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The Villages
Visit Residential Homes
Annemarie “Ravioli” Prioriello
When the nursing homes and assisted living fa- long, one for each month. Every month had a differ-
cilities first began to allow The Villages Clown Alley ent theme, either for a holiday or just for fun. We fol-
179 to visit again after COVID, it was a very different lowed the format of having 8-10 songs, some one lin-
gig than pre-COVID! Before 2020 when we visited the ers, a magic trick or two, and a skit or two. We usually
facilities in our area, we usually went room to room had an entrance song, like It’s Showtime by Learning
in pairs to visit with residents. Occasionally, they Station, or something else to go with our theme. We
brought a few residents to a central area and we sang would enter clapping and singing and greeting each
a few songs with them and visited with them of the residents. They loved the colorful clowns and
there. After COVID, when they began opening fun music, and soon were clapping along. The
up to us again, we were not allowed to go room other songs we chose not only went along
to room. In addition to having to show them with the theme, but gave us a way to keep
proof of vaccinations, we were only allowed the residents involved. They would either
to put on a little show for a group gathered be exercising their arms with scarves, or
in an outdoor patio, and later in a central keeping the beat on a tambourine. They love
location inside the building. throwing beach balls around to music! In be-
We noticed that many of our clowns were not sign- tween songs we would do a couple of one-liners
ing up for these gigs and it occurred to me it might or a skit. The skits were simple so that there was no
be because they didn’t know what to do now that the memorizing of lines. Even the one- liners were given
format had changed, so I put together a nursing home to them on an index card.
committee to come up with shows that we could prac- We practiced each new show at the end of each
tice ahead of time so everyone would know what to do month to have ready for the following month. As we
and when. We came up with 12 shows, 30 -45 minutes completed each show, a master copy of the show, all
46 MAGAZINE
