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Volume 1, No. 8. May 18, 2001

No clowning around
A week from today Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk in California is scheduled to open its new 3D Funhouse, a walk-through dark attraction. It's themed on clowns, including a giant Bozo-like mug over the building's entrance. It otherwise would be an easy attraction for the Boardwalk's Communications Manager Jan Bollwinkel-Smith to promote, except for one problem. She has a fear of clowns. "Everybody else will think it's cute," she said of the building facade. "To me it's creepy."

It's not a serious phobia that requires therapy or medication, but it is enough to give her the creeps. "I'm not freaked out about them, but I am uncomfortable with them," she said. This trepidation of clowns goes back to her early childhood, and though she cannot pinpoint its roots, she knows its cause. "I think it's all related to the fact that they are not really what they are. And they were just weird looking."

Many park public relations people have a fear of coasters and will forego riding some of their property's prime drawing cards. Similarly, Bollwinkel-Smith will have to deal with escorting media to the Funhouse, but not in it. "I think I'll go through it once and get it over with so I can at least tell people what's in there. If the media comes, they go by themselves." She also has to forge a way to promote the attraction without letting her bias interfere. Already, a first draft of a press release used the phrase "Clown-chilling effects," but other staff thought the language too strong. "They said, 'Oh, it's not that scary.' To me it's, 'Oh, yes it is.'"

She has no problem riding roller coasters— "As long as there is not a clown on them"—and she enjoyed the Boardwalk's annual haunted house. Being startled by a skeleton or ghoul popping out of nowhere is fun; but in the Funhouse, 'The idea of a clown popping out makes me shiver when I think about it." The Funhouse also has a room of mirrors. "So it won't be just one clown, but millions of them when you look in the mirror."

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