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"You are more than just your name alone" ---Jean Houston Pipo/The Eightball/David Roe Performing a clown-breakdance-striptease, or comical belly dance, David has mounted two solo shows in the Boston area as clown character Pipoca, and an off-off-Broadway staging of Beckett's "Waiting for Godot" in New York appearing as Gogo. In the San Francisco Bay Area, David has performed in drag wearing fishnet stockings at the 3rd Annual American Circus Festival, as a clown named after an outer space dust cloud with Gregangelo's Velocity Circus Troupe at Yerba Buena Center for the Performing Arts, and on stilts, unicycle and whatever else he could climb on for the New Pickle Circus at the Palace of Fine Arts. Other characters have included an Italian chef, a French waiter, a fastidious soldier, and a hackey-sack hippie, as well as a dying mime, a dancing dwarf, an angry minotaur, and painter Diego Velazquez among short film credits. A former polka dancer with a 1979 competition trophy, David played a wicked stepsister in the Berkshire Ballet's production of Cinderella, then partnered with shiny metal trash cans for Pooh Kaye/Eccentric Motions Dance & Film in New York, and danced at festivals on four continents before entering the world of clowning and burlesque. His eclectic performance style combines everything from acrobatics to acting, breakdance to ballet, capoeira to physical comedy, along with languages, poetry, and song. A recent San Francisco Clown Conservatory graduate, David has trained with master clowns from Italy, Brazil, and the United States.
The Whole Story “I was dancin’ when I was eight.”---T. Rex When I was eight, I brought crowds to their feet dancing to the “Fiddler’s Polka” and other favorites with the Capital District Polka Dolls and Guys touring New York state. We won trophies at the annual Hunter Mountain Polkafest in the Catskills in 1979, happily receiving the prize from guest emcee Frankie Vallie. This is how I learned at an early age how much a smile can please an audience. As I teenager, I devoted all my time and energy to Breakdancing on cardboard in my driveway, which led to more performing, competing, and an early teaching job at the Emma Willard summer dance program in Troy, New York. At that time, dancing served as exercise, as my creative outlet, and my emotional release. I was encouraged to open up to other creative, contemporary forms at Omega workshops with Jonathon Wolken, and Pooh Kaye.
“The spirit must be set free no matter what the cost.” ---unknown Determined to follow my feet at the end of high school, I signed up for classical training as an apprentice with the Albany/Berkshire Ballet. Performing in “Midsummer Night’s Dream,” “Cinderella,” “Peter & the Wolf,” “Nutcracker,” I had a full two years touring the eastern states from Vermont to New York, and even played at The Palace Theatre in my home town of Albany, New York. Working next with the modern dance company High Frequency Wavelengths, I was carried off to New York City where I gave my first public performance outdoors at the 1989 Tompkin’s Square Arts Festival, happy to see a photo of my own feet on the poster. Studying all kinds of modern dance styles in the city, I trained primarily with Mary Anthony, and performed in dozens of small venues and companies until I found myself working with Pooh Kaye/Eccentric Motions Dance & Film. We toured and shot an animated film, "The Painted Princess" in an abandoned mill in Lowell, Massachusetts.
“I do not consider art as being separate from life.” ---Antonin Artaud Capoeira was my next passion during my college years majoring in Comparative Literature and Romance Languages. In the early 90's, I worked at the Nuyorican Poets' Cafe where I often read my own poetry, stories, and songs. I found other work teaching dance to children at the Cathedral St. John the Divine summer program, and posing for artists. I managed to study acting part time with Marjorie Ballentine while also working as a stage manager and director's assistant. I took in all of Beckett's plays performed by Dublin's Gate Theatre during Lincoln Center's '96 Beckett Festival working as an usher. Between 1990 and 1997, I had traveled to Canada on tour, Europe with friends, and Africa with a backpack, and was still hungry for more. Italy then became my home from 1998 to 1999 where I worked as an au pair. And I attended a one-year clowning and circus school in Rome which led to street shows.
“Being Irish means knowing that one day the world is going to break your heart.” ---Jack Kennedy Upon returning home to New York, I made some early attempts at performing in the streets and parks. A few reviews and articles I had written about downtown dance and theatre made it to print in the free press. I returned to work in modern dance again with Jody Oberfelder Dance Projects while simultaneously mounting a production of Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot” as my first solo project. "Godot" went up in 2001 for a single performance as a staged reading.
“Failed? No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” ---Samuel Beckett It was then that I took on the name Pipoca for my clown character; the name given to me in 1994 by my Capoeira teacher, Edna Lima, who'd said to me, "You're white, & you jump a lot." During 2002 I lived in the Berkshires at the artists community Earthdance practicing Contact Improvisation, and mounting my first solo clown show “Pipoca Goes to Brazil!” as an Artist in Residence. Raising enough money for travel and tuition from my show, I attended a clowning workshop with Master Clown Riccardo Pucetti of the theatre collaborative LUME in Brazil. Pipoca made his first appearance abroad at the 2003 "Feverestival" in Sao Paulo, along with other clowns from Argentina, Brazil, & Spain. After more workshops and further travel in Brazil, I returned stateside to settle in the Boston area. Living in Cambridge, I mounted a second solo show in collaboration with Mavi Dance. "Pipoca the Gypsy!" was a series of clown interludes performed between dance acts by several dance companies. I taught in the Boston area, and took part in performance collaborations in dance, theatre, clowning, and burlesque.
