Date: Monday 31st Aug – Friday 4th Sept 2026
Time: 10.00am – 4.00 pm
Cost: $650
Venue: TBC
Led by: Toby Park, Spymonkey Co-Artistic Director & Petra Massey, Founder Member & Associate of Spymonkey
Suitable for all levels of experience, from novice to seasoned professional.
Please note, we need a minimum of 20 people to run the course.
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As a company that runs international workshops, we use WISE to receive payments. It’s fast, secure, and cost-effective for both you and us. You don’t need to sign up for WISE if you prefer not to, we’ll provide the bank details once you’ve completed your registration.
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What is it that makes you as a performer uniquely funny? How do you share that brilliant, special ridiculousness with an audience so that they are helpless with laughter?
In this 5-day introduction to Spymonkey Clown we will focus on how to identify and develop that particular quality of Funny that is special to you, and only you.
You will be supported to develop these comedic skills in a safe, fun and laughter-filled environment. This positive group dynamic will allow you focus on identifying and trusting your best impulses, taking risks, being adventurous, generous and honest as a performer. In this highly enjoyable workshop we will play games and exercises, developing trust and complicity with the group. You will find the pleasure in your own ridiculousness, stay optimistic, discover your comedy gold, and get ready to laugh until your face hurts.
We will share many of the methods that Spymonkey have found essential over the years in creating Theatre of the Funny: physical games, improvisational games, status exercises, physical comedy routines, chorus exercises and parody.
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We’ve created a new Resources page featuring recommended books to help you prepare for the workshop. Check it out here!
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Please contact Khai at education@spymonkey.co.uk
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“Totally inspiring.”
Lucy Hopkins performer, London/Worcester
“One of the most amazing weeks of my entire life.. My whole heart is beaming and laughing.”
Isobel Chadwick performer, Northampton
“The work has made me more aware on stage. What makes me funny, and what makes an audience laugh, what doesn’t, why am I even on stage. The work has inspired me a lot, as a performer but very much as a person as well. This is the kind of work I’ve always wanted to do and was searching for in all the other work I did.”
Bill Barberis performer, Belgium
“What an amazing week! Huge, huge thank you to Spymonkey, and each and everyone of you who took part in the workshop for being so supportive with a non-performer, you made me feel at home from the very beginning, which allowed me to take risks and have fun. Go Spymonkey!”
Andrea Foa journalist, Italy
“Belly-laughter, support, ideas, and real friendships. Definitely returning for future sessions. Highly recommended for those new to clowning, as well as for old hands.”
Vera Chok performer, Malaysia/London
For more information about our bursaries, please click here.
Studied Drama at Hull University, and trained at Fool Time Circus School, Bristol, and with Philippe Gaulier and Monika Pagneaux in Paris.
Toby co-created all Spymonkey shows to date. He performed in Stiff (1998-2011), Cooped (2001-2019), Zumanity with Cirque du Soleil (2003-2005), Bless (2007), Moby Dick (2009), Love In (2010), Oedipussy (2012), Mrs Hudson’s Christmas Corker (2014), Every Last Trick (2014), The Complete Deaths (2016), Christmas Carol (2018), The Frogs (2024).
From 1994-97 he was co-musical director and actor with Karl’s Kuhne Gassenchau in Zurich; member of the Improbable Theatre Lifegame company (1998-2000) including an off-Broadway run.
Musical director and composer for: all Spymonkey shows to date; Guy Dartnell’s Would Say Something (1998); acro-dance-theatre Mimbre’s Sprung (2001), Trip-Tic (2003) and The Bridge (2007); site-specific pieces with Graeme Gilmour at Kielder Water Northumberland (2006) and Forth & Clyde Canal Glasgow (2007), and with Phil Supple/The Electric Estate for the National Trust at Cragside Northumberland.
Appeared in Sandi Toksvig’s Christmas Cracker starring Ronnie Corbett at the Royal Festival Hall (2009). TV appearances include Cirque Images’ 2003 series Solstrom for Bravo Cable Network and BBC2 Hyperdrive.
Director of Fabulous Bäckström Brothers, a clown opera in Helsinki (2014), and Big Bang Siegfried for Orchestra Hagen Germany (2016), Enter The Dragons for A&E Comedy (2017); co-director of The Flop for Hijinx Theatre Cardiff; Director of physical comedy for Chichester Festival Theatre’s Mack & Mabel (2015); RSC’s Merry Wives of Windsor (2018); Tartuffe (2019) and Jack Absolute Flies Again (2022) for National Theatre; Hello Dolly! (2024) for Michael Harrington Productions.
Co-director of Orpheus in the Underworld (2023, 2024, 2025) for Volksoper Vienna and Spymonkey’s Hairy (2023).
BA (Hons) in Performing Arts at Middlesex University. Trained with Philippe Gaulier and John Wright in London.
Joined Swiss action theatre, Karl’s Kuhne Gassenchau (KKG) in 1996 for Grand Paradis, S.T.E.I.N.B.R.U.C.H (1997), and Stau in 1998. In 1999 she headlined with KKG on tour with Circus Knie. She starred in Cirque Images’ series Solstrom (2003) for Bravo TV. Performed in Zumanity – Another Side of Cirque du Soleil at the New York New York Hotel Casino, Las Vegas, 2003-05, and at the Barbican in “Office Party Xmas 2007”, which transferred to the Pleasance London in 2011.
Starred in two seasons of the BBC comedy sci-fi Hyperdrive, 2006-07 as regular crew member “Sandstrom” the enhanced human, and appears in season 2 of ‘Miranda’, and Comedy Cuts & Headcases for ITV (2008-2009).
Hosted and performed for the German based dinner theatre ‘Palazzo Productions’ in Amsterdam with Spymonkey (2008/09) and Stuttgart (2010)
Director for Wet Picnic (2008-11), The Two Wrongies (2010-11), Swank (2011), Hijinx Theatre (2012), Extant (2012), Naive Dance (2013), Slightly Fat Features (2012-14), Likely Story (2014) slapstick consultant for the film installation Trip Hazard (2013)
Petra performed in ‘Never Try this at Home’ (2014) with Told by An Idiot directed by Paul Hunter at Birmingham Rep, Traverse Edinburgh, Sheffield Studio and Soho Theatre and ‘The Bee’ a production conceived by Japan’s celebrated director and playwright Hideki Noda in Paris, Luxembourg and Germany in 2014. Member of Shakespeare’s Globe 2015 acting company, performing Mistress Overdone in Dominic Dromgoole’s ‘Measure For Measure’ and Chorus Leader in Adele Thomson’s ‘Oresteia’.
Currently starring as Boozy Skunkton, host of Spiegelworld’s Atomic Saloon at The Venetian, Las Vegas.