To win the love of his clown father— as well as the audience— Lorenzo Pisoni drives his body through every pratfall in the standard clowning handbook. The result is exhausting.

Humor Abuse. Created by Lorenzo Pisoni; directed by Erica Schmidt. Philadelphia Theatre Company production through October 25, 2009 at Suzanne Roberts Theatre, 480 S. Broad St. (at Lombard). (215) 985-0420 or www.philadelphiatheatrecompany.org.

Son of Pagliacci

“The fox knows many things,” the ancient Greek poet Archilochus famously observed, “but the hedgehog knows one big thing.” Lorenzo Pisoni, protagonist of the aptly titled Humor Abuse, knows many things: how to pop out of a box, do a standing flip, tap dance, tumble down a flight of stairs, balance a hat on his nose, dodge falling sandbags and drop off a high ladder. But he’s too sweet to be a fox, and he lacks the hedgehog’s grasp of one big thing: how to make an audience laugh or cry.

To some extent, this notion— that comedy is a serious business— is the point of Pisoni’s one-man show-and-tell. As he explains, he’s the son of a clown and yearned for his father’s love and approval but never quite got it because “I’m not funny.” His father subsequently retired with a broken back; and now, it seems, Pisoni longs for our love and attention.

In the course of 90 literally abusive minutes, Pisoni drives his body through virtually every pratfall in the clowning handbook, gratuitously demystifying his craft by spilling several cherished clowning secrets. To what end? “Tragedy inspires comedy,” Pisoni quotes his father. Maybe so. But the result here is neither tragic nor comic nor enlightening; it’s just exhausting.♦


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