“"A Clown is a funny person trying to be normal." ---Dagen Julty The San Francisco Clown Conservatory at Circus Center is where I spent the past year, rounding out a total of two and half years of professional clown training. I've managed to meet so many people working in the circus arts all over the world, as well as others in variety, theatre, dance, burlesque,--all the related fields. I had opportunities to perform clowning, character work, and animation at events both through the school and with Gregangelo's Velocity Circus Troupe. Independently, I managed to show burlesque work, compete, audition, teach, and write reviews for Circusnews.com about all the big shows-and all the small shows-on both coasts.
"The man who is bigger than his body.”---Anonymous My latest creation in burlesque comedy may be the seed for a full-length collaborative piece stretching far into the future as a long-term project. After spending the summer of 2005 teaching, dancing, performing, and traveling back on the east coast, I'm heading west again to begin work with Russian clown troupe Aga-Boom for the show's December debut in San Francisco.
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TRAINING: Clowning---Jeff Raz, Ronlin Foreman, Moshe Cohen, Lisa
Wolpe, & Dick Monday-US Breakdance---Self-taught-practice, books, & bruises! Capoeira---Chuvisco-MA, Senzala-Brazil, Papagallo-Italy, Edna Lima-NYC Circus Acrobatics---Xiao Hong Weng-SFCC; Marek-Italy Improvisational Dance---Pooh Kaye, Marilynn Danitz, Jonathon Wolken Contact Improvisation---Earthdance, Pooh Kaye Mime---Letitia Bartlett-SF, Decroux-Rich Kupferberg, Copeau-Gilberto Scaramuzzo-Italy Acting---Marjorie Ballentine-NYC Vocal Training---Carlo Simoni-Brazil; Lynn Book-NYC Choreography---Pooh Kaye, Marilynn Danitz, Mary Anthony, Ana Sokolow Modern Dance--Mary Anthony, Bertram Ross Ballet---Madeline Cantarella Culpo-Albany/Berkshire Ballet Chorus---Tulio-Italy Fencing---Maestro Taddei-Italy, Julia Pugliese-NYC Chi-Kung---Daria Fain-NYC Tai-Chi---EBA Dance Ctr. Albany, NY African Dance---Dance Complex-Cambridge, MA Brazilian Dance---BCCNE-Cambridge, MA Yoga---Shakti Smith-Earthdance, various Fiction Writing---Alice Sebold, David Winn, Josh Wilner (CUNY), Nuyorican Poets Critical Writing---published: Circusnews.com; Emergency Gazette, NYC Figure modeling---AIC-San Francisco; UMASS, Museum School-Boston; Private-Italy; Private, SVA, Arts Student’s League-NYC
GOALS WITH CLOWNING: What attracted me to the art of clowning was the growing popularity of circus culture in late 1990’s. !Popularity! !Circus! !Exposure! Acrobatics, Clowning, and Juggling Features of Clowning are: -Uplifting to the spirit---Levity -Universal language of clowning, street-shows, travel -Re-cycle and Re-use materials---Resourcefulness -Build Community -Combine Acting and Dance -Flexibility of show venues-not just captive audiences -Ancient tradition continued CLOWN QUALITIES: 1-A contagious laugh, an infectious smile, able to laugh at self, self-amusement 2-Accident prone-but not normal accidents, and nothing serious! 3-Connection to the Absurdity in Life 4-Gullible, easily led 5-Butt of jokes from siblings, peers, and others 6-Surrender to innocence and ignorance to allow for surprises in life 7-Logistically challenged! 8-Idealist, Optimist, Positivist, Pacifist
RECYCLING: “King of shreds and patches.” Another aspect of Pipoca’s work hinges on recycling. Living in big cities like New York, Rome, Boston, & San Francisco has allowed for easy access to mass consumer products, while simultaneously engendering the desire to consume less. (Revise) Thus, over 75% of the materials used for props & costumes in performances are basically “Recycled” or “Found” materials. Friends and family have generously supplied me with all kinds of gifts and hand-me-downs like a Guatemalan vest, a unicycle, juggling clubs. The other main source for materials has been garbage. That’s right. Garbage. Much of what I own was found abandoned on the street. An object like a brightly colored umbrella, a wiffle-ball bat, or a polka-dot shirt calls out from amidst the waste, just begging to be put to good use in a show! Finding or receiving new materials presents the immediate challenge of creating acts in a somewhat organic fashion, taking inspiration from the random flotsam and jetsam supplied by the environment. Another challenge is to mark the uniqueness of each object: an exotic gift from a foreign country, a jacket whose colors match Pipoca’s look, a mundane instrument with a seemingly endowed memory. Then, the materials find their way in amongst the others, changing the character, the symbolism, the themes of the work so that it is ever-evolving.
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David Roe
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* www.SimplyCircus.com * www.CircusNews.com *
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