the Way of the Showman
Philosophical and esoteric perspectives from a modern day Showman.
Each season is different in its approach. S1 is essays. S2 is one book length attempt at Understanding Showmanship, S3 is conversations with remarkable Showfolk. The brand new Season 4 explores the relationship between Showmanship and Play.
The host, Captain Frodo, internationally renowned circus performer, director, writer, husband and dad lays out, in great detail, his practical performance philosophy for performers who seek to deepen the conversation with their audiences and themselves. You can find him, and more of his writing at: www.thewayoftheshowman.com
the Way of the Showman
128 - Reimagining Reality through the Freak Show Lens - Philosophy & Freakshow with Anna Maria Sienicka 2 of 4
Ever wondered how the Freak Show transcends typical performance art with its unique philosophical dimensions? Join Captain Frodo and our esteemed guest, Anna Maria Sienicka, a PhD student and lecturer from Paris Nanterre University, as we unravel the intricate layers of this captivating world. Through Anna Maria's research and insights, we explore the Freak Show's distinct identity, standing apart from magic and clowning by offering a profound encounter with the unknown.
Social media's impact on self-presentation takes center stage as we draw parallels to Goffman's theatrical metaphor of life. By challenging societal norms and algorithm-driven beauty standards, the Freak Show emerges as a rebellious act akin to the transformative power of drag makeup. Sword swallowing becomes more than just shock and awe; it's an invitation to experience the mysterious and sacred, transforming perceptions and enriching life with an appreciation for the unknown. These acts, once labeled as "freaky," reveal deeper truths, encouraging audiences to embrace the intriguing beauty of the unexplained.
The episode ventures further into the art of deception, where the boundaries of reality and illusion blur. We dissect the complex interplay between deception in magic and the authenticity of Freak Shows, much like the theatrical spectacle of American wrestling. From historical marvels to contemporary performances, Freak Shows blend reality with fiction in a way that captivates and challenges audiences. Through my own performances, such as squeezing through tennis rackets, we explore the art of anticipation and humor that guides audiences on a journey filled with surprise and engagement.
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Greetings, fellow travelers, and welcome to the way of the showman, where we view the world through the lens of showmanship. I am Captain Frodo and I will be your host and your guide along the way as we explore the philosophy of Freak Show. We continue to explore it with Anna Maria Seneca. So those of you who listened in last week you know that this goes deep into what it means to be a monster, what it means to be a freak Not to be that as a true part of your nature, but to highlight and present those things about you that can be presented and made monstrous. How is this done? We explore today, and this time and in the next, following two episodes, the tables have turned. The questions are now being steered by Anna. As she asks these questions and I take it something similar to these questions are being asked to other different people around the fringes of the Freak Show world.
Speaker 1:So I'm not going to go on as much as I did last week about this, but it's worth mentioning here again that this episode is filled with triggering content Because we are talking about Freak Show and at the center stage of the Freak Show we have the strange and the beautiful in the freaky way. So if you are easily offended or you're easily triggered, then this might not be the episode for you. Offended or you're easily triggered, then this might not be the episode for you. As they say when they invite you into the freak show, this is not for the faint of heart, but know that we are good at heart in these discussions. So I hope you enjoy it.
Speaker 1:And if you do enjoy the Way of the Shaman, please support the podcast by clicking support, if you have it in you to write a review, or even just click five stars on whatever podcast app you have. It really helps, particularly on iTunes. It helps. It helps people find us. So all of that's free for you. Very meaningful to me. So let's jump into the freaky world of Freak Show with Anna Maria. But let it be noted that, unlike me, who have no credentials except for standing in front of an audience for a very long time, Anna Maria Seneca is a PhD student writing about freak show and monsters, and she is a lecturer in philosophy, a professor at Paris Nanterre University. So you know now that this has some credibility, which freaks like me certainly need.
Speaker 2:Do you see me, do you hear?
Speaker 1:me. I see you and I hear you. Oh, perfect, thank you so much for your time, my pleasure. So, uh, yeah, tell me about your, uh, your phd. Uh, yes, I'm I'm.
Speaker 2:I'm working on freak shows in the field of philosophy, aesthetics specifically, and I try to see if there is something very specific about the freak show art, something that is very different from, for example, the art of the magician, the art of clowning, something that would be intrinsic to the freak show, to the sideshow. So I'm trying to get in touch with many performers to see what they have to tell me about their performances, their experiences and how is the freak show scene today, those of other things. So I have many questions because I've been listening to your podcast for the last few days, so I have us somehow a strange para social relationship with you now sometimes I did.
