New Acts

[Peter Voice]

I have a friend with enormous talent and a fabulous idea, who has recently begun to consider taking his/her work to the streets (after years of not understanding the artform). I have tried everything to encourage him/her to keep the job in the bar and stick to the occassional $30 Comedy Club bits, but to no avail.
We don't need any more competition.
Please help me keep this maniac off the streets. Explain to this person why they should not embark on this road to aprochryphal fortune.
Why would you go street-performing in the first place anyway? What was your first day like?

[Rich Potter]

My first day out?

I had a partner that day. Separately, we woulda been too scared to try it out. We went to a park during a Tuesday lunchtime where people were sitting out in the sun. Nobody wanted to move up to stand around us, as they were already comfortable. After a few minutes of unsuccessful attempts to get these people to make themselves less comfortable for our benefit, Tom & I started.

We did our juggling tricks. I babbled a lot. We hadn't really worked out routines; relying heavily on saying whatever came to mind. (A technique I use to this day) I was too nervous to notice whether anyone was laughing, or if we were actually funny. Now, I wish I had the guts to suck that bad again.

Didn't have a hat line. I remember having an old military officer hat, which I placed on the ground and kicked it so it slid along the sidewalk at the people in the grass. Made 4 bucks and change of pity money. We split the hat 50-50. I think I gave him the extra penny.

We would've DIED for a $30 comedy club gig. That woulda been the big time.

--Rich

I also remember setting a rag on fire to burn off the extra fuel...

[This message has been edited by Rich Potter (edited 08-02-2001).]

[Peter]

Peter Voice says "We don't need any more competition.
Please help me keep this maniac off the streets. Explain to this person why they should not embark on this road to aprochryphal fortune."

Yes we do need ALL the competition there can be! Why? Because it makes us constantly improve ourselves to be better than the newcomers.

My first day I was filled with fear of failing combined with the feeling of pure exileration due to following my dream of being my own boss and telling the rest of the "corporate world" to kiss my whatever part they wanted to." Your friend will be entering the world of being a busker and if they are good they will make it very big. If they are not good they go back to being a member of our audience.

Busking is the only way for me, I just wish I had the courage to do this before I was 55 years old.

Peter

[Orange]

my first day was... ouch. who would have thought that anyone could do so badly on canada day? i knew nothing about the toronto performing scene, and so i decided to go out to the eaton's center (a big mall), the only place i had seen performers before. but canada day = all stores closed. bad idea. i did find a few people, though. but here's a word of advice: don't expect generosity from a group of people standing in line for a free movie. that was also how i learned that a captive audience is not a good thing. your audience has to want to be there, or they will give you nothing. i made about... 50 cents that show. and although it was very discouraging for a first show, i decided to take one of the audience members' advice, and head down to an area called the beaches. i did a whole lot better down there, although i think i did only 2 more shows, and came home with maybe $40, it was still enough to give me the confidence to keep going, and i'm sure as hell glad i did.

[Butterfly Man]

this is an excerpt from a bio. I'd written a long time ago ...

As I was walking away, I felt some sweat on the back of my neck and wiped it off. It was then that I noticed there was blood all over my hand. I looked over my shoulder and the entire back of my shirt was soaked in blood. Apparently, the sweat had mixed with the small amount of blood coming from the tattoo and spread across my back. I hustled to my car and drove back to Slidell. I cleaned up and changed into my makeshift jester costume grabbed my backpack of props and went down to the square. It was almost two in the afternoon and there were several shows already in full swing.

I recognized one of the acts immediately, I had seen them in on TV during the Montreal Olympics, it was Bounce & Cyrus of the Locomotion Circus. They were far and away the best juggling act around in those days and perhaps the best juggling team act ever. Bounce was short, clownesque and bald, Cyrus, tall, rugged and tough. Both were lean and toned with glistening musculature. I’m not gay but damn if I couldn't help but stare at their washboard stomachs. They warmed up on gymnastic mats with handstands and body balances while setting out all their intricate juggling paraphernalia, rolling globes zig zag unicycles and the like. Their preshow was better than anything I ever did as a performer for the next twenty odd years.

How naive I must have been back then as I didn't even hesitate to set my stuff up right alongside of them. I waited until they finished though and then started juggling five bachi balls in the air ... talking about anything that came to my mind, the books I was reading, growing up with my family, absolutely total incoherent ramblings. My strength was as a musical juggler but these were the days before Walkmans and Peavey amps. All I had to offer in the way of entertainment was a minimum of juggling skill and a bloody head (and whatever was inside of it).

When I caught the balls, however, I had a circle of people around me. I didn't choke either, I loved the attention. I threw stuff at them, they threw it back, I yelled at them, they yelled at me. I went through all the stuff I had with me: a devilstick I made myself, some fire torches, also homemade, a borrowed diabolo, and a beat up unicycle, given to me by Carter. That was my act, nothing but seat of the pants juggling, no form, no structure but in retrospect, I guess I did have some sort of style, though hardly what you'd call cohesive. I had never had any theatrical training so I didn't know what NOT to do, I roughed up kids, fell all over people on the unicycle, whatever. Believe me when I say, it was not a common thing to do at the time.

