Allegra Barnett makes people laugh. She explains, “I love performing. Clowning is like anything else in the arts. You do it only because you must. It’s a driving force. If I wanted money, I would have gone to law school and eventually take over my dad’s practice. But money isn’t my goal. Making people happy, that’s my role in life. Clowning shows people the funny side of themselves and appeals to everyone. It creates a universal connection, because there’s no language barrier. It also provides the opportunity to create my own material…Clowning is a way of seeing life in a different light.”

Allegra attended Clown College, tuition free, because in the late 1960s, professional circus clowns were becoming an endangered species. There were less than 200 in the entire US. In 1967, when Irvin Feld purchased Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, there were only 14 members in Circus’ Clown Alley. In order to preserve a clown future, Feld established Clown College, the world’s only formal training school for clowns. 

Although the eight-week program at Clown College is held in various parts of the U.S., Allegra attended the college at the Sarasota Opera House in Florida. She took all the essential courses: pie throwing, stilt walking, unicycle and rola-bola riding, juggling, acrobatics, make-up, mime, improvisation, double-take, and make-up. Allegra also took a class in falling without getting hurt. She explained, “A dead clown isn’t a funny clown.”

“Sure it was fun,” Allegra explained, “but we worked 14 hours a day…It’s like anything else. The more you practice, the better you get and the more you develop muscle memory. It’s like anything else, but it’s like nothing else. “

It’s been said that a clown incorporates six other careers into one.
1) Medical Doctors (Guardians of Our Bodies) attempt to cure our ills by prescribing medicines. Clowns provide a moment of laughter that can scatter a hundred moments of pain and grief.
2) Rabbis, Priests, or Ministers (Referred to as Guardians of Our Souls) attempt to touch an unreachable part of human nature.
3) Musicians tend to stimulate the weary and soother the savage beast. Clowns provide laughter, which can be music to the soul.
4) Artists autograph a canvas or carve their signature into a marble masterpiece. Clowns carve their names on our hearts.
5) Mechanics, under layers of grease, keep all metal moving parts functioning properly. Clowns, under layers of greasepaint, provide the lubricating ingredient, humor, which also reduces friction.
6) A Homemaker attends to daily chores of maintaining a house and family.  The laughter a clown provides is similar to changing a baby’s diaper. It doesn’t permanently solve anything, but it makes things more acceptable for a while.

Allegra knows that humor is contagious. She doesn’t wait to catch it from others. By working as a clown, she’s become a carrier.

(North Massapequa, NY: 1997)