Speaker 1:When I started the podcast, one of the goals was to come out as a thinker, because I think about all these things, but it normally only came out through conversations but to collect the ideas and, anyway, what it has afforded me. Because this has worked, because now when I talk to people, sometimes we can jump straight into these yes, bigger questions or so, because, as you maybe know as well, or you know, but uh, when it comes to circus or um, freak show, maybe even more so, the people who engage in it are often not so philosophically inclined.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, and I think you've said in your podcast that you have a background in philosophy.
Speaker 1:Well, very, very small Academically, very small In Norway, to get into the historical philosophical faculty to study at university, which I went to in 1995, I think. Uh, I did a course in um philosophy history and it's like a history of history and philosophy of science and uh, so it's an introductory course to the historical faculty. It's a one semester thing. So you take philosophy history, philosophy of science, thomas Kuhn and Karl Popper and all of this and logics and a few things like this.
Speaker 1:And this is the preparatory course and I was supposed to then afterwards go in and I wanted to study first. I wanted to study comparative religion, as it was called then. So I am interested in religion and interested in mythology or whatever. But I applied to go to back to university and do that. But in the meantime I some friends were going to do a circus course in england and I we were already doing shows, but then then I went and did that and from there on I started, we did street shows and then I started doing street shows more and and I never went back to my studies. The closest I've gotten was that when the pandemic came and I came back to Norway, I applied to do an online course of history of ideas. I don't know if that's what it's called in French or whatever, but this is a study course.
Speaker 1:So, it's not quite philosophy, it's somewhere in between. But the course, because everybody wanted to study online and the pandemic the course was was full, and because I am in my 40s, I guess they gave the spaces to the people who are getting an education up anyway. So so I. But that said, I am still very interested in philosophy currently. Currently, I have been the last couple of years been getting into process philosophy, so I did an online follow the lecture course. It's like 20 lectures or so about Henri Bergson, and currently I'm trying to read my way through process and reality by Alfred North Whitehead, but it's a very tricky book.
Speaker 2:I have some questions that are really philosophically inclined, so I think you won't be in foreign land with my questions. I have many of them, so we'll see how it goes, and my first question would be I've seen that there has been a great recent resurgence of the interest in freak shows and side shows and I wanted to ask your opinion who are the new freaks today?
Speaker 1:This is a very interesting question. I mean, when you have a resurgence, it is usually a you're bringing back from the past and somehow recontextualizing it and in a sense it's like what the new freaks of today you always, when you're doing the freak shows. They're always trying to push the boundaries and in a way it is there's almost no boundaries, boundaries which has not already been pushed in the past. Uh, as an example, I do one act where I put cans and put on top of each other, so it starts with a big one, the smaller and smaller, and I sit on the top of this, so it's like two meters high or whatever, and I put both of my legs behind my head and I balance on top. And this trick I've seen. It's a yoga move to sit on the ground with your legs behind your head and balance on your bum. But I had never seen someone do what I did. And then I saw some pictures of people who did sit on an object in a freak show performance context. But then the other day a friend, nils Juncker, who publishes books about juggling and so in specific, but he's interested in the history of performance found a picture from the 1930s with no name or whatever, but a man sitting on the stack of cans, not big like mine, man sitting on the stack of cans, not big like mine, but tall and skinny just like mine. So that was the last piece that I thought this was my invention. I mean, it was my invention but it had been invented before. So that was just an example of how. So what are the freaks of today? I mean, it's so hard because I think like I don't have a specific group. But my thought goes to Robert Bogdan in his book of freak show. But you might know this book, yeah, and he talks about aggrandization and how it is you make yourself into a freak by highlighting a certain, a certain feature of yourself.
Speaker 1:So when I first joined, really really got into the freak show world, there was a, was a woman. They were identified as a woman but presented also strongly like a male, but she had breasts, so she was presented as a kind of hermaphrodite in this, in this show. So this thing like which is big at the moment, in what both they're fighting for their rights but they're also being ostracized by the right and the left is pushing a different direction. So gender issues, um, just on how one presents oneself. I find this to be material or something that we have seen within freak shows. Uh, already that was coming in the 80s but it goes all the way back. I mean, you see what's her name? Josephine, something who was in the Freaks movie by Todd Browning, for instance. This half and half or so has been presented in there.
