Clowning Around Isn’t Easy : Thousand Oaks: A summer course teaches children the fine points of making people laugh.

To get to the top in Mr. Blue’s class, students have to be pretty good at clowning around.

“Conduct befitting a three-ring circus is actually preferred in my class,” said the sad-faced instructor, who heads a summer course in Thousand Oaks teaching children the ways of the big top’s comic mainstays.

At Clown College, offered for eight Tuesdays at the Conejo Community Center, children from 5 to 12 act like bozos as they have their faces painted, twist balloons into animal shapes and perform silly tricks.

Their teacher, whose real name is Randy Harold, is a Ringling Bros.-trained clown and actor who models his character after the tramps of the 1920s and ‘30s.

Harold wears his melancholy heart on his sleeve.

His slapstick antics, however, are strictly off the cuff.

Dressed in blue overalls big enough for two people and shoes three feet long, Harold spouted clown wisdom to his rowdy class of 35 children.

“I’ve been booted in the pants my whole life,” Harold said with a kick to the sky. “But, hey, you’ve just got to learn to laugh at yourself.

“If you can’t make them smile, you’re lost,” he added.

Before students can even smirk, they have to develop a character of their own.

During the first class session, they metamorphose into one of four basic clown types: the dumb clown, the mime clown, the Keystone Cop clown or the tramp clown.

Derek Franklin, 7, of Thousand Oaks said he wanted to become a cowboy clown--if his mother will let him use some old clothes.

“I’m going to paint my face really neat,” Derek said.

During Harold’s classes, students choose names to go with their new clown selves and paint their faces.

Later, Harold helps them channel their energies into a skit, which sometimes includes rag juggling and other antics.

Elizabeth Wilson, 7, and brother Daniel, 5, of Newbury Park brought their own props to class on a recent Tuesday.

“I’ve got a whoopee cushion,” said Elizabeth, who also goes by the name Brite Eyes.

The 30-year-old Harold is by no means a stranger to the comic stage.

He began working with the Magnificent Moorpark Melodrama & Vaudeville Co. nine years ago. And before that, he was a student at the Ringling Bros. circus school in Florida.

“If you want to be a clown or an actor, you’ve got to go to Ringling or a drama school,” Harold said.

Now, Harold holds forth in front of his own pupils and even issues diplomas.

The young clowns going through his course this summer will be among the second class to graduate.

“You really have to teach them to think when doing these skits,” Harold said, scratching the latex wig that made him look half-bald. “If it involves throwing a concrete block at someone, remember to use padding.”