Behind The Makeup
NEO’s Top Children’s Entertainers Unmasked

They didn’t lie in bed as kids dreaming of becoming children’s entertainers one day. Nor did they take a straight path to their current careers bringing joy and laughter to the faces of Northeast Ohio children. Bill Morley, Jr., was a DJ working the Cleveland bar and wedding scene, even doing bikini shows for a time. Laura Broyles was a stay-at-home mom living in Uniontown, south of Akron. Ron Fowler was an electronics technician who repaired video games and vending machines.

But even though Morley, Broyles and Fowler all say they fell into their roles as children’s entertainers, they also say they’ve found their calling, and spend each day doing something they love.

Ron Fowler, a.k.a. Flower Clown

Growing up on farm in rural Lake County, Ron Fowler had adult responsibilities thrust upon him early in life. His father died, leaving Fowler to become “the man of the house” at only seven years old. Looking back today, Fowler says this event was most influential in his current career as Flower Clown. “I feel like during my childhood I was repressed, so when I finally left the house, that’s when I began my childhood,” says Fowler. “Now I just play all day. I go out and have fun and make balloons.”

But even after leaving home, it would take Fowler 10 years and a trip around the world to become Flower Clown. He spent the first nine years of his career as an electronics technician, repairing video games for Cleveland arcades and vending machines for American Greetings. It was at an arcade that he first learned to make balloon figures, but it was nothing more than a hobby that he trotted out at nieces’ and nephews’ birthday parties.

In 1996, Fowler made a life-changing decision. “I just wasn’t happy, and I wanted to escape, basically,” he says. “So I quit my job, rented out my house and bought an around-the-world airline ticket.” He spent the next year traveling alone throughout Asia, visiting such countries as China, Laos, Tibet, India and the country became like a second home to him, Nepal.

When Fowler returned to Cleveland in the summer of 1997, his life began to take a different path. He returned to a job repairing video games, but began actively working on his craft as a balloon artist. He got his first clown outfit and went to bars and restaurants in the Flats asking if he could make balloons for their patrons. He became successful so quickly that within eight months he was able to quit his video game job and become Flower Clown full time.

Today Flower Clown is one of the most popular children’s entertainers in Northeast Ohio. He’s a regular at Tommy’s in Coventry and Mom’s Diner in Orange. He does birthday parties, festivals, trade shows and bar and bat mitzvahs. He sells supplies to other clowns and brokers entertainers through Flower Entertainment. He’s worked events all over the United States, and has even been approached to do two weeks of shows in Dubai this summer.

While Flower Entertainment has grown from hobby to empire, Fowler still makes time for his passions of traveling and Asian culture. He spends every winter in Asia, although he no longer takes the trip alone. For the last five years, Fowler’s now-wife Stacy has accompanied him; they married in January in Nepal in front of 125 guests that he calls their “second family.” He’s cultivating a network of Asian clowns, magicians and other entertainers and hopes to eventually spend six months out of each year there, keeping his home base in Cleveland.

From his farm days in Lake County, Fowler says no one guessed he’d reach this point in his career. “At first, people were asking – you have a college degree, and you’re really going to give that all up and just be a clown?” he says. “But now that they’ve seen that I can make money doing this and still take my Asia trip each year, they know that they don’t have to worry about me.”

Laura Broyles, a.k.a. The Tiaras and Treasures Princess

After several years as a stay-at-home mom, Laura Broyles faced a challenge commonly voiced by mothers-turned-entrepreneurs. “I loved being home, but I missed having something to strive for. I missed that part of having a job,” she says. It was while planning birthday parties for their own kids that Broyles and friend Brooke Trizzino decided to open their own company in 2005 providing dress-up theme birthday parties.

But as co-owner of Tiaras and Treasures, Broyles does much more than just stuff party bags and shepherd four-year-olds through crafts and activities. She’s also often the featured entertainer, starring as Disney princesses Belle, Cinderella or Ariel for an hour-long visit to your child’s birthday party. Broyles’ arrival at a party is typically announced with great fanfare, with music swelling under the chatter of excited little girls rushing to meet their heroine. She dances with them, makes small talk, reads a story and helps them apply their glitter makeup.