Speaker 1:So when it comes down to it, back to an easy thing, I don't know who the Freaks are today, because you can kind of still make anyone into freaks and it's also. It's interesting, like, what is the goal of the freak show? It's to touch you the most. And one thing that I commented on when I was talking with a friend of mine who does work, circus work, circus-related work, with a dance troupe of aboriginals, australian first nation people, and he, we had had a conversation and where I was going in the revival of all the freak acts that happened in the sort of in the in the mid 90s and that sort of had a resurgence again when we were doing freak show at like early 2000s or so, that's that that decade. The thing which was not revived but which was common everywhere was to have First Nation peoples in cages. And today, if you Wanted to shock and get on the front page and everything. Then these hot button topics of Jen and of race, which sends people into an explosion straight away.
Speaker 1:I think that in the past, or that this is this, this scary area of not knowing, so it's like when things are unclear, or so this area, this freak show, does well in this area. And also I think that the core thing that freak shows do is to hit you not so much in the head but to hit you in the emotions in the strongest possible way. When things are too strong to be in the circus, they have to be in the freak show. In the circus you can have the beautiful lady with their stockings and everything, but if it goes any further in presenting sexuality, it needs to go into the freak show kind of, and you can have dangerous or scary things, but if it goes, goes one step beyond um, into the really stuff that hits you in the gut, I think it belongs in the freak show. And for today, who the freaks are of today, I think? I think it would be whatever would push those buttons and whoever dares to go into those territories. And I'm not suggesting that one should go into race or into gender, but. But they are issues which I think would then get all of a sudden get freak show on the front page of the paper again, like they so.
Speaker 1:But that is not to say that those things are in any way a freak show thing. But if we're looking for the new, then most of the time it's a bringing back from the past. Because the guy that I spoke to, josh bond, who runs the juki mala where he works with this dance performance troupe in Australia, he was interested in exploring this because there's some incredible literature of what happened to some of these Aboriginal people who traveled around. And just like in Robert Brogdon's book, how he describes the story of somebody who goes to see the freak show and they meet a black man, zulu, nation, crazy. But then they go oh, it's mr Johnson from down here, but he had just taken a job in this free show and he, he goes from being just a guy that works in the corner store to being whatever his role was in that show.
Speaker 1:So we were talking about like and and it's yeah, it's this. You need that shock value and uh, to delve into this areas where, uh, another thing, another, another performer, david, plenty, a man who was the first one to take uh babies in jars into australia. He's an australian performer. He he told me of an act that somebody did back then which he took a mouse, a little white mouse, put it in his mouth and then chewed it all up and blood came out and everything and he said, oh, and they were, people were fainting and everything, and it was crazy.
Speaker 1:And then in the end he did take the mouse out and it was just a gag. But this kind of stuff too today, animal cruelty, it does not fly. So if you did this act today and you took the mouse and you pretended to do it, or whatever, people would, uh, would be outraged, and this to to play with this, to play it, how far can you push it? So I don't know, it's, it's a scary thing even to talk about with you what it is, because I'm thinking of what are the most sort of dangerous issues and when you can take this and push it, but just not too far. Push it just so that people are outraged but that they go. Then they will tell their friend did you see this? You gotta go and see this.
Speaker 2:I recently met some American performers that also do novelty acts, freak acts, and most of them told me that many, many of them used the freak show for its monstrous aspect like a way to reclaim the stigma, like, for example, adopting the figure of the birded lady to challenge the gender binary. Like we said, and among those different people that I interviewed, and among those different people that I interviewed, many said that the freak is today a subversive symbol. Would you say that the freak became some kind of figure of rebellion and if so, against what? Against some kind of normalcy, against some to push some political ideologies?
Speaker 1:yeah, I think it has this power. I don't know if it historically always have had that, um, that aspect to it, but there is, there is a part of it which I know in like in freak stories or so that you go if you're, if you're a short person or you have any physical abnormality that is visible no matter what you do that sometimes they would say, oh well, it's like I am on display, whether I want to or not, and by placing yourself in display and taking control of this image and you are, in a sense, then owning it and going, yes, and I'm aware of your gaze, your gaze will always make me an other, no matter what. And by me accepting it and taking steps towards presenting myself in a certain way within this, I accept that I am different and then I present it in a way, you then reclaim some of that power also. So, yeah, I think I think there's something in that. But, um, and I think I think there is there is power in this of being different and by claiming it. So I think that you can absolutely be a rebel.
