Healing through hope and humour

BENGALURU:  When city-based dramatist Prithesh Bhandary decided to take up clowning in mid-2022, 
he was going through a difficult phase personally. It was neither professional nor amateur. Along with half a dozen like-minded artistes, Bhandary would put up impromptu performances on the streets of Bengaluru, to the delight of some and annoyance of others. “If you saw a couple of people troubling others with their creepy smiles at Church Street last year, it was most likely us!” he laughs. 

Now, several months later, Bhandary and his group are putting smiles on a varied group of people – from patients suffering from chronic diseases, hospital staff, children in orphanages and more – through therapeutic clowning. “It got me out of a difficult phase in life, and now we are cheering others who are going through hard phases in their own lives,” Bhandary adds. 

Originally started as a way to meet the psycho-social needs of children in the early ’80s, therapeutic clowning has slowly gained traction as a way to use humour as a tool to reduce stress and anxiety among adult patients, especially ones suffering chronic diseases, as well. 

“When we started, we would do impromptu performances on the streets of Cubbon Park, Lal Bagh and more. People mostly rejected us, and it was tough. But over time, we found ways to turn that initial rejection into laughter,” Bhandary says, adding,  “We soon started performing at orphanages. The reception we got from both the children and caretakers motivated us to continue. Until then, I hadn’t considered medical clowning, it’s quite rare in India. But one of my mentors, Igor Narovski, was a medical clown. So, I thought we should try it.” 

The group initially performed at government hospitals, later at disability and cancer hospitals, to mostly positive reception. “Not only have the patients received us positively but also the staff. Hospitals can be stressful work environments for nurses. And when we go there and lighten the mood, they appreciate it,” Bhandary says, adding that a father of a patient suffering from cancer once told him that he was grateful for their performance, after seeing his son smile after a long time.  

While clowning demands that the performer understand the audience, being a therapeutic clown 
requires the performer to be sensitive to a patient’s needs and realise when to keep their distance. Bhandary shares that oftentimes, their visits to the hospital would involve just reading to patients and keeping them company rather than performing any of their usual acts. 

With nearly a decade's worth of experience in theatre, having worked with several city-based drama troupes, Bhandary considers clowning an integral part of an actor’s training. “Most people just associate clowning with physical comedy. That’s very reductive. A clown is someone who is in command of his feelings and is able to effectively express them to an audience. I believe every actor should be well-versed in clowning because it teaches you how to be physically expressive and how to hold the audience’s attention. It demands a different set of physical strength, training and conditioning,” he shares.