Skeeter the Clown poses for a photo Tuesday, July 26, 2022, with a family at Broadway Park in Marseilles to promote upcoming shows of the Culpepper and Merriweather Circus. (Left to right) Skeeter, Alicia, Adelaide, Zack, Bria and Gene Carlson, of Marseilles Rotary, are pictured. (Michael Urbanec)
A Rotary-sponsored big top circus is coming to 10 Acre Park in Marseilles with 5 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. shows Wednesday, Aug. 3.
The Culpepper and Merriweather Circus will construct its big tent at 9:30 a.m. that same morning, providing a free tour to the public.
Skeeter the Clown, one of the performers, visited Marseilles on Tuesday for appearances at OSB Community Bank and Broadway Park. She shared more information about the performance and the life of a circus performer.
The show will feature Leo, a clown who also is a contortionist and Miss Kelly, a performer who uses silk hanging 35 feet above the ring and her strength to perform aerial ballet, and Miss Simone, who performs on a miniature jungle gym suspended 35 feet above the ring with Miss Kelly.
“Just by holding onto each other, they do different twists and turns and acrobatic skills just holding onto each other without a net,” Skeeter said. “The neat thing about this act is Simone performed it with her dad and before that, her dad performed it with her mother. Now she and Miss Kelly are performing it together.”
Skeeter said many circus performers go back generations, with performances being passed down generation to generation in their families.
“We also have lions and tigers with us and a gentleman who rescues cockatoos,” Skeeter said. “They are the most abandoned birds in the world because, like parrots, they usually outlive their human families.”
The Perez family will perform on the wheel of destiny, which Skeeter said looks like a double ferris wheel thirty feet above the ring in the form of two hamster-style wheels. There’s also a low-wire act, contortionists and other animal acts.
Skeeter also said there will be a midway with a concession wagon with simple items, such as peanuts, popcorn, cotton candy, hot dogs and nachos.
Skeeter said she started clowning when she was 9 years old in an effort to help deal with a speech impediment.
“It’s like second grade and they’re teaching English and halfway through, they decide we’re going to learn phonetics,” Skeeter said. “Oh, with a speech impediment, I had a hard time with spelling things the way I hear them.”
Skeeter said she was able to use circus skills to improve her speech via pantomiming, which her teacher was OK with as long as she wasn’t being a smart aleck about it.
She said her act is as a “goose clown,” essentially a stumbling, bumbling fool. She learned her act from a man who wore the traditional white painted face that covers the ears and neck meant to be a reflection of humanity. There’s also a third type of clown, which is a hobo clown. This act was created during the Great Depression era.
Gene Carlson, with Marseille Rotary, said the Rotary Club is rewarded for selling tickets and getting the circus to have an adequate audience.
“Then we take the money and invest it back into the community by doing things like building parks, planting trees, whatever it takes to make the community better,” Carlson said.
Rotary is an international organization that operates locally made up of businessmen and women.
Tickets for the Culpepper and Merriweather Circus are available at OSB Community Bank, 125 W. Bluff St.; Marseilles Bank, 100 E. Bluff St.; D&S Foods, 120 E. Bluff St.; Marseilles City Hall, 209 Lincoln St.; QTB Limited, 504 Main St.; Piper Spencer Agency, 487 Main St.; the Marseilles Pool, 555 Commercial St.; and Gleasons, 385 Main St. Credit card purchases are available at City Hall.
Tickets are also cheaper in advance: An adult ticket purchased in advance is $12 and a child/senior ticket is $7. Tickets purchased the day of the event are $15 and $8, respectively.
Copyright © 2022 Shaw Local News Network
Copyright © 2022 Shaw Local News Network