There is an expectations about clowns. Juggling, silly, fall down, play with balloons, sad, happy, don't talk, talk in a squeaky voice, are only men, are fat, are skinny, etc. You can name a bunch, the clown is an iconic character. People know a lot about clowns without thinking about it.
People expect juggling of clowns. You don't have to but if enough people mention it or request it. My thought, give it to them. You don't have to be a great juggler to juggle.
I started clowning with the skill of juggling. I get as much applause and laughter from my scarf juggling as my fancy club juggling.
The downside of scarf juggling...can't do it outdoors. Oh well.
Scarves are tactile. Children like the feel of them. Juggling scarves come in neon colors. I have have two boys help me, in this routine. I take a green, I give one boy an orange scarf, then pull out the next boys favorite color...PINK! It's fun and gets a good laugh, if you choose the right child. Usually a 6 year old boy.
The kids throw a scarf in the air, catch it and pose. I show them, then make a big deal about how to pose, correcting them again and again. We do the same gag with the colors for two scarves (I take green, one orange and their favorite...pink!). I have the boys throw them up, catch them, spin, dance like ballerinas and pose. They are now jugglers with two. I call them jugglers, so they are to the audience.
When I get to three. I say, "I'll show you how easy it is". Then I throw up scarves and just try to keep them in the air, one at a time. The kids laugh, it's super clowny and it's certainly juggling. You can do juggling patterns but the wider, the more you have to run, the better and funnier.
I get behind the children with their scarves, they throw theirs up with mine and we try to keep them in the air. I have extras in my pockets, that I can throw up. It's very visual and looks like the children are in a washing machine.
Ta da a juggling routine. And you can honestly say you have juggling in your show.
Now that you're an expert with scarf juggling here are other things to play with. If you throw a scarf straight up, you can blow it up in the air. You could do a scarf juggling routine to music with every pink one floating up, ending with it landing on your face like a bride's vail.
You can trail a scarf on the ground like a snake, then when it flies up, it scares you. If you hold the scarf 2/3 from the top you can make it look around at you and the crowd.
You could end the scarf routine by catching the scarves in a change bag. reach in and find them all tied together when you reach into the bag. Or you catch 3 in the change bag after juggling, reach in and pull out scarf after scarf after scarf, they are very light so you could probably easily pull out 15.
I used to do a recycling routine in my show with those awful plastic shopping bags from my house. Plastic grocery bags float the same as scarves. I tried to keep as many as I could in the air, but I couldn't. Just like the planet I couldn't handle too much garbage. Easy message for children. And I was able to use the thousand grocery bags from my cupboard at home.
Need ideas? Ask in comments below.
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