Speaker 1:And, of course, then, in today's society, which is more than ever focused on presentation of self it's because of social media. We all are, in a sense, curating ourselves, not just through our daily life, where we put on clothes and go out and interact, which always has been. You know, like what's his name? Goffman, who wrote the presentation of self and everyday life, but that he this is. This has always been the case, but now we have one more level of abstraction here, where it's not just a presentation of self in everyday life, it's also a curated presentation of self through digital images, digital videos. You are combining it in exactly the same way that I do. I go, okay, I do this act act, but if I put this music on, it makes you feel one way. When I do my tennis act, I have this really cheesy herb albert music in the background, so that it goes with a funny bumbling clown, even when I say I will do this location and this is so that you will relax a little bit and go this is supposed to be funny.
Speaker 1:And then you accept me to push you further than I could if I put on marilyn manson or rammstein and I go this is supposed to be funny. And then you accept me to push you further than I could if I put on marilyn manson or rammstein and I go this is going to be the most scary thing, or whatever so and so. So in this and and society is usually pushing, you know, females in one direction, and the algorithm is pushing you in one direction or so for and for a particular type of beauty. Yeah, and the men are being pushed in another one. I am NOT interested in violence or in car crashes or this kind of stuff, but it comes in my feet no matter what. And they know if I scroll down and I go, oh, what's this? Oh, that's disgusting. But they know, oh, he stopped. Next time there will be two of this. So you're, they're grabbing your base instincts or so, so taking.
Speaker 1:So if you push it, if the algorithm or everything is pushing you in one direction, it is a sort of a rebellious act to go. Beauty is more things. Like you know, like Camus or everyone talks about beauty is not just what we think of as beautiful, but there can be be a particular kind of beauty and in in a, in a romantic sense of, of the death of a loved one or whatever it it's. It's agonizing, but it still has its sense of beauty. And to then make this crazy makeup or whatever, like the sort of drag makeup or so, whether you do that as a woman or a man, like you are exaggerating the features, to be crazy, but to be.
Speaker 1:It is, in a sense, taking what I know you want me to do and deliberately going against it, and I think there is a rebellious act in that absolute. But when you open this question, can't remember the exact words, but that the main thing that you're presenting is this the freak and the shock factor. And, uh, when we were working with the happy side show, which we did from 1999 or 2000 I think, till for five years or so, we wanted, we worked hard to go beyond this idea of um, of just showing that freaky kind of stuff, because to me I feel like this is the level one of the, you're going with what is already inherent in the, in the freak act.
Speaker 1:When you swallow a sword, people will think, oh, that's disgusting. So my challenge is then how do I transform your experience of this so that you don't just see the first level of oh, this is disgusting. But I and I do it by talking, without going in detail, but like rudolf otto, who talks about the sacred as being mysterium, fascinans and tremendous, like it's, it's, it's mysterious. The mystery is that it is fascinating and repulsive at the same time. So you are, and to me this is the description of what sword swallowing is if you look at it from a point of view. You, you don't want to watch, but you can't not watch, and this encounter and by saying a couple of things like this within.
Speaker 1:So I build everything up until you know that I'm going to swallow the sword and I talk about mystery, but I do it in by being silly. I do stuff and they don't know what's going on, and I produce it. Well, it doesn't matter what I do in the act, but they set up and I say mysterious, what is it? No one knows what's going on, I don't know all of these things, that I do magic and I do a few different things. And I have a sword. By the time I pull the sword out, they still don't know. When I chop cucumber off my hat, that it flies into the audience, and they don't know. But when I take the sword up and I put it on my lips and go, but then in this moment they know what's going on and now I go, now I have set ups, I've talked about mystery, but I think they think I talk about mystery because I'm doing silly, uh, magic not necessarily that you know what I do, because I'm doing magic, but I present it in a funny way.
Speaker 1:So I talk about mystery, say they think it's a joke, and then in the end I go because this is what the mystery is really when you meet it, and then I say I hope that when you see it now, that you can have this in mind. So the fact that I say, the fact that we don't understand everything, makes life more beautiful. And if you don't understand what you're about to see now, I try to keep this in mind which they don't understand, the source following. So then I. So what I am then trying to do is to reframe the freaky miss to make it into an act of devotion.
Speaker 1:I say some stuff about you, you, you take the mystery of this unknown and you put it inside yourself. So, with a few minutes of talking as I, as I have that strong attention because now they go oh, he's going to swallow the sword I do a little a bit that connects to the previous but reframes it in a way that I'm going, I am proposing to them that what I am doing is a kind of sacred action, um, in the ancient way of what the mystery is, or so, of of being awesome, like it's both or full, and also, or some, like in the wrath of jehovah, when people experience an angel or so it's beautiful but also terrifying. So so this was a bit with this idea of what, because? And part of the reason why this works, I think, is because when somebody is proposing to swallow half a meter of sword in your mouth, then they feel it you can't escape it.
