Everyone has a “Larry,” agreed Candy Roberts; hers dropped by one day down from Campbell River, put his feet up, made himself at home and has been part of her professional life ever since.
“He’s based on my family,” admitted the award-winning clown artist, who is bringing her loveable-if-misguided alter ego to Salt Spring for a single night Thursday, Jan. 22. “My brother speaks in idioms; he’s all, ‘fly at ‘er, Candy!’ or ‘fill yer boots, Candy’ or ‘whatever floats yer boat.’”
Roberts chuckled. “He even makes idioms up, and they don’t make any sense — and I’m like, ‘let me get my pen!’”
Larry has been described as “Bob and Doug McKenzie meets Gloria Steinem,” a send-up of a particular brand of heart-of-gold honesty Roberts said seems to increasingly appear the further one roams above the 49th parallel.
“I can’t tell you how many people have messaged me and said, ‘Oh my god, that’s my uncle up north — are you channelling my uncle?” she said. “I’ve toured this show across Canada — it’s always somebody’s uncle ‘up north,’ no matter where we are!”
Larry’s the first person to pull over if he sees you broken down on the side of the road, she said, and the most eager to help you sort out any problem — regardless of how well he knows the topic.
“And he might say some sexist things while he’s doing it, but, you know,” Roberts laughed. “‘That’s just Larry being Larry.’”
The show is certainly a bit of a poke at stereotypes. Growing up in the ‘70s and ‘80s, according to Roberts, there was a conditioning for girls to “just be quiet and do all those ‘feminine’ things.”
“It was a little different, right?” said Roberts. “It’s been fun to see what it’s like to have the confidence of an average white guy, to play with never being wrong — because Larry’s never wrong! He’s always got an answer. Whatever he says — and it can be so, so dumb — he’s like ‘yep, that’s how you do it.’”
Sometime in 2017, while she was studying as part of a clowning group, Roberts put on a fake beard and “started acting like my dad.”
“And my cohorts were just killing themselves laughing,” she said. “They thought it was hilarious, and I’m like, ‘but I haven’t even said any jokes!’”
What followed was a refinement of the act and sold-out runs from Vancouver to Orlando, alongside a host of awards — including Pick of the Fringe Vancouver in 2019 and Best of the Fests in the Fringe Encore Series at the historic SoHo Playhouse in New York City — as the brilliantly stupid “well-meaning hoser” continued to win over audiences wherever people identified with having “that one friend.”
Sometimes, Larry will say the most profoundly sexist things, Roberts said. While he might not set out to cause harm, the show inescapably highlights how often women find themselves forced to decide whether to let those kinds of remarks slide.
“He’s loveable, but on a deeper level, we do get tired of that stuff,” said Roberts. “Playing Larry has been really healing in that way. It’s sort of taking the piss out of the patriarchy.”
Based in Vancouver, Roberts’ connection to Salt Spring comes partly from a decades-long friendship and working relationship with local physical comedy performer Nayana Fielkov and her “Geezer” father Sid Filkow. Social media is abuzz with speculation that the legendary Salt Spring Hysterical Society member may appear in Thursday night’s show, but Roberts remained coy.
Apart from warnings for flashing lights and haze, coarse language, some nudity and a lot of mentions of alcohol — “Larry really likes to drink Lucky beer” — Roberts said Larry’s Salt Spring audience should mostly just be ready to laugh, and maybe have a bit of a cry.
“That’s the thing about clowning,” she said. “Laughing will open you up, then the clown will punch you in the heart and make you feel something.”
Larry’s bigger goal, Roberts said, is to help people connect — even something as small as brief eye contact with a person beside you can be meaningful, especially while you’re laughing together. Larry’s a pretty big character, she said, and he can help audiences create that shared space for some much-needed joy.
“There’s a lot going on in the world today, it’s a heavy place,” said Roberts. “I think we have to remember the joyful parts.”
Showtime for Larry on Jan. 22 is 7:30 p.m. Tickets are available at ArtSpring and via candyroberts.com.