The Theatre School at DePaul is known for fostering specific and niche talents, ranging from costume technology to comedy arts. What started as an informal “Juggle Club” has now evolved into DePaul Amateur Circus Club– a full-fledged TTS organization with weekly meetings, a faculty advisor and active participating members.
Spearheading the operation is William LaMaster, president or “ringmaster” of DePaul Amateur Circus Club. LaMaster is a third-year comedy arts major at TTS with a love for clowning.
“My main wheelhouse is being a comedian, performer, artist. I’m a fight choreographer, I’m a writer, I’m an actor, I teach, I like branching out into voice acting when I can,” LaMaster said.
The club rehearses a variety of physical comedy tricks such as acrobatics, juggling, clowning makeup and physical artistry, alongside a variety of other skills.
The origins of the Circus Club came from an informal group of people, including LaMaster, that came together to practice juggling skills.
“And then I started telling people where I was on Wednesday afternoons, and more people ended up coming in, until we had amassed like half-dozen to a dozen,” LaMaster said.
Once the founding student graduated, LaMaster expressed, “we didn’t want juggle club to go away, because it not only served as a great way to learn circus skills — it was a community that we found our first place in, so we wanted to make sure that it survived, turning it into a club.”
Since then, the club has developed an executive board consisting of a “vice ringmaster,” treasurer and social media manager. According to LaMaster, everything for Circus Club has been a labor of love for the club members, as they are on the road to becoming an official DePaul-affiliated student organization.
Persephone Almato, vice ringmaster and a second-year comedy arts student, expressed her love for the club.
“I’ve been doing circus since I was five,” Almato said. “I think honestly, this is the perfect sort of springboard for everything I want to do in my life. I want to be a circus performer.”
Almato also touched upon the safety and community in the Circus Club, noting that it “provides a safe space for all of these different people to get to be silly and let loose.”
Similarly, club member and DePaul freshman Gabriel Thompson expressed how welcomed he felt into the community.
“I came in not knowing anyone, and now I feel like I’m really close with all these people — and I’ve only been to three meetings,” Thompson said.
While some may laugh at the concept of a Circus Club for DePaul students, LaMaster finds authenticity in the art of clowning.
“I think that clowning and clown artistry, at its core, is an exercise of generosity and sharing, because clowns are basically vehicles of emotion,” LaMaster said.
LaMaster also describes clowning as one of the most engaging artforms for viewers, as there is an intense audience-performer relationship during shows.
“Anything that a good clown does is come out, and immediately lock eyes with the audience and introduce themselves, because whatever that clown is about to do, they want to take the audience along with it,” LaMaster said.
DePaul Amateur Circus Club meets every Tuesday from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. in TTS Room 401, with each meeting focusing on a different aspect of clowning. For more details on how to get involved, follow the club on Instagram.
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