Speaker 1:It's real now. So now I'm actually grabbing them and I'm, in a sense, they can feel the mystery too and they are asking why, why are you doing this? And in that sense, maybe the participation is stronger, in the same way that you do when you watch somebody walk on the high wire. You can feel it, your hands get wet and your heart goes faster because you go. I don't want to watch somebody die. This is too much for me, almost, because it's it's a chance that she's gonna fall down, and oh.
Speaker 1:So I think that the power of the freak show can it. One is to be the act of rebellion, of just going, and the other one is the, the act of that. You have the possibility of take the power which lies at the heart of every freak show act, whether it is the Person in the cage or whatever like used to be a big part of of it, or it is the, the dwarf or the short person, that that is. And you can take this power that you have of human interest. We look at these things and we go what is it like? You are, and then take this power and you can then, because you have the retention, you can potentially transform it and make it larger.
Speaker 2:So it really makes me topic two of your episodes about art and entertainment and the art of entertainment, and it makes me think about something you've said about entertainment being immediate, being something that should be accessible, that should not require effort from the audience.
Speaker 2:But as we speak, I see that in many slideshow performances, spectators, the audience sometimes looks away because they project onto themselves the pain they imagine they would feel if they were in your place, like with with the sword swallowing, or even the the tennis gig. It's like, oh my god, it must feel so bad, it must hurt, it's um, it's something like. I see him, you know, for example, on talent shows. People when I see sideshow act, they grimace, they watch in fascination but they also start to peek through the fingers as if to keep their distance. So my question would be do you think it actually involves an effort to be a member of the audience of a sideshow act, and could we think that the sideshow act, the sideshow performance, is more the communion between the performer and the audience, is some kind of shared physical trial?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I totally believe that. That is, I believe that what you just said there a shared sort of participatory event. When you have reached the apotheosis, the biggest I am possible realm of what a performance is, is when you have made this connection. And sometimes to make this connection through poetry, at least a certain type of poetry, some poetry is more charles pokowski or billy collins, or so are maybe more storytelling things, so they're easier to get into, uh, but there are more metaphysical poets. So it is. It takes you if you listen to it. The first time you maybe get nothing, but maybe there is enormous wisdom in the poem that you can't meet it with a freak show. You are grabbing them straight as you go, as it is gone, I'm going to swallow the sword and now you have their attention in this particular kind of way and and the idea what I mean- with it being effortless is that the performers taking you by the hand in a way and leading you, leading you through it to bring you along.
Speaker 1:Because part of my acts, my main acts that I perform around the world, is the tennis act with the dislocation thing and that dislocation thing when I sit on top of the buckets and a sword swallowing act and an act where I talk about what the difference is between circus and freak show. I should send you this act on a video link. I talk what the difference is and I balance the spoon and catch it behind my ear as an example of circus and I go the feeling you have when you watch this is the feeling of circus.
Speaker 1:It's beautiful, impressive and surprising when it catches behind the air, surprising that somebody spends so much time doing something so useless. But then I do the freak show and I put the spoon up my nose and I pretend to balance it or so. And so that means that my main acts that I perform for a real general public, we perform is all essentially freak show, but they have taken them and transformed them in such a way that people like them everywhere. I bring them by the hand. And the tennis act. There are moments in there where I do the dislocation, but the act is, when I do it live, it's eleven and a half minutes and it goes six, seven minutes before there is a dislocation. All the rest is just attention. I say I'm gonna do it, and then there's more chaos and then I re-mention it, oh and then, and then it doesn't happen and the biggest amount of chaos comes. So then, and when I finally get up again and we do it, then there's been so much physical comedy that we are hopefully now in the terrain of of buster, keaton and Chaplin, where I prepare them for it. And that's what I mean with it being effortless or so, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have a threshold, but it means that it also means that the different venues, the different places where you encounter the freak show, will allow the performer to be in one way or another.
Speaker 1:Because there are ways to present freak show. You can present it as torture in a way, and then it's agonizing to watch. And you can introduce also like misogynism, where there's a guy that is putting pins into a woman who says she doesn't want it, which is like, even if this is this woman's act, she puts pins through us herself, which is a freak show act. But you change it, then you put the power thing in and you do all of this and then for many different places this would not be okay. But then you take it within like well you know, like torture garden or when you have this BDSM aspect to it and it's within the consensual understanding that the performance is going on, and then this act could be amazing, but it would not go on Le Plus Grand Cabaret du Monde. This would be wrong in this context, but maybe in the right way, a woman or a man or something could put the pin through themselves.
