San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
Circus holds drive-thru performances
As a car pulls into a drive-thru food distribution site at Chollas Mead Elementary, circus performers give the family inside a grand show.
A juggler throws juggling clubs into the air in a perfect circle. A clown with a big red nose glued onto his face mask dances while holding a colorful umbrella. An acrobat does a handstand on another acrobat’s hands.
The performers are with Fern Street Circus, a nonprofit based in City Heights that for 30 years has organized after-school recreation programs and performances in San Diego’s low-income communities.
The drive-thru show last Tuesday was one of 35 the circus performed at food distribution events since the coronavirus pandemic started.
Usually Fern Street Circus hosts several performances during its neighborhood tours at this time of the year. Performances are traditionally interactive and draw large crowds.
But this year the pandemic forced the nonprofit to pivot to drive-thru shows.
Executive Director John Highkin came up with the new approach after watching shoppers wait in line at a neighborhood market. It seemed like a good idea to entertain people while they waited, he said.
Because it wasn’t possible to perform outside the market, he took that idea to food distribution events, he said.
“It feels like the right place to be,” Highkin said. “We are surprising, entertaining families who in some way are food insecure.”
Fern Street Circus held its first drivethru performance at a fruit distribution event in City Heights in late May and has not stopped, holding at least a couple shows every month.
The circus has upcoming performances this week at Central Elementary School on Monday and Knox Middle on Tuesday, from noon to 1:30 p.m. It also will livestream two performances on Nov. 21 and 22 at 2 p.m. on facebook.com/fern.st.circus.
The nonprofit also transitioned its circus after-school programs to online instruction, which has been surprisingly effective, Highkin said, and has allowed the organization to host classes by professional performers from outside San Diego.
Marcela Mercado, a mother of three children enrolled in the circus programs, allowed her 8-year-old son, Marlon, to perform at Chollas-mead Elementary’s food distribution. He juggled balls during the performance.
“It makes me happy when I see their smiles,” Marcela Mercado said. "(It’s) bringing a little hope to their car.”
andrea.lopezvillfana@sduniontribune.com