SIFF 2023: Circus of the Scars Revisits Jim Rose's crazed Circus Sideshow

Circus of the Scars – The Insider Odyssey of the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow (2022 | USA | 96 minutes | Chickory Wees)

For a few years in the ‘90s, The Seattle-born Jim Rose Circus Sideshow was everywhere—packing clubs and theaters across the US and Europe, and bum-rushing the era's media (international talk shows, TV news, print magazines) back when that meant something.

How this band of sideshow misfits scraped, lifted, regurgitated, and self-mutilated their way to international notoriety (for awhile, at least) is told with a veteran carnival barker's rumpled, robust zing in Chickory Wees’ great documentary, Circus of the Scars – The Insider Odyssey of the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow.

The Sideshow saga began circa 1991 with wiry, charismatic ex-smack addict Jim Rose, who traded in his heroin dependency for an equally massive addiction to ballyhoo. Rose honed his skills as a contortionist, escape artist, and busker before recruiting a quartet of singular performers dubbed The Four Marvels to form the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow.

That quartet of sideshow oddities included The Amazing Mr. Lifto (formerly Joe Hermann), a pierced, tatted, elegantly androgynous cross-dresser able to lift cement blocks with his nipples and clothing irons with his junk; Tim Kridland, AKA Zamora The Torture King, a loveably cranky human pincushion and fire-eater; Paul Lawrence, a tuxedoed, nerdy, curly-haired kid who graduates from swallowing swords, to eating live slugs, to eventually festooning his body with puzzle-piece tattoos to transform himself into The Enigma; and Matt "The Tube" Crowley, a dorky, dry-witted Montana transplant and former pharmacist infamous for using rubber tubes and lavage pumps to absorb, then creatively regurgitate his stomach contents before an audience's disbelieving eyes. Ringmaster Rose, Rose's wife BeBe the Circus Queen, and beloved veteran circus dwarf Dolly the Doll Lady rounded out the performing crew.

Longtime local musician and promoter Jan Gregor had his jaded sensibilities blown to kingdom come by the Sideshow's combination of shock tactics, genuine humor and showmanship, and rock and roll attitude. He enthusiastically agreed to be the group's tour manager. And a combination of relentless touring and Rose's tireless hustle helped launch this group of misfits—briefly, at least—into superstardom.

They represented the kind of phenomenon that could’ve only been breach-birthed in Seattle, and only during Gen X's halcyon days of youth. The Jim Rose Circus Sideshow took the dust-covered, nigh-forgotten art form of freakshow oddity and attacked it with the same sense of generational cynicism and barely-contained punk energy that grunge's downtuned guitars and tattered flannel employed to throttle fluffy Reagan-era pop and hair metal.

That synergy registered strongly with Gen X audiences, and with some of the era's most iconic rock stars. The Jim Rose Circus Sideshow became the undisputed darlings of Lollapalooza ’92, drawing crowds tor rival the headliners and earning a dedicated following among that music festival's biggest acts. Chris Cornell and Eddie Vedder, to name just two, enthusiastically quaffed ‘Bile Beer’ (beer, chocolate syrup, ketchup, and stomach juices regurgitated during The Tube's sets) at shows. The Sideshow cast partied with Ministry's Al Jourgensen, Marilyn Manson, Perry Farrell, and many more. They jolted sensibilities on Sally Jessy Raphael and The Joan Rivers Show, and revolted political and journalistic bluenoses on two continents.

The stratospheric rise and ceaselessly fast pace of the Sideshow's journey to fame invited even more parallels to the rock and roll lifestyle, with Lifto relating tales of whiskey binges with the very thirsty Jourgensen, Rose promising his team of Marvels "wheelbarrows full of money," and very rock-band dollops of sex and drugs flavoring the mix. And like any live-fast, crash-faster rock and roll story, a rupture between the savvy but super-controlling Rose and his beleaguered band of weirdos proved inevitable. Today, Rose occasionally tours with a mostly new group of oddities and marvels, but the chemistry that charged the troupe's salad days just ain't there anymore.

Wees moves the action at a rapid clip, smartly deploying low-fi, antiquated home video clips from the time to give Circus of the Scars a real patina of a bygone age (and in today's 12-GB-speed world, three decades ago kinda is a bygone era). Wees also portrays most of the principals with care and affection. The four Marvels all come off as odd but genuinely likable misfits and legitimately talented showmen, with the battle-hardened but equally likable Gregor making for a great partial narrator/observer.

Engaging as all of this proves to be, not every player gets their say: BeBe the Circus Queen and especially Dolly the Doll Lady elicit respect and praise from the rest of the Circus Sideshow, but don't show up as interview subjects. And though Jim Rose himself appears in a few brief chat segments, and there's a consensus of huzzahs for the results of Rose's savvy tenaciousness from all involved, Circus of the Scars flirts with hatchet job territory. Part of the reason it sidesteps that one-sidedness, interestingly, is Rose's own evasiveness. Charming, charismatic, funny, and handsome as he is, Rose ultimately feels like almost as much of an enigma as Paul Lawrence, the tattooed performer who evolves to adopt the stage name of The Enigma for himself.

Of course, the irony of the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow is that this shotgun wedding of venerable carnival freakshow oddity and jaded Gen-X/punk rock attitude—such a dangerous, subversively funny punch to society's face back then—has itself become a relic of another time. The flyers that Rose coated Seattle telephones with in his pre-internet quest to get the word out now sit in collectors’ sleeves and second-hand shops. And Rose's brainchild presaged, but was ultimately subsumed and absorbed by, three decades of reality TV, Jackass, and the squirming can of worms that is the internet.

With one of America's two major political parties now prioritizing froth-mouthed, largely fictional geek show provocation over governance, The Tube's vacuum-pumped stomach contents look less like a container of stomach bile, beer, chocolate syrup, and ketchup, and more like a sick 21st century variation of prophesying tea leaves. In the exhilarating patois of Jim Rose's motormouthed hyperbole, Circus of the Scars makes for one wildly entertaining, seat-of-your-pants slab of storytelling. But what it also reveals about us today is more jaw-dropping and ugly than any act The Four Marvels ever performed in front of an audience.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Circus of the Scars – The Insider Odyssey of the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow screens for SIFF 2023 tonight, May 19, at 9:30 PM at the SIFF Cinema Egyptian; Sunday May 21 at 2:00 PM at SIFF Cinema Uptown; It will also be available on SIFF.tv screening from May 22-28. Director/Editor Cory Wees, Matt ‘The Tube’ Crowley, Tim Cridland aka Torture King, and Producer Jan Gregor are scheduled to attend both screenings.

The Seattle International Film Festival runs from May 11-21 in person and May 22-28 online. Keep up with our reactions on Twitter (@thesunbreak) and follow all of our ongoing coverage via our SIFF 2023 posts