The Barios at the London Hippodrome

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Presenting the Barios Trio!

The Barios, whose heyday was the 60s and 70s, claimed a proud clown lineage, that of the Meschi Italian clown brothers, better known as Dario & Bario, one of the most highly regarded European clown teams of the entre-deux-guerres era. Dario Meschi (1880–1962) played the elegant whitfeace clown to the auguste of his brother Manrico, known as Bario (1888–1974).

Bario's two sons, Freddy (1922–1988) and Nello (1918–2000), joined forces with Freddy's wife, Henny Sosman (born 1923), to form the Bario trio, sometimes referred to as the Junior Barios, whose photo and videos you see below. Henny likewise hailed from European clown royalty, as she was the daughter of the auguste Martin Sosman and cousin of clown Pipo Sosman (Gustave Joseph Sosman). Tony Bario (died 2007), son of Freddy & Henny, was an accomplished musician and conducted the Cirque d'Hiver orchestra.


The brothers in the trio act both work as augustes, with Henny playing it straight, though her function is more that of a ringmaster than of a whiteface clown. This musical clown entrée is from a television circus taped at the London Hippodrome in 1966, and has a fair amount of physical business.




The Barios did lots of television. Here's a tv clip with the brothers in tuxedos. This one was on YouTube but disappeared. I snatched it from DailyMotion.com in case it was in danger of vanishing from there as well. Haven't managed to lose the little ads at the bottom without cropping the video... well, at least not yet.






Update (2-26-10): I totally forgot I had this circus clip of the Barios performing their trick car act in Stockholm and preserved on a 1990 French television special, Piste de Clowns.