Wayne Brown: Loving the life of clowning around

Only after “Pixie” applies his white face paint, red lipstick and black eyeliner to make his clown face does he feel comfortable – and naughty.

“It’s like I become someone else when I put my clown face on. I become Pixie, then only can I face people,” says Wayne Brown, a clown at the Mclaren Circus.

Brown, who has been working at the circus for four years, says when he is barefaced he is shyer than his stage persona Pixie, who likes to look for trouble with “big boere ooms” during his circus act.

“I am a shy person, but Pixie likes to take the piss out of anything or anyone. I wouldn’t be able to do that with a straight face.”

Brown, 39, was born in Cape Town and celebrates 24 years working in the circus industry this year.

He says making people laugh drives him.

Brown does not recall any childhood dreams of becoming anything when he grew up.

“In primary school, I was an athlete then I got lazy in high school.”

Just before Brown turned 18, he and his older brother joined the Brian Boswell Circus.

“First I worked in the shop selling coke and popcorn. After a few months, the boss’s daughter saw I have an interesting character and suggested I work as a clown.”

The rest is history after Brown met the head clown, known as a white-face clown who was also a trapeze artist. Brown is a Joey clown who torments the white-face clown in the act.

“I instantly fell in love with trapeze,” Brown says.

Although clowning is his second love, it completes him.

He was named Pixie when he worked at the Brian Boswell Circus 24 years ago and it has stuck.

“Pixie is a naughty sh*t,” Brown laughs.

“Once I put on my makeup I turn into a different person.”

Wayne Brown, a clown at the McLaren circus makes a balloon dog in Pretoria, 10 December 2020. Picture: Neil McCartney

He said his favourite part was seeing how the audience reacted to his act.

“Once I picked on a big uncle and he got so angry he threatened to get up, so I immediately stopped and showed him time out.”

He said although most people enjoy his act there are a handful that take his teasing the wrong way.

Brown has since retired from the trapeze because his age is catching up with him.

“Up there you truly escape from everything. The adrenaline rush is even better up there. Up there you are free.

“Yes, it is also dangerous but you practise and have to take the correct precautions.”

Brown said every trapeze artist knows they don’t walk out of it without a few bumps and bruises.

“I have dislocated my arm and cracked ribs,” he says.

Brown has had acts that have gone awry.

“On a show about 15 years ago, we had a little dog in the performance who would chase after me at the end of the act.”

Brown laughs as he shows all the scars of the dog bites.

Another challenge is keeping a poker face when something goes wrong.

“Do you know how slippery the ring mat is?

“Do you know how many times clowns run out and fall, which is not part of the actual act.

“It happens quite a lot.”

He says there is a reason he has been part of a circus for more than two decades.

“When you walk through those curtains, the ring becomes a different world.”

He says he loves the smell of the ring, the sawdust and the aroma of popcorn in the air.

Yet his love for the circus comes at a heavy price.

“I only met my son for the first time in 14 years this year,” Brown says.

He worked with his former partner in the previous show for four years. “At some stage, she grew tired of the circus life, but it grew on me.”

He says he wished he had met his son earlier, but that he had to work and travel.

“I can’t blame his mother, we are constantly on the road. She also worked at the circus, she knows. It’s just sad that I never got to see him.”

But Brown doesn’t want the circus life for his son.

“Working for the circus has its ups and downs, but I would prefer for him to have a normal life, rather than being in show business.”

He says living like a gypsy has become a way of life for him and he has formed strong bonds with his 40 colleagues, with whom he travels the country.

“People call us freaks but we call each other family.”

– news@citizen.co.za

For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.