HALLOWEEN GRAB BAG! ... Roller Skating Rolls Back On ... Ringling Rolls Back Off ... Fantastic Circus Acts, From AI? ... Astaire Rogers Last Movie Tops Them All.

 It was America’s Number 1 participation sport in the fifties, remember the fifties?  Your grandparents held hands roiling round the rink. Through the Grand March. and the Hokey Pokey.  And then came Roller Blades in the 199os to steal the show and render the imagery of eight wheels obsolete.  To hell with those superior quad skates, inverted over the years to give roller pros posture and control. And the sport suffered a slow death. It’s been a dreary twenty fie years marked by vanishing rink competitions and the demise of rinks. . 

See what those hip teenagers are rolling on?  Can you imagine that on in-lines" Well, oh well!, and I knew this was bond to happen A new generation have rediscovered the superiority of wheels.Of how much more enjoyable they are.  Roller  rinks are making some kind of a comeback, far more quads circling the floors than in-lines.  Be proud, all ye quadsters, old and young.  The floors are covered with wax and aglow, massive crowds yet to appear in photo searches.  

A full fledged roll back?  I don’t see big crowds.Yet. Unless the sport can reinstate its heyday with a new storm of roller rinks and competitive skating.  Meet me at he pizza and popcorn machines! ALL SKATE, AMERICA!

Roller to Ringling.  It’s website is mum on any kind of a new edition being theorized, the world scouted for more new acts .New Ringling gives its last show in December, in Columbus, Ohio..  The new Pittsburgh?  Columbus, the last gasp of a circus that no longer had dared to speak it’s name? 

Who knows what boss Kenneth Feld may have up his leave.— if he has a leave.  Seems to me he either bows out humbly, or finds his inner circus and daringly throws up the gritty guts of Barnum, the artful wonders of the Ringling brothers, the earthy atmosphere of smelly animals and rowdy clowns .This is NOT an ice show.  This is NOT a monster jam!  

A puppet show? Bailey the robot was said to have been stealing the show. And what might that tell us?

Video amazements flitting circus skills to miraculous new heights.. Have you ever seen an elephant riding a horse? A horse dancing with a cow? Is this AI showing off? There’s a woman who juggles an array of cups and saucers, so many in perfect motion as to make the old Deter Tasso’s low wire routines look like  kid stuff in a beginners class.  Mixing the real with the digital illusion  may render a standard circus less compelling?  I still believe that the public is  inherently drawn to the reality of circus art. Raw and real. 

 A movie musical  shamefully ill-reviewed:The last Fred Astaire-Rogers flick,  this one produced by the kings of motive musicals,  MGM. Titled The Barcleys of Broadway, it puts our two dancing angels in serious acting territory. I watch their RKO films, only for the great songs and dances — not  for the farcically inane plotting and the stock characters mugging away.

Here, in Barcleys, I cared what happened to Fred and Ginger. She wants to become a serious actor and he fears the worst.  In the end, tears in my eyes.  Astaire shows remarkable depth as an actor — keep in mind that  he won kudos for a straight role  he took on in the film On the Beach.

Of what? Back to the Ringling thing, the winter quarters --- what’s left of them. At the mid-air moment, it, feels vacant, the silence a prelude to what? Let’s take this  thread further, after all the trick and treating.  Next due, I walk the grounds and wonder what might next might come to be, if there is to be a next. What the Feld of Felds may try bringing off — if he is up to yet another chapter. 

All Skate! Alllll circus!     

Dolly Jacobs, Evicted from the Circus Arts Conservatory She-Co Founded, Tells Her Side of the Story

D

 Dolly Jacobs and her dad, Lou Jacobs

Via Covington Connected

I am publishing here a part of the article.

By Dolly Jacobs, Guest columnist USA Today Network via Reuters Connect Updated October 18, 2026 9:24 AM

"Circus Arts Conservatory was my life. Then I was forced out 

For nearly 30 years, the Circus Arts Conservatory (CAC) has been part of my life.

Pedro Reis and I founded what began as Circus Sarasota with a shared goal: to elevate the circus arts and present them at the highest level.

Artists, volunteers, donors and friends helped turn that vision into an organization rooted in performance, education and Sarasota's circus heritage.

I remain enormously proud of what we built.

That is why I want to clarify what happened when my relationship with CAC ended.

I didn't want to leave

I did not resign.

CAC terminated my employment and removed me from its board.

My departure was unexpected, and it was not my choice.

