Clowns can be delightful, hilarious, and sometimes even terrifying. Emmett Kelly took his Weary Willie in an entirely different direction and entertained with sadness.
1. He Was The OG
Many people find their work depressing, but Emmet Kelly made his living by being sad. Kelly was the original “sad tramp clown”, and he pivoted his Weary Willie character from the circus to Broadway, from motion pictures to TV. Heck, this clown even did opera. So, what was there to be so sad about? Among other things, a horrible betrayal by his own son.
2. He Made A Move
Emmett Kelly was born on December 9, 1898, in Sedan, Kansas. Kelly’s dad was as far from show business as you could get, The Missouri-Pacific Railroad employed him as a section foreman. But Mr Kelly had other dreams, and this meant uprooting the family to Texas County, Missouri.
Moving to a farm wouldn’t get Emmett Kelly closer to show business, but there would be one big advantage.
Arthur Fellig/International Center of Photography, Getty Images
3. He Saw Two
Living near Houston, Missouri meant that Kelly could attend the circus. When he was 11 years old he managed to visit two major circuses. It could be, at this young age, that something clicked with Kelly and the circus. Maybe he was already envisioning a future under the big tent. Unfortunately, his mom had other plans.
John Springer Collection, Getty Images
4. He Didn’t Tell His Mom
If Kelly was already thinking of working in the circus, he certainly didn’t tell his mom. Instead, she enrolled him in a correspondence course in drawing cartoons. This was the Landon School of Cartooning, and Kelly worked hard to hone his skills. Kelly‘s mom had set her son on a career trajectory of her choice. Kelly felt obligated to give it his best effort.
5. He Created A Character
When Kelly was 19 years old, he moved to Kansas City to get a job drawing cartoons for a newspaper. At this time, he developed a character he called “Old Dubey”, and the character was a tramp. He was doing what his mother had envisioned for him, but he still hadn’t forgotten his own dream.
He hadn’t forgotten about the circus.
6. He Went Up High
While trying to start a career as a cartoonist, Kelly found work in the circus. He even started to do some training. This was not in the safe world of clowning. No, Kelly was up at the top of the tent learning how to do trapeze. Now he had a big decision to make: pursue drawing or stick to his own dream of working in a circus.
In 1920, he made his decision.
7. He Dropped It
Kelly put cartooning on the back burner and decided to pursue a life in the circus. In 1921, he landed a job with Howe’s Great London Circus in Mason City, Iowa. Kelly remembered the character he’d drawn back in Kansas City—the tramp—and he decided to try making that character into a clown. He did a few performances and then dropped the tramp idea altogether.
He may have dropped the tramp, but it would soon surface in a surprising way.
State Library and Archives of Florida, Wikimedia Commons
8. He Went Up
When the American Circus Corporation bought the circus where he worked, Kelly got a new assignment. He wouldn’t be a clown anymore but instead do a solo trapeze act. In 1923, Kelly was working with a circus family known as the Moores. Sisters Mitzi and Eva had a double trapeze act, and one of them caught Kelly’s eye.
State Library and Archives of Florida, Wikimedia Commons
9. He Swung Into Love
Kelly fell in love with Eva Moore and they tied the knot on July 21, 1923. But they were more than just a married couple. The two started performing together on the trapeze. This went well until Eva got some surprising news. She was going to have to spend the next little while a little closer to the ground.
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10. America Changed
The thing that was keeping Eva off the trapeze was a pregnancy. Emmett Kelly Jr was born on November 24, 1924. It wasn’t long after they had their first child that things in America started to change. It was a troubled economy, and for many people, going to the circus was something they could easily give up to save money.
Circuses across America were closing, and Kelly needed to keep his family fed.
11. He Remembered The Tramp
While he considered himself a trapeze artist, Kelly had to pivot his career and got back into clowning. By this time, the depression had created a large mass of people—mostly men—living in poverty. Kelly saw these pitiable men in their ragged clothes, and they reminded him of the tramp he’d drawn so long ago.
Kelly thought it was a good time to bring “Old Dubey” back.
IMLS Digital Collections & Content, Flickr
12. He Brought Him Back
On April 21, 1933, Kelly was ready to introduce his tramp clown to audiences at the Chicago Coliseum. As it turned out, it would take a few years for the character to really take off. In the meantime, Kelly and Eva had a second child—Patrick. Around the same time, there was a shake-up with the ownership of the circus. Kelly got an offer to continue on, but his wife did not.
This would prove to be a problem for Kelly’s marriage.
