Review – Fear&Love&Clowns

Have you ever wondered what happens when a clown loses his red nose? Well if there is anything this show has taught me, it’s to never ever underestimate the power of that signature squishy honker, both in its presence and absence on the clown’s face.

Fear and Love and Clowns is an original show in every way possible. This quartet of clowns and their ringleader will make you laugh no doubt, but the concept is by no means funny business. The performers perfect dynamics create a world that engages with each audience member. There is everything you could ask for in a show; comedy, drama, violence, masturbation, dance moves that would tear up any stage and a live tree. However, in its anti-theatre abstractness it is a performance like nothing you would have seen before, but really should.

Yes, the story does have a metaphorical undertone of power and control within society, but the delivery is comically entertaining from beginning to end. We follow an audition for clowns that starts out with all the typical tomfoolery, but turns nasty fast. When you have a master that will go to extreme authoritarian measures to fulfill some kind of lost self-gratification, there is bound to be (imagined) blood and gore. Adult wit and childish silliness are combined through some real grade A acting from these young Melburnians. Even if, like myself, you have some poltergeist induced fear of clowns, get down and join the circus.