I supported Jennifer Mitchell's appointment as CEO in 2024.

After that transition, I continued serving as vice president and a board member.

Pedro's stepping down almost two years ago did not end or alter my separate roles at CAC.

His decision and my subsequent termination were distinct events, and they should not be understood as a shared decision to leave.

But on or about June 25, 2026, I was informed that my employment was terminated, and that my board service would be "involuntarily terminated."

I was not provided with a specific factual explanation identifying any particular incident or personal misconduct that caused CAC to terminate my employment and remove me from the board."

END 

To read the entire story: 

 https://www.coralspringsflnews.com/news/article317662144.html 

One arm plunges were not her thing:  This from AI: "While Jacobs was also hailed as "Queen of the Air" for her immense strength and grace, her defining, unprecedented signature trick was a full layout flyaway somersault from swinging Roman rings to a vertical aerial rope without a safety net" Although I can't recall her acts that well this strikes me as a terrific payoff.

AI on ringling crowd size

Question:  Is the new Ringling struggling to draw large crowds? 

AI Overview

Yes, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus has faced significant, ongoing challenges in drawing the massive arena crowds it once enjoyed. While its parent company, Feld Entertainment, does not publicly release specific ticket data, the circus has struggled with a well-documented decline in attendance across two major eras 

Ringling relaunched its tour with a completely reimagined format that features zero animals, zero traditional clowns, and an immersive, human-centric focus on acrobatics, BMX riders, and technology. Despite initial hype, crowd drawing remains a mixed bag: [1, 2]

Inconsistent Attendance: Reports from modern tour stops indicate highly inconsistent crowds. While Saturday night shows in major cities sometimes draw larger crowds, evening and weekday performances in various markets have heavily struggled to get people through the doors. [1]
Nostalgia Backlash: A segment of the population has been vocal on platforms like Facebook and Reddit, expressing disappointment that the production feels more like "Cirque du Soleil for kids" or a dance concert rather than the traditional three-ring circus they grew up with. This division has made it difficult to secure steady, universal appeal. [1, 2]

For a human source (HS) of surprising candor, see Don Covington's comments on the post below.

Ringling's Bello Bounced Off Program in San Diego to Make Way For Ninja Kidz

** update, 8.29.26 

Down the Covington chute came an item headlined, "Ringling Replaces Bello with Ninja Kidz in San Diego." 

And I eventually ran with it, writing, "News that the totally unpredictable New Ringling, which seems to be re-inventing itself daily, is switching Bello off  the program at the old San Diego Sports Arena, to bring on the Ninja Kidz." Show slated to perform Sept. 11-13. 

Whew! And was that a run on?  And did I get that right?  Not exactly.

**Bello was a recent new arrival for Make-A-Ringling, and according to a message today from Don Covington, he was "hired by Feld to attempt to salvage the remainder of the season."  But his contract did not include California dates. The fearless Ninja Kidz with  nearly 25 million You Tube subscribers, are making this their only appearance with the Greatest (ever changing) Show on Earth.

Ninja, a Japanese word, means stealth, espionage and irregular warfare. And this, now at the circus that dare not speak its name.  

And I feel worn out by all the deck chair changing on the Ringing Titanic.

Sorry, but this one beats them all.

I might ad more to this later. I need to lay down and try regaining my sanity.

"First and only appearance." How apt.

20 Years Later: Welcome to Showbiz David

Telling it like it is from Broadway to the Big Tops!

Note: Today marks the 20th anniversary of this blog, this from 2021: And what am I still doing here?  So much of what was here then, is gone now.  So much of the wrong history has passed by while I watched.  The only thing you can do is watch.  And maybe dream or wonder.  Not the best time for guarded optimism as the tentacles of Corona continue to depress an already decimated big top scene.  Never was the future for circuses more up in the air.  My biggest hope: That Kenneth Feld will re-start the parade with the sort or spectacle and international talent that only he can afford. And in so doing, help the American circus in its gravest hours of need.

At first, I went out under then name "Stage and Sawdust." Slowly, viewership continued to grow, and then, over the last few years, dwindle as big tops dwindled. Lately, I have been feted with a robust resurgence of traffic. From where?  I may be the most anonymously visited big top blog out there.  This first post sounds rather pretentious (maybe they all do), and I don't even relish printing it, but it's where I started. And here, now, is where we are, wherever that is. So here it is: 

My first posting as Showbiz David, August 24, 2006

From your independent showbiz critic David Lewis Hammarstrom (aka: David H. Lewis), my occasional reports, reminiscences, reviews (and rantings -- maybe) on the ever-changing world of the performing arts. Hey, this might be fun!

