Send In The Clowns: A History Lesson that Could Save Your Brand
Clowns have made many significant contributions to our society. The word stupid comes from the early Roman clown character Stupidus; the highest grossing horror movie of all time, It, is a clown-powered hit; a clown represents one of the world’s largest fast foods brands. And they’re not just good at entertaining, but for other “humors” as well: In a remarkable series of studies, clowns have been shown to reduce physical pain in hospitalized children, aid the social response of dementia patients, and reduce anxiety while improving parent-child relations.
So why do we fear them?
The answer lies in branding, or more specifically, archetypes.
They Made Us Laugh
Clowns have always been entertaining, through their combination of oddity, comedy, and pure emotion, a synergy of unnatural qualities resulting in “anomaly”, the idea that strange things are more memorable. This has held true for millennia. Civilizations throughout history have employed clowns, from Ancient Egypt’s Pygmy Danga performers, the Zhou Dynasty’s famous jesters Twisty Pole and Moving Bucket, and the troubadours of Rome, who in addition to stupid, also gave us the words scurrilous (from bawdy clowns called Scurra) and morons, from buffoonish clowns called Moriones. Moving into the 17th century, Italy’s Commedia del’arte al improviso, an improvised clown comedy form, spread across European theatre and jester circles to great effect.
Clowns of this age weren’t just slapstick actors, but actually represented three distinct clown types. The Whiteface clown was the highest status “straight-man” of the comedic troupe; the Auguste or “red clown” was the fall guy, the clown getting pied, sprayed or defrocked; and the Character was a clown parody of varying professions, such as police officers, bakers, etc.
Clowns achieved superstar status in the mid 1800’s, when London’s Joseph Grimaldi was so successful, he was seen by nearly an eighth of the country’s population. His act included pantomime, impressions, and amusing acrobatics, while another clown star, Jean-Gaspard Deburau, enjoyed similar success in France. Both of their public lives were colored by darker shades as well; Grimaldi’s by an oppressive childhood, the death of his alcoholic son — a fellow clown, and pain from years of performing, while Deburau narrowly dodged a murder charge for striking and killing one heckler — a child. These titans signaled the start of the “laughing, but crying on the inside” trope that haunts the modern perception of clowns.
After this era, clownhood largely shifted from the stage to a newly emerging venue, the circus, where the demand for broader humor saw them transition to zany, more stuntman-esque figures. Risky feats, paired with their whacky sensibilities, injected a somewhat unhinged subtext to their acts, but this didn’t cause issue until much later.
Top of the Trapeze
Modern clowning reached its heyday in the 1950’s, which saw the introduction of the biggest name in clowning: Bozo the Clown. Oh, and a mascot based on his appeal, Ronald McDonald, appeared at around this time.
Bozo the Clown was a children’s entertainer and runaway success, with an immensely popular television show in the 1950’s. Not only was the Bozo brand franchised out to TV stations all over the country to create bespoke versions, but at its peak, there was a ten year wait for show tickets! Like many a corporate juggernaut, it seemed like there was no stopping the rouge-faced enterprise, until an Achilles heel emerged — children. As its audience grew broader, clowning faced a classic marketing challenge: Changing the audience changes your brand.
Bozo had hammered home the idea that the Auguste was the clown, effectively reducing clowns to over-the-top-cheery, hapless cartoons, and crowding out the more complex historical interpretations. This, plus decades of chaotic, subtly dark circus clowns cavorting unchecked created the perfect storm. As Smithsonian Magazine notes:
“Once their made-up persona became more associated with children, and therefore an expectation of innocence, it made whatever the make-up might conceal all the more frightening — creating a tremendous mine for artists, filmmakers, writers and creators of popular culture to gleefully exploit to terrifying effect.”
The Big Top Falls
In effect, clowns had changed their brand promise, triggering a shift in consumer expectations — a shift that created a catastrophic vulnerability. The ever-present mystery of what lay behind the clown’s smile began to take on a sinister cast. Humans are innately wired to read facial expressions, and are extremely confident in using them to judge the emotions of others (research shows we actually overestimate this ability). Friendly clowns, now primed in the consumer mind to conjure up terror instead of comedy, began to rapidly lose ground in the entertainment sphere to their horrifying cousins.
While the maelstrom of chilling works like Killer Klowns from Outer Space, the 1990’s IT miniseries and a real-life clown serial killer (John Wayne Gacy) didn’t do wonders for the clown image, they didn’t necessarily have to be a death blow. The 1998 biopic Patch Adams about a clown doctor marked a positive addition to the genre with its box office success, the musical group Insane Clown Posse formed and prospered starting in 1989, and the benign and omnipresent Ronald McDonald continued advertising.
Yet the new creepy aura proved hard to shake. In a 2016 international study, respondents ranked clowns as creepiest profession, ahead of taxidermist, sex shop owner and funeral director. The term coulrophobia gained mainstream acceptance in psychology, and research has shown the erratic movements, intense eye contact, and exaggerated physical traits (looking at you gloves and oversized shoes) are associated with biological fear imperatives.
So what lessons can the beleaguered bozos teach your business?
Don’t Get Pied
Consumers will create stories — you have to tell yours first.
Consider the following picture:
Most people, when asked to create a story about it, describe a huge angry monster chasing a small, scared one. They’re the same size and have the same expression — the hallway framing makes all the difference! The same holds true for our heuristics. When confronted with the unknown, our mind fills in the blanks with archetypes, hence the shift from funny to scary clown as public iconography shifted. But managed transitions are possible. If we consider movie stars like Ice Cube, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and The Rock, who successfully crossed over from rugged action and edgy acts to family-friendly fare, a pattern appears. A signature, mold-breaking work was used to christen the pivot from their original image. It’s hard to image Ice Cube going from N.W.A to 22 Jump Street without Are We There Yet? to shatter our preconceptions about what we could expect from ‘Cube.
If you’re courting a new user base, or changing your product offering, you must clearly signal what the new developments mean for your audience, otherwise you risk backlash and confusion. Your brand can evolve to embrace change, if you align its elements to consistently define the new brand, and your team stays vigilant against unintended blind spots.
Play to all the senses — it makes sense.
Clowns, other flaws aside, are always on brand. Everything about them screams happy, from the painted smiles, goofy demeanor, and bag of practical jokes. Similarly, your brand will succeed by unifying elements that naturally align with consumer psychology. Consider these shapes:
Which one is “Wooba” and which is “Kiki”? If you guessed the former was round and the latter sharp, you’re like most people — psychologically, the shape reflects your idea of the sound. If you pair complementary experiences across your user experience — say you play 1950’s music at your nostalgia-themed diner, and ship your products in vintage vinyl album covers — you can those synergies in your business!
If you learn from the clowns, you’ll be on your way to a show-stopping performance!
Taking a Bow
In addition to excellent reporting by Smithsonian Magazine, the UK Clown/Historian “Bluey”, and many primary research reports, many of the concepts in this article are in fact “Think Keys” from the new book Unlocked. My observations on expectation, storytelling, facial expressions, senses, and anomaly were greatly informed by this work — shameless plug, it’s by Olson Zaltman co-founder and Harvard Professor Emeritus Gerald Zaltman — you can check it out here for an assortment of powerful and interesting tactics to improve your thinking. Half the proceeds go to nonprofit agencies, so you can feel good too.
Alright, send in the clowns!
- P.S It’s not all bad news for clowns. In recent years they have won government office as serious candidates.
Hannibal Brooks is an Insight Associate at Olson Zaltman.