On the job she’s clad in a hoop-skirt gown, gloves, wig and tiara, but out of character Broyles is just as gracious as any princess, with smiling eyes and a friendly, approachable demeanor. She says her best education in how to be the perfect princess has come from her relationships with her six-year-old son and four-year-old daughter. “The main thing is being comfortable enough with yourself that you can be out there being goofy with the kids,” says Broyles. “Just being with my own kids, playing around with them and acting like a silly mom has been my best practice.”

In her role as princess and business owner, she also draws on her prior experience as a substitute teacher – she has a degree in elementary education from the University of Akron – and as a salesperson, having spent seven years in sales for Verizon Wireless. Broyles says she always knew she wanted to work with children, but found that teaching just wasn’t for her. “While I was subbing, I found that I just didn’t want to be in the classroom,” she says. “Now I feel like I’ve found my niche.”

When she’s not playing princess, Broyles stays busy managing a growing young business and family life. “It’s nice that I can still be home with my children, and work around their schedule,” she says, “but there’s still a lot of work that goes into this job.”

Bill Morley, Jr., a.k.a. Capt’n Willie, the Great Lakes Pirate

Bill Morley, Jr., is so comfortable as his alter ego, Capt’n Willie, The Great Lakes Pirate, that he can slip in and out of character fluidly during a conversation, throwing in a random “Ahoy there!” or “Shiver me timbers!” Even his friends and colleagues regularly call him “the Captain.” He drives around town in a black minivan complete with twin skull-and-crossbones flags, and his casual jeans-and-T-shirt attire is capped off with two gold hoop earrings and a skull-and-crossbones baseball cap.

But it wasn’t long ago that Morley, a Garfield Heights native, was better known as the regular DJ and tour guide on the Nautica Queen than as Capt’n Willie. He’s been a regular fixture on that ship since 1989 as part of his 20-year career in broadcasting and disc jockeying. He got his start at WDOK-FM in the mid-80s, where he worked on-air and ran the board. But when a former WDOK production director lured him away from radio to a DJ company, Morley began a successful career DJ-ing weddings, events, lounges, bars and even the occasional bikini show throughout Cleveland.

It was during Tall Ships 2003 that Morley’s current career began to take shape. He showed up for his shift on the Nautica Queen dressed as a pirate, just to try something new. “At first management was like, ‘what are you doing?,’” says Morley. “So they had a little meeting about it and said, ‘we’ll let you go out on this first cruise, and if it doesn’t work you’ll need to go dress in regular clothes.’”

But it did work. Passengers loved it and were even asking to have their pictures taken with Morley. “No one had ever asked to get their picture taken with the DJ before,” says Morley. From that successful experience, Morley and wife Lizz hatched a plan to create family-oriented cruises on the Nautica Queen featuring Morley as Capt’n Willie. They convinced ship management to create a kid-friendly menu and to allow them to sell pirate-themed souvenirs, which grew into the Capt’n Willie Family Lunch Cruises held the Nautica Queen on select Saturdays.

Today, Morley spends about 90% of his time performing as Capt’n Willie, not only on the Nautica Queen, but also for birthday parties, preschool PTAs, non-profit fundraisers and other events throughout Northeast Ohio. Morley packs his presentation full of music, fun and education, offering tidbits of Great Lakes trivia, advice for life, and water and boating safety throughout his spiel. Among his advice to kids: “Be usin’ yer imagination! Pirates be plannin’ their next adventure, not playin’ video games!” and “Never be swimmin’ alone or in dangerous waters!”

Best of all, says Morley, is that he gets the chance every day to share his love of Cleveland with its youngest residents. “I think the Great Lakes are the best kept secret. Tons of people live in this region and know next to nothing about the Great Lakes,” says Morley. “I love Cleveland, I believe in Cleveland, and I really try to sell it.”

From Cool Cleveland contributor Jennifer Keirn jenniferkATwowway.com
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