The Jim Rose Circus is a modern-day version of a circus sideshow.[1][2] It was founded in Seattle by Jim Rose in the early 1990s. The sideshow came to prominence as a second stage show at the 1992 Lollapalooza festival, then called the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow. Rolling Stone magazine called it "the absolute must-see act" and USA Today termed Rose's troupe "Lollapalooza's word-of-mouth hit attraction".
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After Lollapalooza, in 1993 Jim Rose headlined seven world tours and released a self-titled video on Rick Rubin's American Recordings that quickly became a cult classic.
In 1994 The Jim Rose Circus was chosen to tour with Nine Inch Nails and a then-unknown Marilyn Manson, and later with KoRn and Godsmack. 1998 saw another world tour featuring women sumo wrestling, Mexican transvestite wrestling and chain saw football. The show landed Rose and troupe in Lubbock Texas Jail and was later banned from New Zealand. Both of those issues were settled 4 months later. "That was one of my highest grossing shows," Rose claimed. It reportedly netted over 4 million dollars.
Jim Rose was also the top ticket of the Melbourne (Australia), New Zealand and Edinburgh (Scotland) Fringe and Comedy Festivals.
In 2009 Jim Rose joined with professional wrestler Jake "The Snake" Roberts for The Legends Collide Tour, a forty city campaign heralded as "Jake Roberts conquering his troubled past" amidst " pretty girls, wrestling, amazing circus stunts... and a fist fight". .
Rose himself performs in between acts, often committing masochistic deeds such as attaching paper currency to his forehead with a staple gun or driving a long nail into his nostril. During the show's final act, he would escape from a straightjacket. His most outrageous trick followed: he would invite audience members to stand on his head after he'd placed it in a shallow crate of broken glass.
The Amazing Mister Lifto (Joe Hermann) who hung heavy weights (cinder blocks, steam irons, beer kegs, etc.) from his body piercings, including those in his nipples and genitalia. At Lollapalooza Lifto would perform the "genital lift" feat after spraying shaving cream on himself.
Bebe the Circus Queen (Beatrice Aschard) would perform a variety of stunts such as having a watermelon placed on her back and split with a sword, lying on a bed of nails while weights were placed on her chest... or the "Plastic Bag Of Death", where she gets into a large plastic bag and one of the other performers sucks all of the air out with a vacuum cleaner. She would also employ an electric grinder in her act (for example, she would create a shower of sparks from a metal chastity belt covering her groin area).
Matt "The Tube" Crowley, whose moniker came from the seven feet of tubing that he would swallow. The other end of the tube was attached to a crude hand pump. Rose himself would fill the pump with a variety of fluids and proceed to pump it into Crowley's stomach, then back out again. Audience members were invited onstage to drink the vile concoction after it had been extricated from Crowley. He would also provide a demonstration of sheer lung power by blowing up a hot water bottle with his mouth until it burst.
Torture King (Tim Cridland) had a segment that featured him walking barefoot up and down a ladder of razor sharp sabres, piercing himself with long needles and meat skewers, eating pieces of a broken lightbulb (he would hold a microphone near his mouth so the audience would hear the sound), and touching an electrical generator while holding a fluorescent lightbulb that would glow. In 1994, The Torture King left the Circus to create his own show. The Torture King Show toured the US and Canada many times. He currently lives and performs in Las Vegas.
The Enigma (Paul Lawrence). Originally known as Slug , he was billed as a man who would eat anything (worms, grasshoppers), and swallow a variety of swords. He also doubled as the show's organ player. He body is completely tattooed with blue jigsaw puzzle pieces. He left the show in 1998 and has toured the world since, appearing in such acts as Ken Harck's Brothers Grim Sideshow, The Human Marvels and most recently, the Show Devils.
The Lizardman Completely tattooed performer with a surgically split tongue (featured on Ripley's Believe It or Not) joined Jim in 1999 on the Godsmack Voodoo Tour and in 2001 toured with just Jim and Bebe doing comedy clubs. He performed several acts previously done by members who had left (Lifto, Enigma, Matt the Tube) and added new acts and routines to the circus. He left the circus in 2001 to return to his solo show endeavors.
