Playing with your balls

>> Juggler and artist revives the ancient
and glorious traditions of vaudeville

by CHRIS BARRY

Name: Aytahn Ross

Age: 34

Occupation: Juggler/Circus artist

Bio: This adventurous Plateau stud was born in Montreal but moved to Winnipeg at an early age where his mother, “rather than put me into hockey school,” enrolled the somewhat pudgy youngster into theatre school instead, where young Aytahn developed a strong interest in both hackeysack and juggling. A good thing too, because apparently the demand for quality pubescent jugglers in Manitoba at the time was so great that he “started getting gigs without even really wanting them.” Returning to Montreal in the mid-’90s to study liberal arts at Concordia, an education financed entirely through scholarships and his juggling/circus talents, upon graduation he started looking to put his ever-pragmatic university degree to work for him but soon came to realize “I was already doing something I was good at” and decided to devote all his energies to becoming a full-time “actor/performer guy” instead. Now a globetrotting independent circus performer who’s wowed both Serbian mafia bosses and our current Canadian Prime Minister, Aytahn will be juggling up a storm this weekend at Théâtre Ste-Catherine as part of Circo d’Hiverno (www.circusmontreal.com).

How in the hell could there ever be so much work for a fucking teenage juggler? “Because there were only maybe five or 10 of us in Manitoba who could do it, so I’d get lots of gigs at festival events like Canada Day, the Winnipeg Folk Festival, that kind of thing. I’d make maybe $75 for an afternoon, just farting around having fun, when other kids I knew would have to work weeks at a paper route to earn the same money.”

Is it safe to assume a pudgy kid into juggling needs to learn how to defend himself once the other kids at school learn about his passion? “Yeah, it was pretty much a, ‘Let’s beat this kid up’ thing. Even today, it’s misunderstood. It’s a weird thing being an artist. Everyone is always waiting for you to go get what they think is a ‘real job.’”

Some streets where Aytahn has spent a lot of time working: Those throughout the continent of Europe. “But I’m not only a street performer. I’m more an artist who is also comfortable working outdoors. Some people are very proud to be street performers, and that’s fine, but I’ve worked big rooms like Massey Hall in Toronto too. And I really like it, you know.”

What kind of a fucked-up promoter books a juggling act into Massey Hall? “Well, my act consists of more than just juggling. I use music, I do a mouth-juggling with ping pong ball bit, there’s comedy. But it’s all very simple, it’s kind of tongue in cheek, you know?”

What a “mouth-juggling with ping pong ball bit” is about: “It’s an old vaudeville juggling standard that’s done fairly rarely these days. So many old vaudeville tricks like this have just sort of disappeared. You really don’t see them much anymore. Essentially I put ping pong balls in my mouth, spit them up in the air and then catch them again, literally with no hands. It’s incredibly absurd and ridiculous.”

Last book read: Guerrilla Publicity, by Levinson, Lublin, Steisel, Frishman.

Musical preferences: Beethoven, Coltrane, Leonard Cohen.

Words of wisdom: “A wise man once told me that you are best at what you do most.”

Comments: dimwit@hdot.net