Speaker 1:But you are only allowed to go in the certain different venues where you perform. You can only take them to a certain way, and I hope that, like the skilled performer is to be able to meet their audience where they're at, take their expectations and then hopefully bring them in and push them to the edge of what is possible and within the different realms. Whether you're doing the hanging of the hooks as a sacred Native American ritual or so, it's completely different than when you do it as something else in a tattoo convention or so. So I think there is a great power and how you can, yeah, the different ways that you perform it and how far you can take it. I think I've lost a little bit exactly where your question started but oh, it's great.
Speaker 2:But you said that when you perform you take the audience by the hand. They have to follow your guidance and to into this communion of the performance. But it is often said and I think you said it also on one of your episodes that in the sideshow performance there are those in the audience who are in on the jokes and those who aren't. They say also that a sucker is born every minute. So do you think that, even though you take them by the hand, people are going to freak shows, to sideshow performances, for the pleasure of being tricked, for being deceived in these shows, and do you think that this idea of a mutually agreed deception is something that is at the heart of the sideshow?
Speaker 1:No, I don't think so. I think deception lies at the heart of magic. So when you're watching any kind of conjuring act, any kind of magic show, magic performance, the deception will be part of it, acknowledged and understood. So even if the magician never says it is deception, you kind of know that you go in. But of course there is the blurry edge there as well of the where it goes into the religious.
Speaker 1:Uri geller famously claimed he had supernatural powers which made the magicians expose him or attack him, because now he is no longer saying he's a magician and they go. Yes, you do. This is the thing. So but I think there is deception within the freak show, and maybe even more what Robert Bogdan calls aggrandization. It's to exaggerate what is there.
Speaker 1:The giant would have the, even though he might be two meters. They would put them in the big shoes with a big heel and with a big hat, maybe the big fur hat of the Russians, maybe a big cowboy hat. You see the pictures from that. So not only would they be, but there would be something more as well. And when you go on and you would stand up on the stage and maybe when he walks on, just the dramaturgy of it. He would walk in and stand on a box and then the talker would stand just a little bit behind on the floor to present, so that you have the man pointing even more upwards because you wanted to be larger than life. But I don't think that that, that the deception was part of it in the same, in the same uh way, but I think it's also. It's a. We also have to remember that there is a, historically at least, because now it's not so common anymore and I don't know it's a common theme of the books of saying, by the time, by the time of the 1980s, the and and but then it was already happened, then it was, but over time, as science grew an understanding of what was going on with freaks, with people who are born different, visibly visibly different, as that there was a transformation then from the time of maybe, say, 1900 to 1980 over those years
Speaker 1:there's a sort of decline from them being a marvel of nature or an amazing and unusual anomaly or something, or the missing link or whatever from from these kind of language, to them being diseased or deformed people in in a way that it becomes that we go oh no, this is a problem with your glands, or this is this or whatever, and that's in line with that, the freak sort of uh chase, and the people who are born different people.
Speaker 1:People will all, of course, wonder is it real or not? But I don't think that this was the point of the freak show, because with some of these, maybe the blow off, the bit that you could pay extra for in the end would be maybe to come and touch the flesh of the conjoined twins that you actually could come up and see this is real and you could, or things like this where there is one extra thing. But anyway, doug, I think I don't think that deception is the point of it. I would say that the freak show definitely has that, but yeah, do you think deception is a part of it, or so?
Speaker 2:or do you think because no, I think there is a part of deception when I try to think what is specific to the freak show, to the side show, when I try to define it for my students, when I try to define it in my work, even though it's really difficult because it's always, it's a show that is always evolving. I try to situate it between magic and body art, in the sense that it takes from magic, which is a play on illusion, a play sometimes on deception, and the other part, the body art. It takes from the shocking imagery, from the extreme, and for me there is a tension between fiction and reality. So not really deception, but always is it true, is it not?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you are correct as much, and I think it was maybe, maybe when you say that it's the's the core thing, because you are completely right, I think it is definitely an aspect, and to place it within magic and and body art, I think this is, this is a good, good definition, because a lot of what's going on although is not a good definition, but a good placement of it, because there, whether there is, because when I, when I'm, when I'm saying the aggrandization is a form of deception and and I guess in magic too, you're not always, but you often are presenting it as if it is real. Yes, I actually make this thing levitate. So it is real, I actually make this thing levitate, but it is not so far down this spectrum as American wrestling, for instance, where the suspension of disbelief or the deception is, where the suspension of disbelief or the deception is less hidden. But even within that there's, you know, there's the from when it was all real to there is more, they're a little bit more acknowledging that. It is also theatrical, because there too it's, a real person jumps and actually falls on the floor. A real person is slammed, even if they are consensually doing it and helping each other to make it happen also. So yeah, there is definitely an element of deception. I have to backpedal a little bit on being strong and saying no, I don't think. But I don't think it's the core thing. And the reason why I said that is because I think I was thinking from the point of view of it's like it's always been presented as if it's real.
