It is a Flop

My class and our instructor, Carlo Jacucci, on the final day of a 10-day clown intensive at École Philippe Gaulier

Before my 10-day clown intensive in Étampes, I did little research other than reading a 2022 New York Times article, “The Dumbledore of Clowning.” The subtitle read: "The French master teacher Philippe Gaulier has worked with stars. But at 78, are his methods, which include insults, outdated?" 

On a personal level, I was terrified. As an educator, I was skeptical. At Lac du Bois, we train counselors to encourage villagers through positive reinforcement. What is the role of negative feedback- even insults- in good teaching?
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On the first day, the morning session put me at ease. Our instructor, acrobat Juri Kussmaul, describes his own teaching as follows: “Through a playful, safe and process oriented approach we’ll discover freedom while broadening our physical and mental limitations, turning anxiety into excitement.” This was the kind of teaching I was used to- gently supporting students to speak French or perform improv for the first time. ​

Some partner acrobatics during our morning movement class

I was assigned the costume of a Carmelite nun

On the last day, we switched costumes and I impersonated Sophie's garden gnome

Then it was time to clown. Our teacher, Carlo Jacucci, told us to go onstage one by one. Wearing a mask and doing a funny voice, we would attempt to make the audience laugh. If we failed, he would bang a drum and send us offstage. 

I was scared in an ice-in-your-veins kind of way. I watched as my classmates did their best. More often than not, Carlo banged the drum. 

“It is a flop” 
“Who told you to do that?”
“Who wrote this play?”
“Is it a joke? Then why no one is laughing?” 
"Look at the clock. This is the worst moment of the day."

Sometimes he would turn to the audience to confirm his assessment. 

“Raise your hand if you are bored.”

“In Berlin, after Christmas, they feed the dry Christmas trees to the elephants in the zoo. Claire- would you rather eat a dry Christmas tree or spend another five minutes watching these two?” 

I managed to delay my torture until the following day. That evening, I made fast friends with my fellow victims- comedians, actors, and brave laypeople from the UK, Ireland, Australia, and the US. Some of us agreed that we would never teach this way. What was the use of criticizing students without showing them how to succeed? One classmate, Sophie, made an interesting point. “It’s kind of nice to be told when something isn’t working. I feel like people rarely tell you that.”

The next day, I couldn’t hide any longer. I put on a mask and before I had even made my official entrance, I had made the audience laugh. The thrill of success hit me like a lighting bolt. I was hooked. I got a second laugh. Then it was time to enter for real. Once onstage, it was a flop, a catastrophe. I was drummed off. I sat down somehow feeling that it had gone well. 

For the remaining nine days, I experienced frustratingly nonlinear growth. Sometimes, especially when I was caught up in a game or the thrill of the moment, I was funny. Often, I was not. I was in my head. I was no good at voices. Flop, flop, flop. 

I watched my classmates fail repeatedly. Carlo mixed in suggestions with his insults. Look at the audience. Be an optimist- believe that this is the funniest thing anyone has ever done! Don’t play a character. Be specific. Do something special. Have many stupid ideas. Some of my classmates went from performing in dead silence to provoking uproarious laughter. One or two came in funny and left funnier. Most of us were funny sometimes. 

I left hungry for more. I felt a sense of community in this weird world where we wore red noses and learned how to do handstands on each other’s knees and they sold us soup for three euros for lunch. It reminded me of the first time I went to Lac du Bois as a teenager- both the weirdness and the intense sense of belonging. 

As for teaching with insults, the intensive reminded me not to make absolute statements (“insulting your students is poor teaching”) because some odd situation will come along and introduce a perplexing counterexample.

In many ways, Carlo was modeling Gaulier’s concept of complicity. The twinkle in his eyes let us know that he was on our side. The insults were to make us laugh, to make us better. We were playing a game. It’s not so different from CLV and our grand simulation, after all. “This is France” "Your name is Clementine now" wink wink, nudge nudge. 

I won't return to Lac du Bois and tell new monos that their lesson plans are a catastrophe or tell villagers that listening to them speak French is the worst moment of my day, but I’m maybe a little more comfortable with failure and a lot more excited about clowning. Overall… it was a flop, but in a good way. 

It's unclear why I am smiling in this picture, as I was failing miserably at the time it was taken