‘Gravity Is Better in Isla Vista’: 50th Annual Jugglers’ Festival Scheduled This Weekend

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This article was underwritten in part by the Mickey Flacks Journalism Fund for Social Justice, a proud, innovative supporter of local news. To make a contribution go to sbcan.org/journalism_fund.

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Have you ever wanted to learn to juggle? Would you rather get the chance to watch skilled performers show off tricks? Either way, mark your calendars for Isla Vista’s Jugglers’ Festival this weekend. 

“The gravity has always been better in I.V.,” festival cofounder Jon Zuber told the Independent. 

Jugglers and artists will give performances and free lessons. You can witness fire and LED-glow juggling on Friday night, catch a band show on Saturday afternoon and, later on, see a professional show. And, of course, watch (and join in on) the action in I.V.’s Little Acorn Park throughout the weekend. 

This year, the festival celebrates its 50th birthday; longtime festivalgoers say it’s the world’s oldest juggling festival held in one location. And while for decades the festival has fostered joy and community, its origins come from a group of Isla Vistans commemorating the life of a murdered friend, Patty Laney. 

Since the festival’s start, the organizers — men and women alike — have advocated to stop violence against women and to this day, proceeds from the festival’s show go to the non-profit Standing Together to End Sexual Assault (STESA).  Tickets are $10 for students and $20 for other festival-goers. 

In Memory of Patty Laney 

You might notice the name Patty Laney on festival T-shirts.  Laney was a UCSB student in 1977. She was studying psychology and was active in the I.V. community. Her friend, Jon Zuber said she volunteered at the newly formed credit union and the medical clinic. Laney was also a juggler. She made juggling balls and gave free lessons to anyone who wanted them.

Festival cofounder Zuber is now an independent filmmaker. 

“She was part of the Isla Vista Gorilla Theater [a street theater group with improv shows]. We were doing a remake of Peter Pan. Patty was playing the part of Wendy,” Zuber said. 

Zuber said on rehearsal breaks he, Laney, their friend Charlie Jones, and others would gather in the park to juggle. 

At that time, two Isla Vista women were missing. Jacqueline Rook had disappeared in November of 1976, and Mary Sarris had followed a couple weeks later. Laney spent time putting up posters to help the search for both Rook and Sarris. 

Then, in January 1977, another friend went to pick up Laney at the intersection of Patterson and Hollister to give her a ride into Santa Barbara. When her friend arrived, Laney wasn’t there. Her body was found a day later in Refugio Canyon.  

Law enforcement officers wouldn’t solve Laney’s murder for another two years, when they arrested Solvang serial killer Thor Christiansen. 

But Laney’s friends wanted to commemorate her life. The Isla Vista Gorilla Theater put on a play called Personal Fouls, raising awareness about sexual violence against women. And on April 1, 1977, they held the first Isla Vista Jugglers’ festival in Anisq’oyo Park in her memory. 

The Fabulous Strombolis

In the wake of Laney’s death, Isla Vistans organized. Locals formed a group called the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Women. They sponsored an event at Santa Barbara City College that summer and ultimately invited a group of Isla Vista jugglers to perform at the event. 

Stan Hoffman was active in the Isla Vista Gorilla Theater in the ’70s. He knew Laney when the theater was working to put on Peter Pan, and he got involved with juggling after her death. He was at the event that day, ready to perform with the group. 

“Somebody said, ‘We need a name. We got to have a name,’” he said.

Hoffman said he recalled saying they could use the name Stromboli, after the circus master in Pinocchio. A student journalist took their photo and printed the name, “The Fabulous Strombolis.” It stuck. 

“Who is a Stromboli? Anyone who wants to be a Stromboli,” Hoffman said. 

The Strombolis continued to practice and teach juggling. They performed an anti-nuclear show to protest the opening of Diablo Canyon in the early ’80s; that show went on tour. A subsect of Strombolis were hired to perform to crowds waiting to enter events at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. And for years, the group ran the juggler’s festival until they eventually handed over leadership to UCSB’s Juggling Club in the late ’90s. 

