Circus monkeys, deep down, are mean.
A former circus clown once told me that a decent circus monkey is only good for about seven or eight years until he decides to retire, which can come at any time: hanging around the other monkeys, in the middle of a show, whenever it occurs to the monkey that he’s had enough of the carnival lifestyle.
No one ever knows when, exactly, a monkey suddenly says to himself, “OK, had enough,” but when he does, here’s what happens:
He begins, I was told, by stopping in the middle of whatever he’s doing. The monkey freezes, heaves a tremendous sigh, and then begins to wave his arms slowly in a crisscross fashion above his head, sort of like a member of the ground crew at an airport. Except instead of guiding your flight to the gate, it’s a gesture of surrender.
It’s also a warning. Because when the monkey stops waving his arms, he attacks.
Yes, attacks. Something inside him snaps, I guess. All those years of silly hats and tiny vests and hopping around for the crowds, the performing and traveling and years in a cage — all of it just wells up in him, and the minute he’s done, the minute he says to himself, “Yeah, um, not so much of this anymore,” the pent-up rage comes pouring out of him in an immediate and frenzied cascade of shrieking violence.
A lot of us can relate to the feeling. But here’s where it gets sad:
The person he attacks, mostly, is the clown on stage with him, the person who more than anyone was his closest human friend, his partner in show business. When the monkey is done, he’s done, and the one who pays the ultimate price is the poor clown who never sees it coming. Loyalty goes out the window.
The former clown who explained all of this to me did so in a shaking and quivery voice. It’s important to know, he told me, that monkeys are vicious. They’re excellent street fighters, totally unencumbered by the rules and traditions of a fair fight. There’s biting and scratching and eye-gouging and every kind of below-the-belt violence. A monkey can quite literally tear a person’s face off. Plus, they scream. “You can’t imagine the screaming,” he said with a shudder.
I know what you’re thinking. Surely some of the other clowns will come to the rescue? That’s where you’re wrong. The other clowns on stage at the time just back away. When a monkey goes rogue, no clown will come to your aid. That’s just the way clowns are — every clown for himself. There is no loyalty among clowns, either.
So, picture it: a crazed monkey, spitting and clawing with every limb; a terrified, battered clown, face streaked with blood and greasepaint, wig torn to shreds, begging for help, for someone, anyone, to get this monkey away from him; the other clowns backing away slowly; the other monkeys watching, waiting, thinking. And then, it’s all over. The monkey, exhausted, collapses. The clown, whimpering and bloody, is raced to the emergency room.
And the show goes on.
My friend, the former circus clown, made it clear that he doesn’t blame the monkey. A circus monkey, after all, is an underpaid and overworked performer, protected by neither a collective bargaining arrangement nor a single Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulation. The circus monkey is exploited, pure and simple, because he’s cute and funny and can delight an audience.
It’s the other clowns, the coward clowns, who are the real villains here. They’re the ones who refuse to stand up and do what’s right.
The monkey-clown relationship is emblematic, unfortunately, of a lot of relationships we all find ourselves in. There are monkey-clown marriages and monkey-clown business partnerships and monkey-clown pairings up and down the organizational chart of a typical corporation. So, it’s a useful exercise, every now and then, to look around and ask yourself, “When the monkey comes for me, which one of these clowns is going to have my back?”
The answer may surprise you. It may not be the smartest clown you know, or the richest, or even the one who is the most closely related. Loyalty is a tough quality to measure, especially before it’s been tested. Perhaps a better and more uncomfortable question to ask is, “Which one of these clowns will I fight a monkey for?”
That answer may surprise you, too.
Rob Long is a television writer and producer and the co-founder of Ricochet.com.
