The history of clowns and children’s party entertainers

There was the lover, the cuckold, the drunk etc. The actors would travel around and play in town squares. They always played the same character and the play was largely improvised.

Apparently, the Punch and Judy puppets are derivations of characters from Commedia and the clown comes from the drunk character. The clown's red nose is the red nose of the drunk and the clown's anarchistic, wild tendencies are just what any drunk gets up to on a Saturday night.

I guess the clown has been cleaned up a lot since then but still the clown gets away with a lot more than most people can and the vestiges of the drunk, with the clothes that are too big and misshapen, mismatched socks and red nose still remain.

The childrens clown for kids parties has definitely been cleaned up. Most kids party entertainers now wear pristine costumes in neon colours rather than the tattered rags that the drunk would have worn.

I do birthday parties for kids and I got into this from my interest in the clown. I now do clown parties, princess parties, pirate parties and disco parties. All the characters are different and probably have their roots in the clown. I have several other children entertainers who work with me and we all more or less, stick to the same structure for the parties. You can find out more about us at www.sillysally.ie.

At children's birthday parties, whether it is a princess birthday party, a clown party, a pirate party or a disco party, the childrens entertainer endeavours to keep up the democratic ideal of the clown by entertaining all equally.

You can find out more about our parties at www.sillysally.ie or by contacting Silly Sally (Bríd) at 087 4117843.