Allison Zuber is another Stromboli and a neurodevelopmental movement therapist. She said that there were about 10 core Strombolis during their heyday. But the wider Stromboli family is far larger. 

“The doors are always open in the great field of Stromboli juggling,” she said. 

[Click to zoom] Left: An early poster for the Isla Vista Juggler’s Festival; early posters were made from photographs and drawn by Jill Kelly Moorestr. Right: Allison Zuber’s ‘Stromboli’ scrapbook of juggling memories. | Credit: Christina McDermott

Festival Memories 

The weather held for the first few years of the festival, but in 1981, jugglers were met with rain and wind. 

Barry Backalor was the festival organizer that year (he’s an organizer this year, too). He recalls that folks of a nearby bagel shop allowed them to use their back room to perform. 

Longtime juggler Jeff Walsh organized the festival in its earlier years. He was there that day.

“In the back we set up a big-screen TV,” he said, adding. “it was like this monstrosity.” 

He said he remembered Backalore putting on videos of juggling performances. Then, he said, jugglers put on a show. 

Barry Backalore said that one 15-year-old in the audience that day, John Gilkey, went on to headline Cirque du Soleil juggling. Gilkey will return to I.V. this year, to perform, along a long list of professional jugglers. 

From there, the festival’s annual show was born. The next year, they held the show at the Magic Lantern theater (today it’s the Isla Vista Theater). 

Walsh recalls that first year at the Magic Lantern. The Strombolis opened the show. He said he choreographed a routine to Duke Ellington’s “Take the ‘A’ Train” and performed it with Hoffman and festival cofounder Charlie Jones. 

That year, they raised more than $1,000 for what at time was the Santa Barbara Rape Crisis Center (today it’s STESA). 

The show attracts professional acts each year. But it hasn’t taken away from the event’s playfulness.

Danielle Bushar is a juggler and beekeeper, and she’s been involved with organizing the festival for more than a decade. She recalls attending a festival in the ’80s where jugglers performed in I.V.’s red barn while others sat in the rafters. The performance was an after-midnight “renegade” show during Easter weekend. 

“I remember sitting on the beams,” she said. “It was at least three of us.” 

She slept, she said, at an I.V. church under the altar, and had to get up for Easter mass. 

The joy imbued in the festival is evident from photographs of festival-goers and performers — clown paint, top hats, coordinated acts to music. For many of the jugglers, part of the fun comes in teaching others. 

“Some of the most fun I’ve ever had at a juggling festival, and I’ve been to not only ours but ones in other places, is teaching people how to juggle,” Juggler Walsh said. 

Allison Zuber recalled teaching many people to juggle at the festivals — and that the act empowered people as they gained a new skill. 

UCSB’s Juggling Club and This Year’s Festival 

Matthew Thornley teaches juggling regularly. A UCSB alum (and original Juggling Club member), he spends time on Friday afternoons near Storke Tower teaching students to juggle at UCSB’s Juggling Club. 

“It’s really gratifying to see how popular it is,” Thornley said. “We get 20 to 30 people showing up Friday.”

Thornley, whose been involved and attending the festival for years, juggles alongside two of the club’s current leaders, Harrison Majersik and Franklin Chen.

Majersik and Chen have spent the past several months helping put together the festival show, which means working with university bureaucracy to get space at the Isla Vista Theater. It was a months-long process that involved red-tape and stress. 

But Chen said hosting the 50th juggling festival is a little crazy, but also a privilege. 

“It’s very funny to stumble into this world and suddenly you also have this legacy to hold up, 50 years of juggling. Yeah, it’s something that I’m honored to do,” Chen said. 

A Stromboli Reappearance? 

Alongside a long list of professional acts, some of the Famous Strombolis and original festival organizers will make an appearance this weekend. Maybe (just maybe) they’ll reunite for another joyful show.