George R. Lawrence, Wikimedia Commons
13. She Dropped Him
As a trapeze artist, dropping your partner could be a fatal situation. Luckily, Eva just wanted a divorce. Kelly took the end of his marriage hard and for a long while he felt very, very sad. So sad, in fact, that he worked his sorrow into his character. The tramp had already been blue, but now he went a few shades darker.
Newly single, Kelly now had time to focus on his career and realized he needed a change.
Florida Memory, Wikimedia Commons
14. He Borrowed A Name
Kelly’s tramp clown was getting popular, and a newspaper writer named Hype Igho started calling him “Weary Willie”. Now, this name was not new. People used it years before to talk about nameless hobos roaming across the American landscape. Igho put the idea into Kelly’s head that he should use the name for his character. Kelly took Igho’s advice, and Weary Willie was born.
Little did Kelly know, but Willie was about to soar.
15. He Crossed The Ocean
In 1937, Kelly received an incredible offer. He was going to perform in London, England. For his first performance in Europe, Kelly really wanted something that would wow audiences. What he came up with was a bit where he tries to sweep a spotlight, which of course is impossible. Audiences loved it, but there was one problem. It wasn’t Kelly’s own idea.
16. He Borrowed A Routine
The gag where Kelly tries to sweep a spotlight would eventually become his signature bit. Unfortunately, it wasn’t his. Years before, a clown named Charlie “Shorty Flem” had already done it. And it wasn’t as if he’d performed it in front of a handful of people. Flem had done it for thousands at the cavernous Madison Square Gardens.
But this bit now belonged to Kelly, and it would take him to new heights of success.
New York Public Library, Wikimedia Commons
17. He Had To Move
Thanks to the spotlight-sweeping gag, Kelly was making a good living working as a clown in the UK. That was when something large and ominous put an end to it. By the late 1930s, WWII seemed inevitable, and Kelly was ready to head back to the States. As it turned out, this move was a real boost to his career.
Photo Researchers, Getty Images
18. He Got A Big Break
Upon returning to America, Kelly almost immediately got a break: He got an offer to appear on Broadway. The show was a musical called Keep Off the Grass, and it starred Jimmy Durante and Ray Bolger. Central Park was the setting for the musical, and Kelly’s role was as one of several hobos in the park.
Kelly had his work cut out for him. He had to stand out among all the professional actors on stage.
19. He Was A Bright Spot
Unfortunately, Keep Off the Grass did not do well with critics and closed after just 44 performances. But there was a silver lining. One of the few positive comments critics made about the show was about Kelly. One critic said Kelly provided “the one moment of an otherwise uninspired show”.
Certainly, this positive comment would cement Kelly’s success.
20. He Was Really Fast
Standing out in Keep Off the Grass was good, but it didn’t do much for Kelly’s career. After the show closed, Kelly found himself working in noisy nightclubs as a tramp who drew cartoons. During his performances, he didn’t speak at all, but he did become known for an amazing ability. In the time it took most people to write down their names, he could draw eight cartoons.
It seemed that Kelly would live out his days in dingy nightclubs, and then his luck turned around.
21. He Was The Funniest
After a year and a half of nightclub work, Kelly received an offer to work for the Cole Bros Circus. The Cole Bros didn’t hold back when describing the amazing clown. They called him ‘the world’s funniest clown” and they even made his triumphs in the UK seem a little more triumphant than they were. It’s possible that the Cole Bros went a little too far in promoting Kelly.
22. They Lured Him
When the Cole Bros’ competitors, the Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey, saw the promotion of Kelly, they realized they needed him. In 1942, they were able to lure Kelly away from the Cole Bros and into their tent. But everything was not always great under the canvas at the Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey.
In fact, it was downright dangerous.
Unknown Author, Wikimedia Commons
23. There Was Trouble Under The Big Tent
On July 6, 1944, Kelly was in the dressing room getting ready to go on, when he heard someone yell “fire”. When Kelly emerged into the big tent, he saw something he would never forget. Flames had engulfed the entire circus. Kelly knew in an instant that he needed to help the terrified spectators get out safely.
But how could a clown handle a real life-threatening situation?
24. He Needed To Save Them
Strangely, it was at this time that Kelly realized he was carrying a bucket of water. Kelly ran with his bucket to one of the generator wagons that had caught on fire. Just as he was emptying his meager bucket of water, a huge tractor roared toward him. The driver of the tractor didn’t see Kelly and narrowly missed running right over him.
Firefighters eventually put the fire out, but Kelly would not soon forget these harrowing events.
25. He Was Deeply Affected
In the end, the fire cost 168 people their lives and injured another 700. Kelly saw things that had a deep impact on him. There was the temporary morgue that housed the bodies, and there was a burnt clown doll he found in the rubble. It was a horrible day, and Kelly later said he would never forget it.
