Friday
Aug052016
Have clowns ever not been evil in movies?
Friday, August 5, 2016 at 2:29PM That's my question to you today, dear readers.
Jason asked us to choose our favorite drunken clown couple in Shortcuts early in the week (have you voted yet?) to celebrate International Clown Week. I thought to do a follow up post but every time only horror films came to mind and it's just not the right time for that. Are there any non-scary clowns in the movies? Besides Anne Archer in Short Cuts, that is. Even Jimmy Stewart, who was largely a warm screen presence onscreen outside of Vertigo, was of mysterious and possibly murderous history when he played one in the much-maligned Best Picture winner The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), never taking his makeup off.
Reader Comments (11)
There's the other kind of clown, the sad clown, as in Fellini's movies, like Gelsomina.
Well, there's a Filipino film titled Payaso (1986)...
Does Shakes the Clown count?
there's that one time James Bond dressed up as a clown to sneak into a circus and disarm a bomb in Octopussy
Snowball the Clown from Big Top Pee Wee!
cal & jeremy -- ooh good calls.
james -- isn't he one of the other types "the sad clown"
sawyer -- i dont even remember him and i love pee wee movies
Bill Murray at the beginning of Quick Change?
Doris Day, Esther Williams and Judy Garland all donned clown makeup - and retained their sunny likability while doing it (in "Billy Rose's Jumbo", "Easy to Love" and "The Pirate").
Melissa McCarthy was a sad Belgarian clown. Or at least reminded us of one.
He was only in a few scenes, with another clown that I can't remember the name. I remember they helped load the truck with supplies from the general store, along with Dog Boy Benicio del Toro!
Patricia Clarkson in David Gordon Green's "All the Real Girls." Sad clown, underlined heavily, but not creepy. (Also, still love that movie. It feels sort of lost to time, but it was my gateway to several interesting careers, and bands.)