CONEY ISLAND Freak shows still fascinate audiences 100 years later

Live-performing freaks seem to have an enduring appeal.
KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
NEW YORK -- It is hard to say which of Insectavora's meals is the least appetizing.
The pus-colored maggots she dumps on her tongue, then illuminates with a flashlight so the audience can see them wriggle?
The glistening earthworm she slurps with a gustatory glee more often associated with children eating spaghetti?
The crunchy crickets?
Jolting people out of their seats is one of the points of the Coney Island Circus Sideshow. Before Insectavora, the audience has already watched the Amazing Blazing Tyler Fyre pound nails into his nose and Ravi the Scorpion Swami contort and stretch his body as if it were Silly Putty.
Almost 100 years after its heyday, the freak show is hanging on. This may seem surprising when eating bugs and other gross stunts are standard fare on such TV shows as "Fear Factor," but real-live performing "freaks" seem to have an oddly enduring appeal.
"Geek Love," a novel about carnival freaks by Katherine Dunn, has a waiting list at many libraries. At the Bros. Grim Sideshow in Seaside Heights, N.J., Katzen the Tiger Lady has Teflon whiskers implanted in her cheeks and performs with a live boa constrictor. Her husband, Enigma, has puzzle pieces tattooed over most of his body and silicone "horns" implanted in his head.
The center
But New York -- a city some have called its own freak show -- has always been the center of this kind of entertainment.
"In New York, there's just such an incredible culture of circus and freak shows. This is where the freak show started in its sensational and institutionalized form," said Rachel Adams, a professor of English at Columbia University and the author of "Sideshow U.S.A: Freaks and the American Cultural Imagination."
In downtown Manhattan's Soho, Todd Robbins, a former performer in Coney Island's sideshow, had a hit with his own show, "Carnival Knowledge," in which he eats light bulbs and sticks his hand into an animal trap. Robbins teaches fire-eating, sword-swallowing and other skills at twice-yearly Sideshow Schools, where participants pay $600 for six four-hour classes.
Responsible for comeback
The progenitor of this comeback is Dick Zigun, 51, the goateed, tattooed, self-proclaimed mayor of Coney Island. He was raised in Bridgeport, Conn., P.T. Barnum's hometown.
"I grew up thinking elephants and midgets were patriotic and American," Zigun said.
Armed with a master's degree in fine arts from Yale, Zigun thought Coney Island offered the perfect staging ground for a new version of his old love, the sideshow.