Speaker 1:But also if you think of the classic acts of freak show as being the Melvyn Bukkard's blockhead act, or lying on the nails or swallowing swords there is, or putting a pin through your flesh, they will there as well ask is this real? And a lot of what you can do is to present it as if it's. You come over and you can get someone to see it's actually going through or whatever like it's, to show that it's real and the reason why you can do that. And this is also similar to the dramaturgy of magic. Here I have a hand. It's completely empty, but now come touch it's empty. Yes, man, oh, there's a coin behind your ear and this one of them is actually like the sword swallower is actually wanting you to know that is real.
Speaker 1:But the magic is mimicking this particular part of it of using the dramaturgy of showing how. How do you show that something is real? If you were to show it was real. And then the magic does all those things to, but in such a way that it is still not real, but they mimic the process of that. And then, because there is in much of what's being presented in freak show, the skill that is presented putting the pins in, lying on the broken glass, swallowing the sword. It is what it is said to be, what you see is what it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of my research hypothesis is that in the freak show mainly in the 19th century, but we can still see it today in current performances is that the different characters in the performance the talker, the freak and the other talker sometimes they do not share the same the other talkers, sometimes they do not share the same degree of reality. By this I mean I think that the talker is more extra diegetic than the freak. He takes the audience by the hand to accompany them into the fictional world, and the freak is in this fiction because he became a freak when he's seen, when he's on on display, when he performs.
Speaker 1:But those different characters are a way to to step into the fiction yeah, brilliant, I completely agree, and I think this has to do, then, with the idea that to be entertained, you need to be, it needs to be effortless, if itaky as possible.
Speaker 1:You have the talker which brings you into it, which tells this little bit of story, whether it is found on the island of such and such, of the island of miss um, and this brings you in whatever is the fashion of the time to approach this thing, because that would be what the talker would do bring you into the world and to, and, and I believe you have the performer, the showman and the audience and the show is the participatory attention that they share. We pay together, pay attention together at one thing, and this phenomena, which happens in the shared attention, I think of as the world of shows, or so. It's the not real, it's the imagination, or so, but the beautiful thing with the freak is that the freak in itself by being real. If we think of it as a person who's completely tattooed in the face, like the great dolmy, or, or it's somebody who's born different, it's somebody with a, like a short person, then the short person and all the tattoos are, in a sense, the proof of the greater imaginal creation. Yeah, sorry, you do, you want.
Speaker 2:And how does it translate in your own shows? Because you are your own talker, so it must be more difficult to play those different characters, because you're only one person on the stage at the moment of your show.
Speaker 1:And I do it like the most. The first act that I often do is to do the tennis or something, and in this one I start to introduce myself and the way that I do it is slightly self-deprecating or so, and it's I am odd and I look odd in the short pants, very short pants, and I look very funny already. So when I come out and I say, uh, so, yeah, so the overall idea of of this is that I use the structure and the subversion of my own what I have said, so I come out and I say I was born like this, with the ability to do bend and contort, and I'm going to squeeze through these tennis rackets and it goes like this and it has a certain rhythm.
Speaker 1:And then when I am going to go through, then I do a whole lot of jumping around but do almost nothing. So now they go, because when I make the presentation I go okay, and now I'm going to squeeze through these rackets, and it goes like this, and then it has had a certain pace where you think, okay, this is going to take three, four minutes, and then it's finished because I can see the pace. And then when I do the first one, it's like, oh, this is something different happened now. It sounded like I was just going to do it right now, but after all of this jumping around, I have done nothing.
Speaker 1:So this is much more difficult, or much more so, and from there the chaos of it that I it introduced. It slowly, more and more so. I'm doing the role of inviting them in and explaining what's going on and I build it and the biggest amount of chaos and everything happens when it's almost over. So it has the structure of going and it builds anticipation and then, like I'm gonna squeeze through the rackets and then I go to know. You know well, I can understand if not everyone's impressed, because I throw confetti at this moment and understand you're not impressed now but I'm gonna make it more difficult.