As it turned out, a chance photograph would immortalize the day forever.
26. He Was Immortalized
As Kelly was making his way with his bucket to put out the fire, a member of the audience named Ralph Emerson snapped a photo. Kelly is in his full clown garb, and the sight of him—with his little bucket—would almost be funny if it weren’t for the tragic circumstances. The photo ended up in Life magazine on July 17, 1944.
Kelly had to move on and he did it in a big way.
CharmaineZoe's Marvelous Melange, Flickr
27. He Impressed An Important Person
In Los Angeles, Kelly was doing a charity event, but it ended up being a gold mine for him. You see, an agent approached Kelly about working in films. But this was no ordinary agent. He represented none other than producer David O Selznick, who’d already won an Academy Award for Gone with the Wind.
Kelly was now over 50. Was it too late to start a new career in film?
Sun staff photographer, Wikimedia Commons
28. He Found The Perfect Film
Kelly ended up signing a one-year contract with Selznick. Next, all they had to do was find a movie that suited his skills. There’d been a radio drama called The Fat Man that had an obvious plus because it featured a character that happened to be a clown. This seemed perfect until Kelly realized that he would be playing a murderous villain.
29. He Had To Put His Giant Foot Down
Kelly wasn’t sure how his fans would feel about their beloved clown playing a villain. What was worse was that the filmmakers wanted him to use his very recognizable Weary Willie makeup. Kelly had to stand up for his fans, so he refused to appear as Weary Willie in The Fat Man. It looked like this would be the end of Kelly’s career in Hollywood.
30. He Changed His Look
The director and producer actually saw Kelly’s point and allowed him to appear as a different clown in The Fat Man. Yet even with stars like Jayne Meadows and Rock Hudson, The Fat Man failed to ignite. Even the director, Willian Castle, said it had “little merit”. But something good did come out of the experience for Kelly.
31. He Stood Out
The Fat Man was Kelly’s first film role, and he was up against some seasoned actors. Despite this, Kelly’s performance shone. In the New York Times, a critic applauded Kelly’s acting and made a prediction. He said that Kelly could be successful in the movie business. Now all Kelly needed was a follow-up film.
32. He Wanted In
Emmett was back from Hollywood and working again under the big tent. Cecil B DeMille, who’d already found fame producing and directing The Ten Commandments, was filming his epic film about circuses called The Greatest Show On Earth. Kelly now had an agent, and he wanted his clown to appear in DeMille’s picture.
The only problem was that Kelly had a contract to tour with the circus.
Columbia Broadcasting System-CBS, Wikimedia Commons
33. He Didn’t Say Much
Kelly and his agent managed to persuade the circus to give him a 15-week break from the tour and shoot his role for The Greatest Show on Earth. Sadly, this wasn’t going to get Kelly further in his career as an actor. You see, in The Fat Man, Kelly played out of his clown get-up and had actual lines. In this film, Kelly only had one word of dialogue.
Now, all Kelly had to do was wait and see what this DeMille epic would do for his career.
Paramount, The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)
34. It Was A Hit
Audiences loved The Greatest Show on Earth and it ended up becoming the most successful film that Paramount had made until that point. It also took home more cash than any other film that year and was the top performer in Britain and France. Critics were not as kind, but it didn’t matter. Kelly was a part of a hit film.
Maybe Kelly was angry about having only one word in The Greatest Show on Earth because what he did next gave him more words than his entire career.
Paramount, The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)
35. He Spoke Out
After The Greatest Show on Earth hit theaters, something amazing happened. Kelly decided to speak—a lot. Instead of actually speaking, Kelly turned to writing. This was in his autobiography called Clown, My Life In Tatters and Smiles. Henry Fonda then turned the story into a CBS television special that aired on March 27, 1955.
CBS liked what Kelly brought and they were ready to use him again.
Paramount, The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)
36. He Had A Secret
Since Kelly’s life story was on CBS, the studio decided to use him on another of their shows. This was I’ve Got a Secret, where a panel tried to guess a guest’s secret. Kelly appeared on the show along with an acrobatic group called The Four Whirlwinds. Of course, no one knew what his secret was.
Well, he had one and it was a doozy.
Paramount, The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)
37. They Had To Guess
The panelists on I’ve Got A Secret had their work cut out for them. Most people didn’t even know Kelly out of makeup, and here he was sitting there on the show with a group of acrobats and a secret. What finally came out was the fact that Kelly was walking down the wedding aisle for the second time.
If that doesn’t sound like much of a secret, wait till you hear the details of the wedding.
38. He Had Three Surprises
First, Kelly surprised the TV audience by announcing that his wedding was actually on the following day. The bride was also a surprise. Evi Gebhardt was sitting right there on stage as one of the members of the group of acrobats. Surprise number three was that she was a whopping 36 years younger than him.