You want puff? Sorry, I don't do puff. Want rigged feel-good reviews from press flaks on the take parading as critics? Sorry, you're on the wrong lot. In my book, a hit is a hit and a turkey is a turkey. How can this be? Well, I also pay for my own tickets.

I've been dishing out opinions (and being dissed in return) since the age of 14 when I first got published nationally in The White Tops. From there up a many spangled trail I have traveled, landing articles in The Christian Science Monitor, Australia's The Outdoor Showman, American Skating World, and peaking in the pages of Variety --- when Variety was Variety, edited out of New York.

Some of you may be familiar with my books: Behind the Big Top ... Circus Rings Around Russia ... Big Top Boss: John Ringling North and the Circus ... Roller Skating for Gold ... Broadway Musicals: A Hundred Year History ... Fower Drum Songs: The Story of Two Musicals... And I have a new one in the works on the modern-day American circus scene -- [Fall of the Big Top: The Vanishing American Circus]. More about this in the days to come.

So, how about we meet up sometime soon on the midway? This new website I'm fronting has just arrived on the blogspot lot. They're yet to raise the tents -- still unloading the horses and the red wagons down at the railroad yards by the old ice house. Still waiting for the police to escort them through a band of protestors, some self-chained to the elephant car, shouting, "Reparations for Jumbo!"
You'll bear with me, I trust, as I navigate my way through cyberworld to bring you the essential me in this new and very happening format.

So standby for the Big Show! 

8.24.06

SUNDAY MORNING NOW: Ringilng Is Staging Fake Birthday Party --- How Desperate Are the Felds for Attention?

Did you know that Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey is 150 years old?

I did not and I still do not. Pardon my resistance to groundless claims, but in order for it to be 150, it would have to have started out in the year of our lord, 1876.

In fact, the show’s first “circus” as opposed to anything that occurred in Baraboo before 1884, gave it’s first performance in 1884.  Some nebulous sources (or AI) give them two more years, starting in 1882, when the brothers took out a winter hall show, performed on stages. This was not a circus then, all of which does not ad up to 150 years. The figure is 142.  And this includes 10 or more years off the road in re-creation..

So they opened in 1876 (if you have more accurate figures, please feel free to out my grammar school calculations.)

Why the bogus boast? I’m wondering if Kenneth Feld is desperate to reboot his monumental misfire?  Any new angle that might tweak a few more suckers up to the ticket counters. The video is a dazzler, one of their better misinformation campaigns. Such a far cry from their Monster Jam vulgarity.  In fact, those cunningly take-only-credit  Felds  have shown over the years a crass disregard  for circus history, when to rewrite it is to flatter themselves.  You may recall Irving Feld claiming to have saved  “saved” the circus following its big top crash in Pittsburgh, 1956 by moving the show indoors thereafter. Not so, it was John Ringling North and Art Concello who made the controversial move, and who hired a number of promoters to handle select dates, among them, the Feld Brothers.

BIG PICTURE QUESTION: Is crowd size this year up or down over last year?

AI: Crowd sizes and audience turnout for the reimagined Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey tour are mixed to down, with reports indicating lower-than-hoped audience numbers in several stops despite producer claims of stable overall interest. [1, 2]  

Lower Turnout: Community discussions and reviews point to lighter crowds and underwhelming attendance at various arena stops.

History may one day write that the Felds would years later revamp the property down to an acrobatic show minus clowns and animals and ringmaster, and tossed out the  word “circus,’  probably one of the most technically honest things they ever did.  For after all, this emasculated enterprise is not a circus.

Today, I now and then try catching up on New Ringling travails, checking on Yelp and Reddit,combing the internet for clues of actual crowd sizes.  In this regard, we may give AI prime credit for not polishing  the facts like a good card-carrying circus fan. Here is what AI is telling me:

Seating capacity on  average-size indoor arenas?  Ranges from 14,000 to 20,000 seats.

Average Crowd Sizes? Actual attendance generally ranges from 2,000 to 5,000 people per performance,

This year, the show is staying on the West Coast through September:San Diego: Playing at the Pechanga Arena from September 11 to September 13, 2026.Sacramento: Playing at the Golden 1 Center from September 17 to September 20, 2026. They snubbed both LA. and S.F.


