Clown for All Workshop

Clown for All with Julia VanderVeen & Isaac Kessler: Reignite your Appetite for Play

WHEN:

Friday Oct. 13th, 6-9pm

Saturday Oct. 14th, 10-4pm

Sunday Oct. 15th, 11-4pm

WHERE:

Windmill Arts

2823 Church Street

East Point, GA 30344

*free limited parking at Windmill Arts. Free residential parking along Thompson Avenue adjacent to Windmill Arts

COST:

$180 for the entire workshop + includes one ticket to the show (Sat. 10/14 @ 7:30pm)

WHAT: 

Similar to improv, clowning asks the artist to be present and respond to things in the moment; the difference is, in this class, participants will cultivate vulnerability from physicality, using their bodies rather than their big brains to develop ideas. The clown is driven by their fierce desire for play and for pleasure. The clown is irreverent and mischievous. The clown remembers what it's like to play just for the sheer pleasure of fun. This workshop will help revitalize your creativity and get you back to the source of why you want to perform in the first place. 

I am a dancer, or an actor. How will this help me? Clown, like all techniques, is a tool for you to bring to your craft. It asks you to be super vulnerable, bringing authenticity to your work, and has great potential to be generative, spilling into your other creative outlets. More than that, it returns us to the most important relationship in the theatre: the one between the performer and the audience. The clown does not exist without the audience; theirs is a very special relationship. Learning that skill is transformative for the artist, and will greatly impact how you approach performing, no matter what your medium is. 

Also, you will laugh a lot in this workshop.

TO BRING: 

Please bring a lunch and a water bottle and wear clothes you can move in.

*Max Capacity: 15 people. Registration secures your spot. 

ABOUT JULIA & ISAAC:

Julia VanderVeen is an award-winning actor and clown, based in NYC. She apprenticed as a clown teacher under master teacher Chris Bayes at the Yale School of Drama, Juilliard, and at his private studio in Brooklyn. Julia has toured her solo show, My Grandmother’s Eyepatch,  nationally and internationally to great acclaim, including winning "Best Solo Show for Comedy" in the Orlando Fringe Festival, and "Best Solo Clown Show" in Frigid Fringe NYC. Critics have said such amazing things about Julia such as she is “Carol Burnett-esque” as well as she is “a professional actor.” Julia is a sought-after clown teacher, teaching in exciting places like Goshen, Indiana! She lives with her husband, her two cats, and her ambitious plan collection.

Isaac Kessler (He/Him) has been performing, teaching, devising, writing, directing, and producing comedy for over 18 years. He is an internationally-acclaimed and multiple Canadian Comedy Award nominee (2012/14/15/19), nominated as Best Male Improviser in 2015 and is one half of the award-winning ClownProv juggernaut 2-MAN NO-SHOW alongside his comedic soulmate Ken Hall. In 2022, with direction by Sweet Action Theatre’s Gordon Neill, Isaac premiered his solo clown show, 1-MAN NO-SHOW, which won the Artist’s Pick Award at the Edmonton Fringe - North America’s largest theatre festival. He is also an award-winning director/deviser of two solo clown shows: Julia VanderVeen’s My Grandmother’s Eyepatch, and Victoria Watson-Sepejak’s Rivulus: Poems for God. Julia won the Critic’s Choice award for BEST SOLO SHOW – COMEDY at the Orlando Fringe Festival in 2023, and was also named as TOP 20 Best of Fest in the Orlando Sentinel. In 2022 she was the recipient of the "Best Solo Clown" and "EstroGenius" awards in New York’s FRIGID Festival. Victoria was awarded the Fringe of the Fringe Award at the world premiere of their solo show in the 2023 Orlando Fringe. Isaac possesses some TV credits and features in a bunch of funny national commercials like the beer one where he performed on-camera for 4 and a half hours straight. In December 2022, Isaac collaborated with Sweet Action Theatre to create and produce A Solo Show Festival - Toronto’s first ever solo clown festival. This exciting new endeavour showcased established and emerging artists through the innovative artform of Clown Theatre. For the past 11 years, Isaac’s training has focused on Clown, Mask, Idiot Work, Bouffon, and LeCoq-based Physical Theatre with world-renowned instructors Philippe Gaulier (mentor of Sacha Baron Cohen), Paola Coletto, John Gilkey, Dr. Brown (Philip Burgers), and Aitor Basauri of Spymonkey fame. He has performed with the ground-breaking Wet The Hippo Collective by Cirque du Soleil’s John Gilkey, and Off-Broadway with Dean Evan’s visionary Bouffon troupe Mil Grus (Producer’s Award - Hollywood Fringe/Fringe Encore Series - NYC’s SOHO Playhouse). Isaac’s voice is also pretty cool. He’s been listened to over 32 millions times on YouTube’s Dodo Kids Channel! You can learn from Isaac at Sweet Action Theatre’s Ridiculous Institute of Funny, a brand new curriculum focusing on Creative play and Devised Theatre. And follow him on TikTok (@djmenorah) because he went viral once!

*No refunds or exchanges available at this time.*