Variety Performer's Next Trick? Meet the Neighbors

As a parent you’d like to believe your guest appearances on The Late Show with David Letterman, The Tonight Show starring Jay Leno and The Ellen DeGeneres Show carry some weight with your child. But as Brad Weston has learned, sometimes even big-time television credentials can’t prevent you from becoming a lame parent in your child’s eyes.

“I was the cool dad up until junior high,” said Weston, of his relationship with his now 12-year-old daughter. “In fact, at the graduation party they held at her school, she wanted me to come in and perform for the class. Now, she doesn’t want to speak when I drop her off at school.”

Weston, who, with his wife and daughter, moved to Huntley from Albuquerque, N.M., eight months ago, also wonders if his daughter has told classmates what dad does for a living.

“I think she’s kind of kept it quiet,” he said followed by a laugh. “I’m not real sure.”

What Weston does is star in the Brad Weston Experience, a comedy juggling show that also incorporates escape artistry, balancing, stilt-walking, lasso-spinning, visual effects and audience interaction. Oh, and sometimes Weston performs on a unicycle, although he’s just as comfortable walking barefoot across a sword blade.

“I’m the only (performer) doing that,” said Weston, who performed the feat at halftime of an Indiana Pacers basketball game.

Reflecting the wide range of Weston’s act are his bookings. In addition to sporting events, Weston also works cruise lines, corporate events, festivals, fairs, country clubs, private parties and kids’ parties, albeit with a different show for the latter. For those, Weston’s wife, Libby Green, a puppeteer and comedienne, frequently joins him. The two met while performing on a cruise ship in 2003.

“The thing is we never know what people are going to want when they call us,” he said. “It varies pretty wildly. We get calls from people saying, ‘I need a cowboy and a cowgirl to do a reading roundup at the library.’ So I’ll do lasso spinning and she’ll do puppetry. We try to book ourselves together when we can. When we can’t, well, we have two cars.”

Weston, 42, grew up in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood and started performing when he was 13, working as a street performer near the zoo and then studying at the Piven Theater Workshop in Evanston. In time, Weston began performing at children’s parties, which coincided the first of three appearances on WGN-TV’s children’s program, The Bozo Show. After that, Weston continued his formal training, enrolling in and graduating from the Ringling Brothers Clown College as well as the Dell’Arte School of Physical Theater in California. Weston also studied pantomime with Marcel Marceau and improvisational comedy at The Second City. The TV appearances, beginning with Letterman, followed.

Yet, despite all the training, education and publicity, Weston says his success comes down to one element.

“To put it in plain terms, the skills are really secondary to the interaction with the audience,” he said. “For instance, there are guys out there who juggle seven and nine balls, and it’s amazing to watch if you’re a juggler. If you’re not a juggler, you don’t really care. You either like the guy or you don’t. Either he makes you laugh or he doesn’t. And ultimately that’s what it’s all about, so that’s what I studied first and foremost.”

To connect with audiences, Weston says it’s as simple as remembering that the feats aren’t necessarily the star of the show.

“That’s why I’m always looking for something to happen in the show,” he said. “In fact, it’s so important to me that I have written into the show, certain points where I remind myself to refocus on the audience.”

Establishing a dialect with audiences is also an area that interests Weston offstage. At juggling festivals he lectures on the subject, and he writes a blog for variety performers, attracting nearly 1,500 followers. Additionally he’s working on science fiction short stories and a novel.

To date, Huntley has proven both an ideal business and child-raising environment for Weston, whose sister lives in town.

“The other thing I like about living out here is, anywhere you go in (Chicago), it’s going to take you 30 minutes to an hour,” Weston said. “Even to get a gallon of milk from the store, you’re always in traffic. Here, I pass a cornfield, I pass a soy field, and I’m home.”