The End is Near and Dear

Refurbishing a wooden sloop for the first time is an act of faith. So, first off forget about having things go according to plan. It is like the rest of life things don’t usually go that way. Life goes its way and you try to ride the wave or get the hell out of the […]

The Land Yacht… When Dreams were Big and Fuel was Still Cheap

I found my Streamliner in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It was the ultimate. I mean it was the full fantasy. In 1974 I was on the back lot at Circus Vargas. We had jumped over from St. Louisto see the show in Springfield, Missouri. They’d come off a mud lot and the trucks and trailers that […]

You’ve Got to See it With Your Own Eyes

I went once for a look at the Race for the Pole at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Whatever it is I was supposed to see I saw. Whatever I expected the experience to be like turned out to be true. The pig barn at the county fair stinks. The top fuel dragsters in Fremont smoked […]

Cast Your Fate to the Wind

PHOTOGRAPH BY SHELIA LAVERY Must have been that some of the worlds greatest sailors listened to Vince Guaraldi’s hit song, Cast Your Fate to the Wind. I’m no expert. What do I know? I’m looking at the same thing everyone else is looking at. I see a mark on the water and imagine how I […]

The Road that Never Ends

Pulling off a national tour means you need a reliable vehicle. Here I am installing my fourth motor into my ’67 Ford. I did all my own work. The first few rebuilds were not so good, but they got better and lasted longer with practice. Note the camper shell. This shell was scrapped and a […]

Worth a Try

I find some of my earliest material from my show embarrassing. I would have preferred to have come out of the starting blocks with a perfect beginning. My first few years consisted of a wide range of elements. There was juggling, magic, mindreading, sketch comedy, puppetry, water-spitting, springboard acrobatic stunts, and handbalancing. I tried […]

Street Show as Heart Song

My career in show business spans almost four decades. For many years I have presented somewhere around 300 performances per year. That’s a solid number. Some years I didn’t do that many shows and in other years it is likely that I approached as many as 750. There were a chunk of years that I […]

Sometimes I Played for Elephants

Touring a show by truck is a different experience from flying to an airport, renting a car, staying at a hotel, and getting all your meals in restaurants. I arranged my pickup truck to fit my show equipment and everything I would need to eat and sleep while traveling. To travel in this […]

Street Performing as Spoken Word

Dana Smith Harlequin Street Theater from 1978 My approach to street theater has placed particular emphasis on words. It is the power of the spoken word when combined with visual elements, and situational moments that can be one of the most effective tools when building a successful show. In the vernacular of the […]

The Great Romance of Street Theater

Developing an efficient way of stopping pedestrians is not so simple. It is a trial and error process. Eventually each act finds something that does the trick. Some acts are incredibly skillful at gathering an audience. There are all kinds of street shows. People present all kinds of skills. Some people work silent, others talk. […]