Speaker 1:They're gonna put the leg through, and now it's the first time when it's when they go. They thought it was disappointing, but then I introduced the idea of the leg. And then they go oh, this is probably also a joke. And then it turns out it's not.
Speaker 1:And then the chaos start when I go so I'm using the idea of taking them by the hand and lead them in and say something they maybe they don't want to see, but oh, it's a joke. So I they don't know which each time, when it's a joke or not, but the idea is that I am bringing them in and I'm turning it more and more crazy as I go. And that was. We performed for a while with the happy sideshow with the guy we called him sideshow josh.
Speaker 1:He was born very with short legs, with no knees and arms, with just a couple of fingers, not from thalidomide or not from camellia, like this. I don't know what it was, but I was thinking at that time of the difference of how I was presenting myself or the journey for the audience, of who I was versus for him. Because for him we had him. Because he don't have any knees, he can't when he sits down or lies down. He can't sort of stand up because his legs are so short. He has this strange technique of sitting on the ground. He has this strange technique of sitting on the ground and when he leans forward like this, at some point his legs are so short and stiff that he just tips up to standing. And I was like we want to.
Speaker 1:And then he was a smoker and when he smokes he takes the cigarette out and he puts it in his mouth and then he holds with these hands, with only a couple of fingers, this like a digit on this one, and he holds it in some funny way and lights it then. So the act that we had him do, in a sense, was he comes out on stage and in this moment he is a freak completely and we've presented him as a unique and born like no other and all that, and then he comes out. But then the act that we do with him is him doing something very strange, no, very normal. He goes in and then he sits down and then he gets the cigarette out, he puts it in and then he stands up in this strange way and then he lights a cigarette. So in a sense his journey is like from going freak, other strange, to doing something normal in in the end.
Speaker 1:But mine is I come out and I look like normal and I can do a few things with my joints and through my act I stand out. Then at the end as I'm going oh, this guy is actually a freak or he's crazy at the end of it. So it's almost like these two different sort of journeys and that struck me as interesting. So of course the freak could also come out and lie on a bed of nails or something, but almost because they are who they are, there's nothing that they can do. That can make you more freaky, more other, more confronting. Then that he takes his shirt off and he's just standing there in his pants and you go like, because there's something there and I don't know exactly what it is and I know that I can't remember which book it is, but it's at the time in the 80s.
Speaker 1:It also comes out in, I think, maybe the last sideshow or something the book that talks about Ward Hall and he works with a short person who had been eating fire with him for a very long time and sometime in the 80s it became illegal to exhibit deformity in America. So this guy and the kind of regulation that started to cover it. You probably already know this, but that regulation was the kind of regulation that would prohibit sexual acts on display. That would prohibit sexual acts on display. That it's I don't know what that's called exactly, but it's acts of moral turpitude or something like this. That and and I was thinking that- there is something.
Speaker 1:When he then takes his shirt off in our act that Matt Fraser also performed with us, and when Matt Fraser take his shirt off and he did some karate things and smashed bricks with his head, it was crazy. But when he comes out and he takes off his shirt and you just see him who at the first look he's a very good looking man. And then he takes that off and you look at it and he's sort of going like there's something scary now and I can I could almost understand why the pornography laws was used against this, because we feel like we're watching something that we shouldn't watch or like it's this is, it's got a graphic nature to it or so um yeah, now I don't remember anymore where that question started, but I find that sort of fascinating, the two sort of journeys and this was also something that I spoke with Matt Fraser about because he would, when he did his show Seal Boy, seal Boy Freak, he was doing a lot.
Speaker 1:He was also doing normal things, not doing freaky things. He didn't swallow a sword, didn't put a pin in his flesh or any of those things because he don't need to. He would play the drums and he would shave because this was the act. This was what CeeLo did and, of course, when I got the guy to stand up to smoke the cigarette, it was, of course, inspired by this tradition of having the freak do something normal.
Speaker 2:And it is also like there's nothing he can do.
Speaker 1:That would be more crazy than existence. It's interesting listening back to these episodes. It's uh funny to be on the end where I am the one that's being asked the questions. I guess that happens a little bit when, when jay is asking me things, but then he's asking them stuff that he is inspired by, things that we've already talked about. So it's interesting to hear me try to figure stuff out as I go. And also, it has been pointed out to me that last episode I forgot to do my normal sign-off. That might be the only time in 130 episodes or so that we've recorded where that has happened, but if you were the ones who listened to that and missed out, then please subscribe to make sure to not miss out on me saying it for every episode from here on in. So until then, until you've subscribed, take care of yourself and those you love, and I hope to see you along the way.