paint, or have their trousers ripped off. The base colour for the auguste makeup is red or flesh tone. The eyes and the mouth are encircled in white and the features are highlighted, again, traditionally in red and black. The auguste is usually costumed in baggy plaids accented with colourful polka dots or loud stripes. They boast wide-collared shirts, long neckties, unruly coloured wigs and oversized noses and shoes. Notable examples of augustes in the circus history include Albert Fratellini, Lou Jacobs, Greg and Karen DeSanto, Coco the Clown, and Charlie Rivel. The character clown The character clown adopts an eccentric character of some type, such as a butcher, a baker, a policeman, a housewife or hobo. Prime examples of this type of clown are the circus tramps Otto Griebling and Emmett Kelly. On film, Red Skelton, Harold Lloyd, Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin would all fit the definition of a character clown. (Note: Nowadays, the hobo or tramp clown is often considered a separate class and is treated as such in competitions at clown conventions.) The character clown makeup is a comic slant on the standard human face. Their makeup starts with a flesh tone base and may make use of anything from glasses, mustaches and beards to freckles, warts, big ears or strange haircuts. The most prevalent character clown in the American circus is the tramp or hobo clown with a thick five-o'clock shadow and wearing shabby, crumpled garments. When working in a traditional trio situation, the character clown will play "contre-auguste" (a second, less wild auguste), siding with either the white or red clown. Sometimes they are more cunning and less dim than the auguste. Notable examples of character clowns in the circus include, Dev Chaube, Barry Lubin, Bill Irwin, David Shiner, Geoff Hoyle, Charlie Cairoli, Oleg Popov, and Bello Nock. Examples of the contre-auguste character in non-circus trios include Larry Fine of the Three Stooges and Chico Marx of the Marx Brothers. Gags The American circus term for a clown's act is "gag"; Europeans refer to it as an "entrée", and amateur clowns sometimes refer to it as a "skit" or "sketch". Gags are the clown's written and rehearsed performances. They can take place in the ring (a ring gag or production gag), on the track (a track gag or a walkaround) or in the seats. They can be done solo, with the ringmaster, with other