No jokes as clown sues FHM: report

A full-time children's performer and circus artist has won R60,000 in a defamation case after he was portrayed negatively in a men's magazine, the Cape Times reported on Thursday.

 

FHM magazine reportedly ran a story in December 2007 condemning airline fares, car guards, and clowns, saying they often resembled "grown men with long-term tik habits, dressed like transvestites from hell".

 

Norman Pudney, better known as Puddles the Clown, was featured as the story's main image.

 

The newspaper reported that the photo was taken from Masterfile corporation and could be shared if certain conditions were met.

 

The Western Cape High Court reportedly found that FHM had breached its Masterfile contract by using the photo "intentionally and maliciously".

 

Pudney's lawyer was quoted as saying that the photo in isolation was not defamatory, but that the context was, in that people could pick up a magazine and recognise his client.

 

FHM had no comment, according to the report.

 

 

 

 

- Sapa