Kelly was 57 and his 21-year-old bride wanted what most young brides wanted.
39. He Wasn’t There
It didn’t take long for Evi to get pregnant and on November 6—just seven months after their wedding—she gave birth. Sadly, Kelly was working and not at the hospital, but two photographers took simultaneous pictures as the proud parents talked on the telephone shortly after Stasia Kelly was born.
Next, Kelly would tackle a sports problem head-on.
40. He Was A Fan
In 1957, the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team was in trouble. Ticket sales were seriously declining, and they needed a way to revive them. The owner was thinking of moving the team to LA, and fans were upset. As a last resort, the owner decided to hire Kelly to be the mascot to see if he could help the troubled ball team.
All of Brooklyn was counting on Kelly’s ability to draw a crowd.
41. He Wasn’t there Again
While he was working one of the Brooklyn Dodgers’ last games, Kelly missed another delivery. While he was playing mascot, Evi was giving birth to their second daughter, who they named Monika. Kelly now had two daughters with Evi, and he wanted to make up for missing their births by being a good dad.
There was one thing standing in his way.
42. He Wanted To Stay Home
The traveling life of a clown was hard on the family, so Kelly was looking for a job where he could stay in one place. An opportunity arose when his old friends at CBS decided to build a theme park called Pacific Ocean Park. Working a regular gig at a fixed location was just what Kelly needed to improve his family life.
Sadly, things didn’t go as planned.
Pacific Ocean Park, Wikimedia Commons
43. He Was In Charge Of Fun
Pacific Ocean Park was meant to be in direct competition with Disneyland, and to score points, CBS wanted Kelly as their “Vice President in Charge of Fun”. It seemed that the execs had forgotten that Kelly was famous for being sad. Kelly did his best, but the park closed in 1967. Once again, Kelly was in search of a job where he could stay put.
Pacific Ocean Park, Wikimedia Commons
44. He Found A Home
While continuing to look for a job that would keep him in one place, Kelly met Bill Harrah. Harrah owned a huge casino situated at the beautiful Lake Tahoe on the border of California and Nevada. Kelly took a job and performed for an astonishing 15 years with big names like Sammy David Jr, Ed Sullivan, and Carol Channing.
Kelly could have grown old there, but he was still up for new experiences.
45. He Tried Something Completely Different
In 1973—at the age of 74—Kelly tried something new. He appeared in an opera called The Bartered Bride. This was no ordinary opera, as the producer had made a name for herself creating very avant-garde work. One critic said that watching Kelly nibble on cabbage was “unforgettable”.
Next, Kelly moved from the high-brow world of opera to something a little closer to home.
46. He Hit The Small Screen
While being in the circus had attracted legions of fans, it could not compete with what television brought. Due to his appearances on TV in the 1960s and 70s, Kelly now had even more exposure. He even had a chance to appear with the amazing Bette Midler as she sang “Hello in There” to a sad-looking Willie.
Kelly was getting more and more popular, but he still had time for the circus—and more trauma.
Florida Memory, Wikimedia Commons
47. He Heard A Loud Bang
In the mid-1970s, Kelly was heading to Hawaii to appear in a circus. While still at the airport in Los Angeles, Kelly had a scare. A loud explosion terrified him and the other performers. He then saw smoke and glass flying through the air. Kelly first thought it was a joke, but it later came out that a terrorist had planted an explosive in a locker.
Kelly survived this, but his days were already numbered.
Unknown Author, Wikimedia Commons
48. He Worked Until The End
Even after turning 80, Kelly was still working. He was about to start making a film with singer Tony Bennett when tragedy struck. While in his own front yard, Kelly had a heart attack. It was the end for him, and the news quickly spread to all his adoring fans. Maybe it was Carol Burnett who said it best. She called him a “truly gentle clown”.
Kelly was ready to rest in peace, but there was one nagging concern.
Florida Memory, Wikimedia Commons
49. He Got Betrayed
One thing that probably held Kelly back from resting in peace was his relationship with his son. You see, Emmett Kelly Jr had done something unforgivable, at least in the clown world. He’d taken the character of Weary Willie and copied it. For this reason, Kelly and his son didn’t speak for many years.
Luckily, there is one thing that will keep our memories of Kelly positive.
50. We Remember Him Annually
In 1989, the International Clown Hall of Fame welcomed Kelly into its ranks. Sometime after that, something bizarre started happening. On the date of Kelly’s birthday—December 9th—people started celebrating Weary Willie day. It’s now an annual event in America and it reminds us to not take our problems so seriously.
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