Two horrible candidates are both running to be the president of our great nation! Nobody likes it! But they are the only options left and we have to pick one! In fact YOU have to pick one! Because at the end of the show the audience gets to vote for the least worst option! Introducing our candidates! Boo!

Clown can balance things on his nose, he can juggle, he can tie himself in knots, he has long skinny legs, and funny socks. He doesn’t know where a lot of things are or how to do important stuff! He wants to be president because he thinks he’ll get to wear a big fancy hat!

On the other side his opponent Puppet! Puppet is a pig! He can pop out his eyeballs, make up stories, songs, and terrible lies, he can talk in funny voices, dance on thin air, and then disappear into a suitcase. He wants to be president so he can be the one pulling the strings!

O'Ryan The O'Mazing (Clown) and Dave English (Puppet) reprise their roles in an ongoing absurdist political campaign between two hapless and at times malevolent politicians campaigning to win the presidency of the United States. Launched in the fall of 2019 "Clown Vs Puppet 2020" toured small theaters drumming up rust belt votes from people who suddenly matter- and making them laugh! Audiences roll with laughter at each performance as Clown and Puppet tackle the issues debate style with moderators and rowdy participants from the crowd! The content is ever changing as Clown and Puppet both do their level best to compete with the real-life buffoonery of the current events they satirize.

Dave English received a BFA in Theater and Puppetry from West Virginia University’s College of Creative Arts. He is a Flight School Fellow, National Puppetry Conference Alum, A Brew House Association Distillery Artist, A FINE Resident Artist at Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, a Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh Friend’s of Music Fellow, and a 2019 New Hazlett CSA Artist producing this full length puppet play, “The Dragon of Polish Hill” with added support from a Heinz Endowments Small Arts Initiative grant. Dave lives in Polish Hill making puppets and writing shows.

O'ryan 'the O'Mazing Arrowroot is a career clown. He specializes in juggling, object manipulation, stilt walking, unicycling, magic tricks, improvisation, and physical comedy. At 17 he left the farm in West Virginia where he was born and raised and began to travel wherever the whim would take him. Joining up with musicians and small circus troupes, he has found himself everywhere from orphanages and refugee camps to auditoriums and banquet halls. O’Ryan now mostly performs and teaches for an amazing spectrum of children and adults alike here in Pittsburgh and enjoys every minute of it. “I became an artist because it was the only thing that made sense. I became a clown because nothing makes sense.”

The Show Must Go On(line) is made possible thanks to generous support from the Benter Foundation, The Heinz Endowments, the Juliet Lea Hillman Simonds Foundation, the Opportunity Fund, The Pittsburgh Foundation, and an Anonymous Foundation.

Clown vs. Puppet 2020 presented by New Hazlett Theater