From Yelp critics:

Heather G.
San Francisco, CA
2
Jul 25, 2026.

Way to expensive, very disappointed, HIGHLY, my 4 year grandson, kept asking when we could leave he was boarded. THIS IS NOT A CIRCUS, it is a child's first "rave. Pathetic.  Go to Zoo instead       

BEST MIXED REVIEW

A. H.
Clovis, CA
Jul 3, 2026

"The acrobatic displays are some of the best in the world with the trapeze artists being exciting and graceful. The two opposite "wheels of death" were adrenaline-inducing with legitimate moments of tension and anxiety while the performers were running and flipping on top of them.

It definitely had its high moments. It also had some low ones.

You can't deny that the exclusion of animals, albeit probably the morally correct decision, left something to be desired. No more elephant or lion performances, no more old-fashioned carny fun; No more dirt bikes doing circles in the sphere cage, no more fire breathing or just general unhinged circus goofiness.

The sing-along dance segments comprised no small amount of the show time and get a bit boring after the first round of them.

All in all, it was fine. The kids had a blast singing and dancing, the unicycle daredevil shenanigans were neat. We enjoyed ourselves, but probably won't see it a second time, since the stars of the show (animals) are no longer a part of it.

It just doesn't have that same aura of excitement and wonder than it used to. But if you enjoy dance routines and acrobatics you'll have a good time."

Last word:

Jay J.
Sparks, NV
Mar 20, 2026

"The soul of the circus is gone. No magic, No humor, No clowns. Overwhelming amount of dancers on the floor. The target audience for the show are preteens. Totally missing 80% of the audience."

I ask, has Kenneth Feld a soul?  Has he lost his marbles?  How many years from now may these strange days of betrayal be remembered as the postmortem years?

SUNDAY BACKWARD: Sunday Morning Turnabout -- Tragedy to Trophies

Sunday morning not so serene. Had something different in mind. Shouldn't have surfed the blogs, full of mud, mayhem and sad sad tragecy ... Let's start out easy: A young kid named Logan Jacot enters the big top, gets bumped on the head and decides to bear the blood without a Doc. A young trouper to the core, Logan blogs of “death and destruction at Lewis & Clark.“ "Death" marks the passing of a baby goat, "destruction" the trauma to Logan's head. Still, this determined kid, all of about 21 or so, has found a home under canvas. Ironically, he calls it "the only consistent thing in my life. I’ve always been able to count on it to take care of me both physically and emotionally, I hope it’ll always be around to take care of me.”

Then there’s a slightly older chap, Ben Trumble, currently free lancing on the Kelly-Miller lot, chatting on his mud show blog about difficult lots and mixed turnouts, about an operation (now run by John Ringling North II) that is maybe too too nice for some ongoing issues to be resolved ... Heck, who needs the old Billboard or the new Circus Report when we have these on-the-lot troupers willing to tell all (okay, maybe not ALL -- but we're waiting for that, too)... It’s a different world toady ... A keen discovery is circus aficionado Crash Moreau (his blog, Circus Review, is linked to the right), who sees a lot of circuses, writes ‘em up and gives you neat facts about biz and logistics and vital trivia. So far this season Crash has crashed 16 shows – hold that stat for the end, right here coming up...

Surfing the insiders, Buckles pays tribute to the Besalou Baby Elephants as being “the finest elephant act ever trained in this country.” Gosh and “ WOOT WOOT,” as Logan might say, I saw ‘em on Polack in their heyday, and I LOVED baby Opal’s epic tricks ... Wade Burck, the Cage Man, has lots of photos of gorgeous tigers and wonders about some — who are they and who trained ‘em? ... Our King Clown of the Blogs, Pat Cashin, chirpfully quotes Steve Smith on his favorite subject: “Clowning really is snow on Christmas and all day suckers and Never-Never Land.” After the Xmas part, the sentence lost me ...

Now to the Sad Sad Story: Between recalling his leftist youth and talking up the need for humanist imagery in circus animal acts, Trumble (as do others) addresses the horrible murder this last week of Carson & Barnes road office manager, Mauricio Droguett, in a local mall by his estranged wife, Debi. “One family was permanently torn apart. A dozen other families are left to grieve and wonder why?” The circus can’t escape life, nor life the circus....My heart goes out ...

