It is worrying for the legitimate clowning industry as they could all lose their jobs and that would leave some pretty big shoes to fill.
Stephen King's scary movie reboot provokes tears from 'legit clowns'
The imminent release of a new film adaptation of Stephen King's horror novel It has caused upset in the world of professional clowning. The clowns' concerns – doubtless accompanied by mimed theatrical sobbing, oversized hankies and streams of water from fake flowers – have been publicised by their professional body, the World …
COMMENTS
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Thursday 31st August 2017 16:17 GMT John Smith 19
" the Tim Curry miniseries in 1990. "
Ah the delightful Mr Curry, the go-to guy for louche (and a bit sinister) characters.
I've often pictured a group of grumpy clowns sitting around their clubhouse (The WCA offices I suppose) throwing darts at a dart board with Stephen Kings face on it, grumbling "It's all his fault."
Best clown story so far. From the film "Spy."*
Rayna: There was a woman in my home village in Bulgaria. Should couldn't even sell her body. She just stood in the street dressed as a clown, doing magic tricks and crying constantly. You remind me of her.
*It's not a good advertisement for Bulgaria either.
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Thursday 31st August 2017 09:16 GMT Teiwaz
Re: It wasn't It.
1988 was a good year for terrifying children with things they might see each day. "The Happiness Patrol" in Doctor Who that year also had that killer Bertie Bassett as well.
The sour faced ladies of the patrol were scary enough.
With May still as P.M. - I'd not bet against Britain looking a little familiar to that episode once Brexit kicks in.
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Thursday 31st August 2017 15:12 GMT Mark York 3
Re: It wasn't It.
As well as the cannibal grannies in Paradise Towers.
Going further back Terror of The Autons (With some of the outside action taking place around a circus, keeping with the clown theme) by Robert Holmes - I'll let the man himself explain:
""He started telling me about the guidelines he felt the programme should follow. ‘Two or three seasons ago,’ he said, ‘we had some clot who wrote the most dreadful script.
It had faceless policemen in it and plastic armchairs that went about swallowing people. I might tell you, there were questions in the House.
Mrs. Whitehouse said we were turning the nation’s children into bed-wetters’. Could it be that he was referring to my ‘Terror of the Autons’? ‘Tut, tut’, I muttered, feeling the job slipping away. ‘how awfully irresponsible’.
The elements in the story all came from plastic again. At the time there was a soap powder distributing plastic daffodils outside supermarkets, and I remembered all the warnings about children not being allowed near plastic bags. Then it all came together – I suddenly realised that all you need is a four-inch square of clingfilm to suffocate someone, and the spitting daffodils followed on.
As for the doll and the armchair, well, there were some Danish troll dolls on the gimmick market at the time and I thought they were horrible, so I used that idea. Also, those plastic inflatable armchairs were all the rage, which is why I wrote in McDermott – specifically to kill him off in that chair!"
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Thursday 31st August 2017 09:02 GMT Kane
@ Prst. V.Jeltz
Obligatory:
“No clowns were funny. That was the whole purpose of a clown. People laughed at clowns, but only out of nervousness. The point of clowns was that, after watching them, anything else that happened seemed enjoyable.”
― Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms
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Where's the damned Pterry icon, El Reg?
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Thursday 31st August 2017 11:27 GMT EddieD
Re: Spawn Spawnned An Evil Clown
Nah, Frasier Crane even before Sideshow Bob...
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Thursday 31st August 2017 18:29 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: Spawn Spawnned An Evil Clown
In my tinier years, I recall watching a TV series set in a lighthouse. One episode had ghost clowns and a scarecrow that came to life and crashed through the window. Probably my first ever exposure to something scary. Well, it's scary when you're six years old. So scary clowns go a long way back.
And if you want really old examples, there was The Man Who Laughs, an old film from 1928 about a disfigured man in a circus.
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Thursday 31st August 2017 21:11 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: Spawn Spawnned An Evil Clown
Ha! Yes, that was the one. Round the Twist. I think I was too young to really understand it but I remember the scarecrow coming to life and crashing through a window to grab the girl. And she was the character I identified with so it was extra scary to me.
Loved it, though.
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Thursday 7th September 2017 11:10 GMT magickmark
The Man Who Laughs
An excellent film and many think was the inspiration for the 'Joker' from Batman
See here
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=The+Man+Who+Laughs&newwindow=1&dcr=0&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjspufw95LWAhUHPFAKHUXYDz8QiR4ImgE&biw=1200&bih=816
and here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Laughs_(1928_film)
Have fun kiddies
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Thursday 31st August 2017 12:59 GMT TRT
Re: The WCA?
If all the clowns go out of business, will we be treading on eggshells?
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Thursday 31st August 2017 15:28 GMT Geoffrey W
Re: The WCA?
I remember an episode of The Avengers (Steed, not Marvel) where there were killer clowns running round. In it there was this guy who had all the clowns faces painted on eggs and I thought that's just too silly. Now I find it was true. Gosh!
Tomorrow I'll discover there really are man eaters from Surrey Green, and Cybernauts. Eeek!
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