Bello Nock

In case Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey’s long-standing slogan “The Greatest Show On Earth” wasn’t enough to entice circus-goers this year, the 137th installment has been dubbed Bellobration after featured performer Bello Nock. Named “America’s best clown” by Time in 2001, the Florida-born clown is a seventh-generation circus performer, and describes his highly physical act as “Jackie Chan and Evel Knievel mixed with Charlie Chaplin and Kramer,” though he’s probably known more for his supposedly natural, nearly foot-high red hair and graceful ease atop stories-high sway poles. Before Bellobration hits the United Center, The A.V. Club spoke to Nock about whether he lives up to Time’s title, what a clown-college diploma is worth, and why he’s the Thomas Edison of clowns.

The A.V. Club: Do you agree with the "America's best clown" title?
Bello Nock: You know, it sure was a shock to receive something like that. To be very honest with you, I don’t think I’m America’s best clown. I think I’m very different from most clowns. I’m more of a comic daredevil. I don’t feel like I’m the greatest clown in the world, I just feel I’m very different. Most people have a standard expectation of what a doctor would look like; they have a standard expectation of what a clown should look like. And I am very much not that style of clown. At Ringling Bros. we have 22 clowns. There are a lot of clowns, and that’s just our bosses. [Laughs.]
AVC: Why don’t you wear the traditional clown makeup?
BN: My thought is that if you aren’t sitting on the edge of your seat, you’re taking up too much room. If you’re doing what other people are doing—we don’t have enough room for more mediocrity in America. There’s plenty of it—there’s billions of us. You’ve got to shoot for the stars and have to settle for the moon. There was something called the Ringling Bros. Clown College. Most people lived a normal life their whole lives and thought, “Wow, a clown college. I’ve always been funny.” And when they’re 18 to 21, they entered clown college. I started when I was six years old, so I got the jump on it. And I’m a slow learner; it takes me two hours to watch 60 Minutes. It took me longer to get there at that young age, but there’s a lot of fun to the process. It was bred into me.
AVC: You’re a seventh-generation circus performer. How has "clown technology" changed over time?
BN: It’s amazing how clown technology has evolved. Until eight or nine years ago you could make fun of grabbing a rotary-style phone. You could go to a tire and pump it with a manual pump. Those things aren’t funny anymore. They’re still funny to grown-ups, to grandparents, because they remember those things. Now, you have to move with the times and make jokes with iPods and have computer jokes. That’s what kids are doing. So you have to stay current with the times. That doesn’t mean the joke has to change; it just means you have to change its topic. This year I designed this thing called the double wheel of steel. It’s a traditional apparatus that has been in the circus for many years. It was invented by Clay Beckett and my father Eugen Nock around 1958. They patented it. I’ve done what Thomas Edison used to do—taking someone else’s idea, improving it, and taking credit.
AVC: So you’re the Thomas Edison of clowns?
BN: Absolutely. I like taking great ideas, rediscovering them, and reinventing them to find different ways of doing them. This double wheel of steel actually breaks apart into two different sides and can counter-rotate. So when you’re recreating weightlessness in the revolutions of this thing, you can leapfrog over another daredevil stunt performer or go in the opposite direction, which makes the commotion twice as much.
AVC: How do you incorporate iPods into your act? Or is that not something you specifically do?
BN: It is. I actually carry one everywhere I go. I have an iPhone.
AVC: You do keep up with the times.
BN: I do keep up with the times. My iPhone happens to be an unusable, old-style cell phone with an eyeball glued to the front of it. It’s basically a sight gag.
AVC: Some people are creeped out by clowns. Does that bother you?
BN: I don’t think anybody was afraid of clowns until there was a word for it. I think it’s more of a hip or cool thing to say than actually being afraid. Society hasn’t helped us. Stephen King hasn’t helped us. Moms and dads haven’t helped us. But what is the one thing we teach our kids? Stay away from strangers. And clowns are strange-looking things. They’re odd, but they aren’t out to get you. They’re there to make you laugh.
AVC: How does one become a clown?
BN: There are many, many books. But how does someone become a clown? Honestly, the clown is born with the person. There are plenty of schools; there are some schools here in Chicago. There is a flying-trapeze school here in Chicago.
AVC: What do you get when you graduate clown college?
BN: A rubber nose. No, I’m joking. You get a diploma, but it’s the same as any other degree. You have to go out and earn it. In entertainment, you’re only as good as your last performance. I’d say that’s not the same thing in the real world—you have to continually perform to earn your next paycheck. There are many things a person has to learn, and that is good balance—metaphorically and physically, you have to learn what jokes you can and cannot do, what jokes are appropriate, what limit you should set knowing your audience.
AVC: You married your high-school sweetheart, but how hard would it be to ask girls out in a clown car?
BN: It’s not hard to ask. It’s dealing with the rejection. [Laughs.] Being a clown isn’t different from being a human being. Everyone’s human, everyone’s got their own style, and when something looks perfect on the outside, the book usually isn’t that interesting. So, it takes all kinds. Dressing up like a clown is only two hours out of the day. There are 22 hours out of the day when you have to be a normal person, or at least fit into society. Who knows what normal is?