Okay, all this makes me sort of long for a copy of the White Tops. Maybe you, too, need a little tinsel and fresh pink sawdust? Back to the subject of an annual awards for circus performance art. Wade Burck wonders if my earlier proposed titles “the Johnnys” or “The Alberts” (both Ringlings) are a bit dated. Burck suggests "The Irvins" (nice sound) or “The Cliffs” (would the latter be for the most erratically run operation of the year?) And Baraboo’s Bob Dewell wonders aloud if they might not be simple called the RBBB Awards. Hummm, Doc, that sounds like a prescription.

Thus my latest proposal: THE CIRCUS RING AWARDS. What say ye, all three of you out there?

This I believe: If we can find ten or twenty Crash Moreaus who actually go out and see, let’s say, all of about the ten regularly touring shows (not to slight the fringe affairs, but who sees em all?), those people should automatically qualify to receive ballots and vote. It would be an honor system, remember honor before Steroids? We would trust these people, fans or ex-circus employees pledging no current financial or volunteer conflicts of interest whatsoever, to complete a simple form, sign and return. It’s a start, no?

Away from mud and misfortune, back to the front end: Circus Vargas is showing real class in tv ads it's running in the Bay Area. What a surprise! This should be one to watch. Meanwhile, Logan, I’d suggest a hard hat, all except for your ring time. The circus might take care of you -- as long as you are around to be taken care of...


[photos, from top: Logan Jacot, from his blog, Sawdust Nights; Opal, presented by Peggy MacDonald, from Buckles Blog; last photo from Circus Vargas website]

first posted 7.13.08. Yes, we were all alive then.

 

SUNDAY BACKWARD: Creepy Clowns Grip the Nation! ... Letizel and Codona Movie in Works at Warner ... Cirque’s Paramour Gets Scripting Overhaul, Biz Remains Stagnant ... Vinyl is Back ... Farewell, Jack Ryan and Pat Cashin ... and More on the Inside!

Do Creepy Clown lives matter?  That’s what I heard this morning on a radio talk show having fun with the issue.
 

This latest media storm is becoming fodder for late night  TV comedians.   It’s also no laughing matter for our struggling big tops, unless some really smart circus can spoof its own jesters into a new kind of merry mayhem.  Ringling, you’ve tried outer space. What say, a trip to the asylum for retired clowns on parole?   Bring on the Scariest Show on Earth!

Creepy clown sightings are spreading like a visiting virus    Another gift of social media, the demented darlings are rattling news wires, stalking schoolyards, scaring kids half to death.  But what a nice diversion from that political circus going on all around us.  Maybe Lady Hillary or Lord Donald will show up at the next debate in gory greasepaint, or is that what they are already wearing?  (shhh! Think Hillary's laugh, kids ...)

Pity the well-intended circus clown: If this creepy movement isn’t reason enough for all circuses to ban traditional jester makeup in favor of the harmless red nose, (okay, to be extra safe, a pink one)  I don’t know what is.  More and more adults are outing their own fear of funny faces.   No longer something to hide from.  Simon Cowell on America’s Got Talent, for one.   Just another nail in the coffin of our sadly beleaguered big tops.

P.T. Barnum once said that "clowns are the pegs on which the circus is hung."  Well, these days, they may be hanging it — literally

Onto great promising news  Have we, at last, a high-drama quality film for adults about a genuinely tragic American circus story?  New flick about aerial thrillers Lillian Leitzel and Alfred Codona in the works at Warner Bros, and how I hope the Weinsteins have their hands in this one.  Heavy weights already signed on include producer Andrew Lazaar, who handled Clint Eastwood’s American Sniper, and Aussie actress Margot Robbie, right (The Wolf of Wall Street, Suicide Squad), to play Leitzel.  I’m thinking this could be The One I’ve been waiting for through too many mediocre big top flicks  Think of the background alone --- Ringling in the ‘20s!.  The rivalry between Leitzel and her scheming nemesis, conniving Vera Bruce ... Of the tragic ends that would befall both icons.  

To be based upon Dean N. Jensen’s 2013 book Queen of the Air, and I can’t wait.  Yes, I might have said that before another film, Water for Elephants, came out, but I’d not yet read the wretchedly brutal book from which the latter was faithfully adapted. 

Can Queen of the Air achieve what all other circus flicks have failed to do: Mine cinematic gold from genuine big top history? Film Makers and documentarians  have long shunned compelling subject matter staring them in the face: I’m thinking the towering figure of reckless circus king John Ringling, who lived a colorful and ultimately tragic life, and I’ve thought of Leitzel and Codona, and of course of the catastrophic Hartford fire, not to mention its genesis in a fractious war among Ringling heirs for control of the circus.