Cappy (David Capurro) Award-winning yoyo artist. Featured in The Jim Rose Twisted Tour.
Rupert (Ryan Stock) performed the traditional sideshow stunts. He now stars in his own show on the Discovery Channel with partner Amber Lynn.
Preacher Muad'dib Joined the circus when he was 19 for an Irish tour. Now resides in the UK and is an internationally renowned Performer and urban martial artist who holds multiple Guinness world records. He and Jim Rose both refer to each other as 'my hero'. They most recently worked together opening for Alice Cooper in London, UK for Cooper's halloween spectacular.
John Chaos Performs traditional stunts. He now performs his own One Man Show called the John Chaos Sideshow but still performs with the Jim Rose Circus from time to time.
Jake "the Snake" Roberts
SiNn BoHdi (formerly of Carnival Diablo, also known as Kizarny of the WWE)
Brianna Belladonna Female sword swallower who performed at Sturgis with the circus in 2010
Fatt Matt Worlds fattest contortionist
Amber Lynn
Leonid the Magnificent
Stormy Leather
Melody Sweets
Amelia Danger
Johnny Favor
Kinichi
Mark "the Knife" Fage
Throughout their tours, additional acts have included many other "fringe" artists, including wrestlers and Pyro-X.
Both Jim Rose and The Enigma were featured in an episode of The X-Files, the Season 2 episode Humbug which was set in a community of sideshow and former sideshow workers.
Homer Simpson runs away and joins the Jim Rose Circus as The Human Cannonball on an episode of The Simpsons.
The Jim Rose Circus Sideshow video tape (1993 American Recordings) was re-released in 2003 as a DVD by Moonshine Music.
The Jim Rose Twisted Tour[3] was a seven episode series that debuted March 2003 on the opening week of the Travel Channel, although only five episodes were aired. It was released in 2006 on DVD, which includes all episodes.
Jim Rose appeared in the movie "Doubting Riley", a film by HBO's Project Greenlight alumni.
Jim Rose voiced the character Psymon Stark in the snowboarding video game SSX Tricky. The reason he was chosen was because he best suited Psymon's psychotic nature and stunts.
According to an interview with Oddities Magazine (ISSN 2159-4708) Jim Rose claims to have been involved in fundraising for the Mo Udall political campaign during a time in his life when he was addicted to heroin. He was quoted as stating that "[Mo] ran against Jimmy Carter and I was his fund raiser... I used to do fundraisers with like Gregory Peck and Robert Redford, actually while I was on heroin. They didn’t know... actually I forgot to tell them.”[4]
Rose served as a spokesman for Gordon's Gin.
His PR company now reps Fulltiltpoker.com and does publicity for top poker players.
Rose has been hired by corporations including Microsoft and regularly speaks as a consultant for PR firms; in this regard he has been pictured on the cover of The Wall Street Journal and Fast Company magazine, and is featured in the new marketing book The Deviants Advantage.
In 2008 Rose was hired as spokesperson and performer for Dos Equis in the Jim Rose Most Interesting Show In The World U.S tour
Jim Rose is the voice of the popular character Psymon on Play Station 2's SSX Tricky and Sledstorm 2, both EA Sports products.
"The absolute must-see act is the Seattle-based Jim Rose Show" –Rolling Stone
"Freakmania is spreading unabated" –Newsweek
"The line in Salt Lake City stretched all the way to the Mormon Temple. They had to turn hundreds away" –Wall Street Journal
"His delivery is brutally comic. He plays the highly-strung audience like a violin" -The Independent, London
"Amazingly, it is actually fun. It may not be everyone's idea of entertainment, but then what is? It certainly does not deserve to be banned." –The Times Magazine, London
"We all went home satisfied, entertained and suitably appalled to the depth of our being" –New Music Express, London
"I've seen a lot of things in my time. I must see 40 circuses a year, but this lot…They came on in their street clothes and then…They're beyond anything I've ever seen. They shocked me" -Gerry Cottle (circus proprietor) in Sunday Telegraph, London
"Jim Rose is a cult hero" –Tucker Carlson, CNN
"Audience reaction in largely that kind of revolted amusement more commonly associated with tourists at a bullfight" –Melody Maker, London