down to it, I’d rather see than be one. But I’d prefer not to see one, either. I don’t wish them out of existence – let those who want to clown, clown; let those who enjoy clowns, enjoy – I just wish them out of my sightlines and mind space. Easy enough to make happen. But the bottom line seems to be the clowning may truly be going the way of the buggy whip.