What do we usually get from Hollywood?  Of late, Water. I mean, tell me, please, was there ever a circus as thoroughly sadistic as that one?   As improbably untrue to any semblance of tent show history, then, before or now?

Another Cirque du Fizzle?  The company’s ill-reviewed New York stage show, Paramour, closed down quietly for a few days in late Auguest to reivse script in reponse to public feedback, some fans wanting “more acrobatics earlier in the show during the exposition,” others hungering for more meat on the bones of an empty-headed plot.  Post revamping, the altered Paramour is enduring ticket sales still ranging from pretty good to ominously stagnant, hovering too often in the 65% range.  I still think they have a chance.

Will the eggheads on the lot ever learn?  When I came across a New York Times review of two new stage shows, headlined “Identify Crisis: Theatre Productions That Refuse to be Theater,” I thought of how well it applies to circuses refusing to be circuses.

END RINGERS: Sadly, the passing of  Pat Cashin, clown and blogger, and only 48-years-old.  When I started up this blog, he was an early supporter.  That support faded away over the years, down to zero. I never exactly knew why, but likely something I said ... Also departing us, on August 25, another early supporter of my blog and the person who coined "May all your days be circus days," Ringling PR man Jack Ryan, at 77 ... Yet another circus school is rising, this one over Philly, site of the first circus to play America .... Warning to freak show imitators:  If you try dining on blades, be sure to order them Dull.  An Indian man suffering acute stomach pains, discovered by doctors to be harboring 40 various blades and knives in his guts.  About the unnamed patient, you’re thinking. extreme side show trickster?  No, think 42-year-old policeman – and maybe, on the side, a petty thief with a built in fencing flow  ... Retro trendy vinyl record lovers not going away.  It’s no passing fade.  Some new CDs coming out on old wax, too.  Down the street, just opened a vinyl-only shop.  Exciting!  Many of my old LPs from the fifties are still cracking-free good, I’ll have you know ... Sinatra never sounded better ... Oh, you gotta love the kids who don’t dismiss everything that came before them ...

Chase a creepy clown into a panic.  Pray for a great circus flick from the great Warner Bros.  And buy a vinyl record on me!  

first published in 2016

He Only Wanted to Be in the Circus, But the Circus Only Wanted His Ideas

 (courtesy of Freedom Auction Company Archives)

No form of circus clowning I have come upon can match my staggering awe over this totally outrageous take down. Deviously damming? Wickedly funny? 

All those things and more.  

The genius behind this gem was certainly one of circusdome’s most creative contributors without ever achieving a prominent reputation.  Until now.  He had  to practically sneak into clown alley, and then only for a lackluster season or two in  a clown face closer to Stephen King than Felix Adler. I might have fled the tent. The worst possible way to introduce himself to the world. A tale had  it that John Ringling caught sight of his spooky face and ordered him out of the tent. But Pat Valdo, only a few saving  steps away, hired him back, not to clown, but to create their gags and build their props. 

Oh yes, the name of this most  "famous clown" you never heard of?

Jerry Bangs.

This account is  based upon my watching a  video of the  tribute to Bangs by  Brian Hollifield, as interviewed by Bruce Barry. at he Circus Historical Society’s recent convention in Baraboo.

Our sadly neglected figure was born in 1903 in Lisbon, NH.  He loved going to circuses at the Boson Garden.   His father,  a pharmacist who saw him in a higher calling, put Jerry, a promising pianist, through the Boston New England Conservatory of Music. Seven years of it and he did not gradate.  All  he still wanted to do was to be in the circus.  Evidently to do anything in it. A doctor  fiend of his father's, Neil Hoskins, happened to be a circus fan,and was thus able  to get Jerry installed under the biggest big top of them all. The year was 1930.

A design for Mama's in the Park?  No, Bangs sketched this (in black and white) many years before.  

Jerry composed songs, sketched cartoons, and concocted the most audacious clown gags. And his talents were  allowed to flourish under the aegis of Sam Gumpertz, who replaced Ringling in 1933 and saw an expanded role for Bangs to play.  (One for Gumpertz?). He   involved Jerry into other aspects of the performance,  such as composing  the opening spec music for the 1936 show, “Grand Circus Spectacle March."   Gumpertz also sought Jerry’s ideas for spec costumes and used a few of his designs. All for free.  Bangs knew what was happening but let it happen.  They paid him $30 a week ($602 in today's coin).

