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Henderson (2016). Clowning has been a significant weapon in history, to ridicule 
the authority and break the “hegemonologue view of protest” (on phone), from the 
jesters in the monarchy, who mimicked the power they entertained, to Jacques 
Lecoq’s red-nosed clown. The clown has acted as a break from societal pressures, 
allowing clowns to be loud, rebellious, and to mimic the “circus” in power. The 
60s and 70s focused on a self-determining clown with a simple red nose, mainly 
due to the work of Lecoq. Most importantly, clowning, like verbatim, has power in 
times of economic and political downfall. Clowning can occur with something as 
simple as your body or a red nose. It opposes orthodox upper-class theatre. More-
over, throughout history, it has been representative of the working class attempt-
ing to dismember authority through its mischief, commonly commenting on both 
economic and political injustices, such as groups like CIRCA, proving its value for 
grassroots activism, through its ability to break the Spectacle.  
Both Verbatim and Clowning focus on the breaking of the Spectacle. Their  
significance relies on their ability for individualism and community. Verbatim 
can tell individual stories, which represent communities and inform the truth of 
marginalised groups which are commonly manipulated by authorities. Similarly, 
clowning holds individual power for an activist. The aesthetic of Verbatim is  
powerfully represented through Lung theatres E15. Lung Theatre is a  
“Campaign-led Arts Charity” (Lung Theatre). E15 is a campaign which focuses on 
the voices of single mothers and the idea of “social cleansing’’. The economic and 
political aspects of this project is why Verbatim is a great means to break the  
Spectacle of what is believed about working class families and council houses. 
The ideologies which have been spread around working class mothers and council 
houses come from an economical and hierarchical power. Hegemonic judgement 
of these women, disregarding them, but also inhibiting them from changing their 
situations, is a systematic issue which disregards human rights to allow the  
capitalist society to stay at large. The view of these working-class women is  
monolithic, exacerbated by the media we consume every day. Examples such as 
[the TV series] Little Britain (2003-6) demonstrate this dehumanisation of  
working-class mothers E15 attempts to disrupt.  
There are of course discussions on the limitations of Verbatim. Verbatim “Poses 
texts as testimonies ... seeming to offer transparent access to the truth’’ (Harvie 
2021). However, as Jen Harvie mentions, these testimonies are open to as much 
deception as the mass media. She argues that Verbatim is only reliable at its own 
discretion, which is valuable criticism; however, it takes away the value of 
 Verbatim itself. Verbatim theatre interviewees are rarely paid, unlike the pockets of 
the councils/funding relying on these testimonies to remain unheard: the  
commodification of truth is higher in the houses of parliament than among the 
mothers of Newham. As Harvie states there is a possibility of deception, yet this 
can be used as a tool in Verbatim, through Détournement. Language is  
commonly used to misinform the public about marginalised groups, as we’ve seen 

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