Well,, I passed the hat (a can really) ... my first hat line was “the sound of a jingle is as sweet as a bell but doesn't paper rustle swell” ... pretty bad but it worked. I stood there at the end with the can in my hands as coins, rolled up bills, Mardi Gras beads and fake doubloons flew through the air towards me. I remember looking up as they sailed through the air glistening with the sun's reflection. For an instant it was the most beautiful sight imaginable, incomparable to anything that had ever happened to me and then THWACK a coin hit me in the eye, I never did that again!

I think I did 5 or 6 shows that day. During my last one, as the crowds were getting thin, I saw a little bald head in the back of my crowd. I recognized it immediately. It was Bounce. As I was packing up and dumping the last hat into my backpack, he came up to me and said “why don't you come over to the truck, I've got some fruit juice, you look like you could use it”. I followed him over to this huge Econoline van where he gave me all kinds of vitamins and juice and a towel to wipe off the sweat, soot and grime that was all over me. He was so kind and genuine, a real gentleman. All the while Cyrus was stacking mats and putting away their unicycles and stuff. While Bounce was giving me pointers on my act I was in awe of him and all their professional looking equipment ... then Cyrus walked up to the back of the van and stood there looking down at me. I looked up, in admiration, my eyes all aglow with anticipation that he was going to welcome me into their world as well. Instead he said flatly “you wanna buy a t-shirt?". Sigh.

I made it back to Slidell that evening and dumped my take on the kitchen table, I figured I must've made at least 50 dollars. But at the end with Sid's mom and dad helping count, (not including all the beads and fake coins) I had made almost two hundred dollars! My first day as a street juggler! I was overwhelmed and inspired. I planned on going out the next day and working even harder. The coolest thing that I got in my hat that day was a Polaroid picture of myself someone had taken in the middle of one of the shows. I still have that picture to this day, pasted safely in my scrapbook.

[danielc]

Well, my first sort of street performing experience was in 1999 at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival. I had made the effort to get booked onto the outdoor pass the hat stage, and well, we got a prime time slot on opening night. This was going to be big. It was me and a buddy named Sky who had worked a duo act that year, and well, we had a 30 minute show that was our entry into the world of performing. It had some good moments. Some boring moments. Some fun moments. And a neat finale.

So, it rains, RIGHT BEFORE we pass torches on two 6 foot ladders, making the torches mighty slippery. We finish the show, and pass the hat. Our first hat ever. Wow.

Excitedly, we run to my car to count the hat. Beaming with anticipation, we take out the money and count it. 156.35.

Not bad! And thus, the madness began. And no one knows when it'll stop.

[BFlat]

Well, my first day out was in 1997, after playing 3-4 years earlier in the subway. Playing on the streets and in the subway is not the same thing; people who take the subway are too much in a hurry.

Anyway, so on that day in 1997, well I was totally unexperienced, I didn't know what the good spots were, and what's the best time to play, etc. So there is not need to say that I didn't do very good on my first time. And it took some time before I began to get experienced and to do better.

I must say that Montreal local street performers aren't exactly the friendliest. They really gave me a hard time. They tried to intimidate me with any below the belt pranks you could think of. They tried to discourage me, to scare me, they insulted me... you name it.

But I don't really blame them for this, cause I understand. Every year, we see dozens of performers 'wannabe' who think that street performing is easy, and wanna try it. Usually, these wannabe don't last more than a couple weeks, some last just a few days and they quit after finding-out that it's not as easy as it looks.

The truth is, not everyone is cut-out to be a street performer. So for the regular local performers, these 'wannabe' represent some useless competition. And so they try to discourage the new ones and get rid of them.

But Peter, I wanna ask; Why do you absolutely feel that you gotta discourage that friend of yours to get into street performing? You think he's not cut-out for that? Well maybe so... you be the judge on that, but you know, some people need to smash into a bricked wall at 100 mph in order to understand. So why don't you let your friend see for himself. If he's meant to smash in that bricked wall, he gonna. If not well, there's always that possibility. You never know, maybe he's gonna surprise you. Maybe that he's meant to do that.

Anyway, that's just what I think. But I'm still curious why you wanna talk him out of it.

[martin ewen]

I have an irony deficency, Is there a cure?

[Peter Voice]

Come on guy's, you're encouraging my friend with these wildy apochryphal stories of happiness and success. You are telling us what happened after you took the leap. I want to know WHY you took the leap.

[martin ewen]

My first performances as a clown were a hijack of a primary school classroom and a white faced water pistoled bank robbery.
My probation officer gave me permission to go to clown school.
The first exercise in interaction we had was you had to ask people the time.
You had to experiment with them telling you the time or not telling you the time.
Off we went.
Next, we had to go into town and ask people 3 questions. (4 counting the lead in which was ' excuse me can I ask you 3 questions'.)

1:Are you or have you ever been a member of a public library.
2: Did you find it a traumatic experience being weaned?
3: What do you expect from the typical NZ [Insert gender]

12 people with red noses walking round auckland asking stupid questions.
Some interesting answers though.

For me it wasn't really a leap, the rest of society just seemed to move away suddenly.

[This message has been edited by martin ewen (edited 08-06-2001).]

[Rich Potter]

Wow -- you guys had really good first days!

Did I say 4 bucks? I mean we made 400 bucks!

I got the decimal in the wrong place.

--Rich
(I'm glad I could set the record straight)