My Sponsor the Clown

Meet Claire Woolner, dubbed "if...Marina Abramovic were a clown" by The New York Times

The first time I saw Claire Woolner’s one person show “Retrospection” at Public Displays of Altadena (PDA), the 35-seat microtheater Claire co-runs, I thought: this is fucking bizarre. With 18+ years in the art world, I have seen my share of eccentric performances, including but not limited to a woman in a human-size vagina costume “coming” on stage in the form of billowing white scarves. My threshold for strange is high.

Describing Claire’s show is a challenge. There was audience-singing. There was a harried blonde wig. There were phone calls of Claire with herself. There was a banana, nudity, a kiss with a stranger, lots and lots of fake blood. At moments, “Retrospection” was funny. Other times, terrifying. Always the performance reeked of absurdity and desperation. A nod to the lengths artists go to communicate the messages most urgent to them, even if know no one understands their meaning. Even if no one is paying attention.

In last week’s post with long time The Simpsons writer Dan Greaney, I said I’d write about pitching my agent a book about trying to have a spiritual experience with social media. I changed my mind. Not because my agent wasn’t interested in such a book. He was. But because this blog would not exist without my sponsor, Claire. It felt imperative to write about her first.

Claire and I belong to a 12-step fellowship of compulsive hiders. As hiders, we hide behind others. We hide behind our smug justifications and struggles. Behind our fears. Authentic visibility is the antidote. I’m tempted to recite the history of Claire’s and my relationship (Beanie Babies and NFTs were involved), and all the 12-step slogans I’ve learned from her (“marketing is self-care for your career”). But I will skip this. Because nothing Claire says impacts me as much as what Claire does. All the ways she enables her visibility to flourish. All the hard work she’s done to get out of her own way. When Claire wins best show at the Hollywood Fringe or tells me she’s hired an assistant and is filming a special—I am agog. If this freakazoid can make it as an avant-garde clown, then by god anyone can.

Claire gives workshops, offers acting lessons, runs a theater, acts in film and television, has a supportive partner and family. She does not strictly make her living as a clown. She also has ambitions outside of clowning, like winning an Oscar. This is besides the point to me. All of it adjacent to her courage to show up (on stage, on Instagram) as the full-throttle farceur she is.

I respect Claire so much that when she sends me a 90 second long video for “Live Laugh Lube” about the importance of using one’s face on Instagram, I listen. For two weeks, I resisted posting a video (suggested by Melinda) of me explaining “Live Laugh Lube,” afraid that it would come across as glib. Then I got Claire’s video, and it was as if God themself was telling me to use your god damned face. I posted my video the next day.

Next week: Thoughts on Andrew Solomon’s New Yorker article “Has Social Media Fueled a Teen-Suicide Crisis?”

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My video collaboration with Claire Woolner. Please check out and share!

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My video explanation of “Live Laugh Lube.” Also check out and share!

Use Face, 2024, acrylic and graphite on canvas, 14 x 11 in. (collaboration with Claire Woolner)