Originally published January 5, 2006 in The Baltimore Sun

Innovative QuestFest
By Sam Sessa
Sun Reporter

Lost & Clown'd is no mime show.

While the play's three characters come straight from the circus and don't utter a word, they're not the traditional black-suited, white-gloved figures you might see in a park.

"When people say a 'mime show,' you think there's a white-faced person taking us to a 'once a upon a time' story kind of place," said actor Mark Jaster. "This is really not that."

Jaster plays a circus roustabout in the performance, which is part of the QuestFest theater festival. The festival starts Monday, runs through Jan. 22 and features workshops, master classes and a score of wordless plays like Lost & Clown'd. Through these shows, the festival aims to raise awareness of visual theater.

Lost & Clown'd is more like a European circus clown setup than a mime, Jaster said. European circuses often include clown routines without dialogue, he said.

And while Jaster's character isn't a full-fledged clown - a roustabout is a three-ring technician - he is forced into a clowning position in the play.

As Lost & Clown'd starts, Jaster, a clown (Eric Beatty) and the ringmaster (Willy Conley) are walking out of the ring and onto the stage. They think they're done performing for the day, but then realize they're stuck on another stage and have to act their way out.

"It's sort of like the classic actor's nightmare," Jaster said.

All three of the actors had been separately associated with Quest Productions before, Jaster said. Quest founder and director Tim McCarty wanted to see what would happen if he threw them together, he said.

They didn't have a script, theme or project in mind - just each other, Jaster said.

"It was just 'OK, you three guys, here, come together and come up with something,'" Jaster said. "It was sort of like being thrown out to sea for a while."

Jaster, Beatty and Conley had to determine what kind of piece they wanted to make, based on their individual strengths, he said.

"It was an unusual process that way," Jaster said. "It was personnel-based rather than project-based at first, but we did come up with a project that I'm pretty happy with actually."