Shakes the Clown (1991)

Directed by

Bobcat Goldthwait

Genre

comedy thriller, black comedy film

Country

United States

Runtime

1h 27m

Rated

R

Rating

5.4 of 10 from 92 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A clown named Shakes stumbles through a seedy world of competing clown communities, where alcoholism and petty rivalries fuel his disastrous life. The movie mocks the pretentious, cliquey nature of performance art and stand-up comedy.

satiricaldarkly comicgrimyrawcerebralbleakdeadpanunsettling

What happens

Shakes the Clown is a 1991 American black comedy film, written and directed by Bobcat Goldthwait, who performs the title role. It also features Julie Brown, Blake Clark, Paul Dooley, Kathy Griffin, Florence Henderson, Tom Kenny, Adam Sandler, Scott Herriott, LaWanda Page, Jack Gallagher, and a cameo by Robin Williams as Mime Jerry using the pseudonym "Marty Fromage". The film is a satire of performance art and portrays different communities of clowns and other performers as clannish, rivalrous subcultures obsessed with precedence and status. Goldthwait made the film as a satire of the dysfunctional standup comedy circuit at the time he was first starting out as an entertainer. The film was widely panned upon its release, but in recent years, it has since become a cult classic, with particular focus on how the film handled the serious topic of alcoholism. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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