“This thing gives permission to find meaning in nonsense, and that nonsense is often the place where sense begins, and opens the door to an unhinged expression.”
JOHN GILKEY, he/him/his
John is the Founder and Creative Director of The Idiot Workshop.
He has performed internationally for more than thirty-five years in circus, variety, comedy clubs, theater and television. Beginning in 1987, he spent four years as clown, acrobat and featured juggler with The Pickle Family Circus. This troupe is widely recognized as a pioneer in the contemporary circus movement.
In 1996, John joined the popular French Canadian troupe, Cirque Du Soleil. In his first production with Cirque, he created and played the lead character for the show entitled Quidam. His collaboration with Cirque Du Soleil continued to grow with the creation and performance of clown numbers for the shows Dralion, Varekai and Iris. John also wrote for and appeared in the Cirque Du Soleil television program Solstrum. With Cirque Du Soleil alone John has performed live for more than four million people.
In 2002 John was invited to Pixar Studios to consult on the physical comedy routines that were eventually included in the Oscar winning film Ratatouille. John also consulted for Pixar on the character voices in the Pixar short film, La Luna.
Additionally John worked with acclaimed director Franco Dragone to create Le Reve, a water spectacle for the Wynn Hotel and Casino, in Las Vegas. As “Comedy Concepteur,” John was in charge of casting a team of seven clowns and, with them, developing the comic material for the the show. With a budget of over $135 million, this show stands as one of the most spectacular in the world.
John continues to create challenging and experimental theater in California, including shows like We Are Nudes which earned a Best of the Fringe award in the 2009 San Francisco Fringe Festival and Wet The Hippo which was nominated for Best Comedy in the 2013 Hollywood Fringe Festival.
John now spends most of his time leading The Idiot Workshop and various Wet The Hippo productions in Los Angeles.
BLAIR BOGIN, she/her/hers
Blair Bogin is a video artist and hermetic-warrior whacko queen >> a counseling astrologer and physical theater clown. Her work combines documentary story-starry-telling with surrealist humor. Blair received her MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and was a William Merchant R. French Fellowship recipient. She was an artist-in-residence at HATCH Projects, ACRE, Elsewhere Museum, Ox-Bow, Platte Forum Colorado, Hub14 Performance in Toronto, The Future Mpls & Visual Studies Workshop in Rochester, NY.
She has performed live at Pitchfork Music Festival, The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center NYC, The Chicago Cultural Center & The Poetry Foundation. Her video art has been exhibited around the USA and Canada including Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, VIVO Media Arts Center and Temple Contemporary.
When she's not obsessing over the universe at www.sisterbride.com, she's lying motionless on the floor or co-running the creative activist group Operation Project in LA.
IAN BRATSCHIE, he/him/his
Ian Bratschie came from Michigan by way of Chicago. With Wet The Hippo he has performed with The Murge, The Greatest Show in the Back of a Truck We Rented, and The Invention of Language. He has been on television on Criminal Minds, Chicago PD, School of Rock, Chicago Fire, The Mob Doctor, and a recurring role on Modern Family. Ian has also been the hero in many commercials including DIRECTV, Chase Bank, Tostitos, McDonalds, Samsung, Bic, Peak Motor Oil, and Dunkin' Donuts. He is a graduate of I.O. and the Second City Comedy Studies program in Chicago, and of both The Groundlings and UCB here in LA. He has studied clown with Paola Coletto, Jet Eveleth, and Philip Burgers, and has been studying with John Gilkey for over a millennia. He also has a dog.
AMRITA DHALIWAL, she/her/hers
In addition to teaching at the Idiot Workshop, Amrita is an adjunct professor of comedy at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. For more information about Amrita, her training or her work, check out amritadhaliwal.com.
KEVIN KRIEGER, he/him/his
Kevin is a performer, writer and content creator. He has trained at Upright Citizens Brigade, The Pack Theater (formerly known as The Miles Stroth Workshop), and The Idiot Workshop since its early beginnings. He began his comedy career as an improviser, and, since joining The Idiot Workshop, has applied the work to stand up, clown, sketch and to visual and written narrative storytelling. He performs regularly with Wet The Hippo in The Murge as well as The Greatest Show in the Back of a Truck We Rented, which he co-produces with Tyler Watson. He is a regular performer at Scot Nery’s Boobie Trap and a member of The Innocents Clown Show, a collective performance group focused on developing classic clown bits and solo character sketches.
MEERA ROHIT KUMBHANI, she/her/hers
Meera Rohit Kumbhani is an actor, writer, teacher, and clown. On television, she has been a series regular on FOX's "Weird Loners" and USA's Donny!" and has appeared in numerous other shows and films, including "This is Us", "The Lincoln Lawyer," "The Mindy Project," "Life in Pieces," "Shameless," Uncorked, A Futile & Stupid Gesture, and many more. She also works extensively in theater and has originated roles in several world and NYC premieres, including Ayad Akhtar's The Who and the What and Kate Attwell's Testmatch. She's performed with Classic Stage Company, Ensemble Studio Theater, Playwrights' Horizons, Ma-Yi, La Jolla Playhouse, ACT, and more. She has an MFA in Acting from Columbia University where she trained under Kristin Linklater and Olympia Dukakis.
She has studied clown for over a decade with Christopher Bayes and John Gilkey. Since 2017, she has been teaching core "idiot" (physical comedy) classes at The Idiot Workshop as well as her signature acting class Acting as Disaster. She spent 2 years performing and touring a clown show she co-devised with her fellow performers called WOM, directed by John Gilkey. and performs regularly with the Idiot Workshop's flagship show, The Murge.
ZACHARY STEEL, he/him/his
Zachary is a performer and teacher specializing in clown. He is an assistant professor of theatre practice and head of comedy at the USC School of Dramatic Arts. where he also teaches acting, improv, movement, and a critical studies class on comedy and performance. Zach serves as director of SDA’s medical clown program, a training program to bring clowns into hospitals and other healthcare sites to improve the healing process through creativity and joyful interaction. This program is the heart and soul of Zach’s body of work as it takes the theatre makers out of their formal houses to transform the spaces in which we heal. He has extensive performance experience throughout LA and New York, and has taken shows to São Paolo, Brazil, and The Telluride Playwrights Festival in Colorado. He has appeared on several television shows for NBC, The Disney Channel, Cartoon Network, Comedy Central and Fox.
CLAIRE TITELMAN, she/her/hers
Claire Titelman is an actor, writer and Andy Kaufman Award-nominated stand-up comedian based in L.A and is an original member of Wet the Hippo. A roundtable regular on Chelsea Lately, Claire’s appeared on New Girl, Parks and Recreation, Wilfred, Veronica Mars and Cold Case. Her solo show Lemons Are for Emergencies Only received rave reviews at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and she’s performed at top national comedy festivals like Bridgetown and SFSketchFest. Claire’s short story “Casual Friday” was published in the anthology True Tales of Lust and Love, and her play In Tubes was produced at HERE Arts in NYC. Claire recently sold an original series to Warner Bros.'s short-form studio Blue Ribbon Entertainment and she’s currently developing a television series based on her autobiographical solo show, Filthy, which she developed in a residency at Machine Project.
"One of the things I like the most about The Idiot Workshop is that it makes space for the ugliness. The obscene and strange bits of ourselves. To bring into the open parts of ourselves that are often hidden. It has a wildness. Which is a real relief. A place to let go. And simultaneously push ourselves. I always leave feeling woken up."
"THE IDIOT TEACHERS have a knack for pulling out what is uniquely funny about you as an individual and performer." ~ Scott Wainio