Virtuoso juggler whose signature trick took eight hours’ practice a day
Rudy Horn, who has died aged 85, was one of the world’s greatest jugglers. His signature trick was described by Cyril Mills, of Bertram Mills Circus, as ‘‘perhaps the greatest feat of virtuosity I have ever booked’’. It involved flicking more than half a dozen cups and saucers on to his head from his feet, often adding a teaspoon and sugar cube – while riding a high unicycle.
He was born into a circus family in Nuremberg in 1933. His parents were both circus performers and his maternal grandfather had owned a small open-air circus.
Rudy first took to juggling at the age of seven. His father had been called up to the German army, and was attempting to cheer up his son and daughter by juggling with three apples. Within 10 minutes Rudy was juggling more skilfully than his father.
Rudy’s parents put him through a rigorous training regime: he would practise for an hour at lunchtime and then, when his father came home from his training camp in the evening, they would work for three hours, taking in acrobatics and tap dance as well as juggling.
Two years later his parents persuaded the owner of the Wintergarten Theatre in Nuremberg to give him a chance.
He was booked for the 1942 Christmas show in a double act with his grandfather. He performed his signature trick for the first time, stopping the show as he flicked up a single cup, saucer and sugar cube from his foot and on to his head. He was soon performing in Germany’s best night clubs, but when Allied bombing raids intensified, his parents stopped him performing until the war was over.
He returned to the stage, entertaining the occupying troops in clubs set up by the United States Army, adding dance moves to his cup-andsaucer trick.
The combination of juggling and dancing went down a storm, and in 1948 he was invited to join the famous Circus Krone in
Horn had ‘the delicacy of a moth and the pertinacity of a bulldozer’.
Munich, and toured with them for three years. Other jugglers began to imitate his routine, performing it on tightropes, slack ropes, ladders and globes, but none did it as well as Horn.
Mills, who would tour Europe looking for talent, saw Horn in a nightclub and signed him up. At 18, he became a sensation with the Bertram Mills Circus at Olympia.
His cup-and-saucer routine involved eight hours’ practice a day: one morning, at 3am, Mills found Horn drenched in sweat as he tried to increase the number of cups and saucers to nine. ‘‘Rudy, you’re wonderful, but you’re stark crazy,’’ Mills told him. Horn, he recalled, had ‘‘the delicacy of a moth and the pertinacity of a bulldozer’’.
Horn went on to the Lido nightclub in Paris, developing a routine in which he juggled seven balls at high speed against a drum angled on the ground.
In 1952 he had the first of his stints in Las Vegas, and went on to appear all over the US, including four appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.
In Britain, apart from his work with the Mills circus, he appeared at the London Palladium, the Savoy Hotel cabaret, with Ken Dodd at the Blackpool Opera House and at the Blackpool Tower Circus. He was also a talented accordionist.
A decent tennis player, he retired after 33 years of juggling to become a tennis coach in the Bavarian Alps. In 1973 he was awarded the Rastelli Trophy as the world’s greatest juggler at the International Festival of Juggling in Bergamo, Italy.
He is survived by his wife, Helga, and their two sons. – Telegraph Group
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