Fears of a Clown

In anyone's life, change is a necessary, if often unwelcome, constant. Most people seem to prefer stability and predictability and look for the unexpected only to add variety to their daily routines. For others, change is something to be embraced, an indication of the nature of living and, perhaps, a challenge to face and overcome. Far less often, change is something that is initiated from within.

La Putain Avec Les Fleurs (The Whore With the Flowers) is a story about just such a change, and it's being brought to you by Austin's newest theatre company, RoHo Productions. "In a nutshell," says Kate Arpke, RoHo's director of public relations and marketing, "it's a dark comedy about a 1920s French circus troupe. Baptiste is a very famous French clown who has been performing his entire life in the circus, but he's no longer happy simply with satisfying an audience. He feels he's essentially become a whore, so he begins to suffer this existential crisis, if you will, and he goes out to find his purpose and meaning in life. As you might expect, it's a very physical show, with lots of dance and movement throughout. And it's got a big French bear."

The play is loosely based on Henry Miller's novella The Smile at the Foot of the Ladder, as well as on Herman Hesse's Siddhartha. Says Rocky Hopson, the writer and director of La Putain, "A friend of mine gave me Miller's book and said, 'Read this. I think it would make a good play.' So I read it and it reminded me of Siddhartha, so I reread that and started thinking about this French clown and his search for the spirit. He keeps having these weird visions while he's doing his show because his mind keeps wandering. Still, people love him more and more, even though he's not really with them. I started thinking about telling it theatrically, a vaudeville, cabaret kind of thing. It's hard to categorize it because I'm using this old type of melodrama style. It's very upbeat, and there's lots of music, but it's not a musical in the way that a song progresses the story. The songs comment on the plot but don't advance it."

First produced at the Orlando Fringe Festival in 2002, the show won numerous awards, including Best Production. Arpke and Hopson, along with Rob Houle, who composed the score and the libretto, all hail from the Orlando area. "We had a huge group of friends in Orlando," says Arpke. "We were involved in all kinds of performance, guerrilla theatre, improvisational comedy, bands. Then in groups, all of our friends either moved to L.A. or New York. But we had no interest living in L.A. or New York. There's performance work in Orlando, but almost everything revolves around Disney World. We didn't want to work at Disney World. We wanted to work in a place with an active performance community, and Austin is it. We love Austin, and we're so happy to be here."

Sometimes, change can be a good thing. So spare some of your loose change and check out these clowns. It may not be Disney World, but it's sure to be a circus.

For a review of La Putain Avec Les Fleurs, see Arts Listings.