My dissertation explores how contemporary theatre and performance can become more accessible and inclusive for its participants by focusing on music and non-verbal clowning performances. It is not limited to ‘inclusivity’, but also a reflection that language is not always enough, or even helpful- rather a limitation. There are certain experiences/stories which escape words; they are ineffable. Either hard to talk about or not yet established in the language, because they are either new, or have been censored, unheard, or invisible. The body language- including voice, gesture, and movement is as powerful as verbal language, in some cases, more liberating, empowering, creative, and more inclusive.

 As an international student myself, from Argentina, studying an Acting degree in an English university in York, I came across with some language challenges at the very beginning of my first year such as struggling with fluency and spontaneity in improvisational verbal exercises during my education. This made me realise the importance and relevance of having different ways of making of theatre a more inclusive experience. “Human movement and its perception [are] inseparable from affect, sensation, and attention” (Sofer, 2022, p. 394). Through my performance projects, I discovered I can still communicate without words, purely with movement, gestures, sounds, and instruments. 

 I realised one of the most effective ways to communicate in theatre within performers, as well as towards any multi-lingual audience member is through the language of the music, sounds, gestures, movement- body “[p]henomenology claims access to a fundamental-transcendental level of cognition, perception, intersubjectivity and being which would apply to all humans.” (Sofer, 2022, p.390), this suggesting a mutual connection and reflection that humans have in common with clowning. Although clowning is often associated as a form of children entertainment oriented or circus spectacles for the family, there is a type of clown that goes beyond the silliness of itself – the critical political clown. From Charlie Chaplin’s silent films to Clowns Without Borders, diverse clowning techniques that gives power to the clown to send a strongly political message to society. 

 This paper research is aimed for performance makers, as well as for audience members. It wants to contribute to the conversation about theatre as an empowering and inclusive practice. I will be using some examples of contemporary clowning across countries and cultures to support my argument about clowning taking its power- enabling power from the non-verbal elements such as sounds. Although purely the body language on its own essence can communicate throughout the entirety of a show, the usage of music enhances the emotions being transmitted to the audience. So much so, adding an extra layer of a different way of communication, without the need of words; this welcoming cross-cultural communication and deeper emotional connections. This performance technique is the one I specialise in and will focus on, as the ability to perform to audiences who do not speak your language is liberating and powerful- a human right. Charlie Chaplin, for instance, a well-known artist who lived in a time where the lack of verbality was not a surprise because the filming style was already not-verbal, and the key to his success being how his gestures spoke like language – deep, versatile, engaging, funny, tragic. His movement vocabulary was so wide yet accessible cross-culturally. 

 Clowning as a form is not necessarily seen as a critical and powerful form in mainstream theatre. It usually targets family entertainment, children, as an extension of its past as a form of circus art. However, we do have new forms of clowns today: clowns without borders, hospital clowns, clowns in prisons, clowns in the streets, clowns during protests- clowns telling stories that are not expected to come from them.

 My interest is not necessarily about recorded music, or songs, but the multi-plural performer clown as the musician, mover, dancer. The live sound which can be created with the instrument, or vocally, are responses to the clown- it is a mutual act. When a clown is making music for another clown, there is a clear communication, the music doesn’t simply tell us how to feel, but music and sound just function as a narrative with cues, hints, transitions, expressions of emotions, events - how the clown responds to the high and low keys of the instruments.

 I am a clown, and I have reasons for that. It is not just because I can move, and I like to entertain. I experienced the enabling, empowering and inclusive aspect of clowning; I found it specifically in relation to live sound and music, and the gesture and movement work, and I want to promote it. I want to talk about this because it is empowering, enabling and inclusive, in a world where the mainstream theatre only language in the scripts, English, may not have space for experiencing minorities.