We must acknowledge, however, that since Bangs only clowned for less than two season, he really never became a clown, but stayed in the background as a comedy creator.  Paul Jung, if I am correct, served as producing clown for the Ringling show for many years.  A photo of him in the 1946 route book bears a caption that identifies him as  "clown inventor." 

Our unsung wunderkind did not drink, never married, and lived a largely solitary life, but loved every aspect of life around the tents and rings. Loved  relaxing in the backyard with a magazine in hand, eating at the cookhouse. Loved it all, and kept a  daily history of the show’s travails during the  Ringling Wrangling years of the 1930s and 1940s.  He turned them into a book, but could lot find a  publisher for.   He was active in some of the other shows for a number of years.  Google his name and discover.  Google Pat Cashin Dusty Dillion.

This photo in Life Magazine, of Bangs' The Long Headed Man, seen here above John Ringling North, has charmed me for years.  As fate would have it, all the other images in the photo except Jerry's work were credited in the caption. Given our subject's brilliant creativity,  I am surprised that North did not keep him  around for many more seasons.  He left the show at the end of the 1949 season.

Jerry Bangs was inducted into the International Clown Hall of Fame this year. His props now reside there. What a draw!

There is such rich complexity to the Bangs legacy. Notwithstanding their fractured premise, give Hollifield and CHS high marks for this ground breaking illumination.

Bravo buffoonery!

Bonus Extra:  From what the late Pat Cashin had to say about Jerry's diabolical face on his blog:  

"This has got to be, hands down, the single most hauntingly disturbing image of a professional circus clown that I have ever seen! WOW!"

Here is a link to the You Tube:

 https://www.google.com/search?as_q=jerry+bangs+circus+hstorial+society&as_epq=&as_eq=&as_sitesearch=&as_filetype=&as_qdr=&lr=&cr=&tbs=&authuser=#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:d4a70fc1,vid:8gEktpthevQ,st:0

Mid Year Scraps ...

 What the world first saw, 188 years ago

TRAP HISTORY UNCHALLENGED?.  It took me one posting close to almost making a fool of myself. Again.   In it, which I narrowly escaped publishing, I disputed Jules Leotard’s claim for trapeze invention, until I dug deeper and pulled up this rendering of his genius.  Nailed!  Highly persuasive!. That young man gave us  the vision, too.  Really, history can be a very complex subject, but I won’t take this any further, only to wonder aloud, who invented the flying return act rigging?  That is, who added the catcher?  I am thinking Clark?

OK, there’s one for Serious Circus. How about some wacko comedy relief?

LOMVABLY LOONY MAD CAP CLOWNING BY THE DOZENS. Europe favored the family act, often with instruments.  Three Ring America gave us the Clown Walkaround and one of the best comedy and gag producers was Ringling’s’ Jerry Bangs, who helped supply the goofy costumes and gags from  1930, 1949. Jerry Bang! Bang! I love the names, Jerry for down to earth, Bangs for noise and pratfalls that filled the tent at intervals during the show, fast and funny during prop changes. Circus Historical Society gave Bangs a Zoom tribute – The most famous clown you’ve never heard of, presented by  CHS Trustee Brian Hollifield, hosted by Chris Berry. And I missed it! Update: Don Covington sent me  a link to the presentation, and I look forward to watching it. Thanks, Don!

MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS, LOUIS!

I wanna go! Is it true?  Never knew Circus Flora had so many varied animal acts! What a revelation!  Am I in the Twilight Zone? Pardon me for the following ...

PILFERING NON-PROFIT KITTIES FOR  for "restaurant meals and skin care.” That would George Pace, 63,  who once served as president of Circus Flora,  now headed for 22 months  behind bars for trimming over one hundred grand off their kitty.  These civic shows. so revered, can be remarkable human.  Celebrating its 40th anniversary,  Flora left shocked and saddened.  Said Flora exec John Marsh to St. Louis Public Radio “Everyone I think really understood the gravity of this and that we were victims of something terrible and we  have been able to pull it together.” Non-profit skimming is everywhere.  Come out here to California and take a look around.  We are sinking in money-raising corruption.

You never know, do you?

BRIT BIG TOPS SUFFER gloom and doom.   Kenny Darnell of Paulous Circus talking down (or up) signs of harder times and smaller crowds ahead ...”the industry urgently needs some fresh ideas.” Would a Jerry Bangs blast of painted characters outrageously dressed  help revive the most primal lure of circus?  

