At one time most people thought of clowns as those funny guys who somehow emerged by groups from very little cars at circuses. I realize that some small children were scared of the wild antics of clowns at circuses. This probably was the driving force of the dark turn that clowns took in movies. The latest clown prince was of course Heath Ledger’s “Joker” in “The Dark Knight”. But to keep your interest in clowns going, here is EW’s list of 18 TV/Movie Clowns.
I remember Bozo from my youth. One not listed was a local clown, I remember seeing him as a kid in his clown suit and in normal person form. He would always take time to talk to me in his clown voice, and he always had balloons to make balloon animals. His clown name was Quacky the Clown. I found a site listing for the for Quacky and a picture at the bottom of this page, but I don’t think it would be the same Quacky from my youth.
Bozo is creepy while Krusty is cuddly… must be a generational thing. Killer Klowns from Outer Space… HAHA.
I never found Bozo creepy… Wizzo, one of his sidekicks, yes, I was afraid of him. If you grew up in Chicagoland, then you went to the Bozo show taping – the girl I went with had been on the waiting list for tickets since she was a fetus and we were 9 when we went. I was so hoping Wizzo wouldn’t be there. The Poltergeist clown scared the heck out of me. Of course, my dad was in charge at home one day and let me watch when I was only 5 or 6 – oops. And then there’s Ronald McDonald – I’m sure he is on the list?
Yep… both Poltergeist and Ronald are there. I remember watching Poltergeist the first time, too. My cousins house for a big sleep over. they had just gotten cable TV and it scared the crap out of me, too. Could we have a scary clown for one of our scenes?
Ah, Bozo. I remember getting to go to one of the shows after a year or two on the waiting list. The boy right behind me got picked to do the Bozo buckets…
The Killer Klowns are there two, along with the real killer clown. The latter WAS more frightening (as they say) particularly because of the proximity to where I live…