HIDE THOSE EMPTY SEATS! 

Gndey Circus tent, 2019, in pre-shrunk days.

Below. today

 IN RESPONSE TO A COMMENT OF MINE about wishing not to watch another  Shrine or any circus in a mostly amply arena,  Dohglas McPherson apprised me of tent shrinking over there.  In a move to look  more continuously well patronized, Gandy Circus Directors shrunk all of their tents from 1,550 seats down to an even thousand..  Me wonders, might this only lead to further cuts? A tent is hardly an arena, and  I’d rather see Vargas with a half house, for two reasons.  Circuses and movie houses don't  always fill up the tents, and a larger tent lends the impression of the show’s potential markets elsewhere. 

SCREEN STARS WHO PERFORMED  FIRST OVER SAWDUST

CHRISTOPER AIKEN, Can you  guess what he did in his younger years?  He tamed lions!

PIERCE BROSNAN   Yes, 007 ate fire in 1968, and under the tents.   Three years was enough.

EDDIE ALBERT   He clowned and walked high wires with Escalante Brothers cirrus.  

BURT LANCASTER He left the circus for movies reluctantly, when a fall ended his big top career.  But look at the film he gave us ... Trapeze!

Circus Flora ...                    

Jules Leotard died at the age of 32

A Thousand+ Showbiz David Postings Join My Papers at ISU Milner Library

Pleased to report that they now reside at Illinois State University along with my papers and taped interviews.  And in a form that makes searching them easy.

Good to know that Mark Schmidt remains in tact following the unfortunate departure of Maureen Brunsdale.

Total posts, 2006 - 2024:   1,311 

A Sacred Cirus Ring ... A Revolutiony Acroabt and a Transforming American Showman ...

 

Spring on 609 Brown Street in Santa Rosa sent sun-happy kids through flexing sprinklers, around the block on roller skates .. I Love Lucy and Monopoly,  county fairs and swimming parties.

But nothing could compare to the thrill of news items trickling our way (some from Grandma in Brooklyn) of the the nation's most famous and watched circus moving into Madison Square Garden for its annual spring opening.  The Big Show.  The Big One.  Big Hertha.   Gorgeous color photos in TV Guide touting a one hour telecast of highlights the following week. Dazzling artistry attached to strange sounding names ...

I had learned early that while most of the best acts came from abroad, it was American showmanship that cast them in into fascinating modes of production.

The Ringlngs had long scouted the world for the greatest and the most bizarre attractions, freaks to thrillers, but nothing to the extent of the annual talent-scouting haul of John Ringling North.

 Actor Minor Watson.  as John Ringling North, in the Burt Lancaster -Tony Curtis film Trapeze 
    
North was never more respected or revered than in 1956, and in 1956 a brilliant new movie was released, Trapeze, in which his character is given its due by the actor Minor Watson,who portrayed him. Indeed, North was arguably the most prolific American force for creative circus presentation.  Not confined to just one ring, JRN interlaced the acts with parades, production number and aerial ballets.

And by 1956 when his cinematic character rang true, he had it all. The movie was released on May 30, only six weeks before the real Ringling circus fell in Pittsburgh, when North struck the big top for good and was declared "the man who kiled Santa Clause/"   His charismatic image in ruins, he would never fully recover. 

The movie that honored him was filmed in the famed Cirque d’Hiver in Paris, the oldest circus building in the world, now undergoing a major renovation. The first images of trapeze were  performed over its ring on November 12, 1859,by French acrobat Jules Leotard, though without catchers. Leotard swung from one bar to another, once over a crowd below without  net!

H lived a rather short life.  For me, an equally key question would be --- when did the catcher  enter the tent?

Burt Lancaster. a flyer himself whose career had been short lived by a fatal fall, got behind the movie with a passion and became one of its produces. Tony Curtis, begging Lancaster to show him how to master the triple, turns in the performance of a lifetime.

My favorite scenes depict North's jovial interactions with performers  all of them obviously hoping to be offered contracts. 

A joy shared by all: Ringling North congratulates Tony Curtis for  his perfect Triple and ticket to Madison Square Garden,

 This I know: What North was to the circus world will long live on in this terrific film.  I look for his scenes whenever I watch this masterpiece. 

Douglas McPherson has penned an enthralling, 4-star history on cirque d'Hiver and the movie.

Highly recommended!  Link to Circus Mania on the right bar, down a ways.