With Covid meaning fewer crowds on street corners to perform for, mimes across the US have had to turn to other means of making a living – taking jobs at advertising agencies, financial houses, and other businesses. The number of mimes in the corporate workforce has increased from 156 in 2019 to over 2.5 million today, and companies are taking steps to ensure they’re welcome and respected.
“It’s incumbent upon us to create a nurturing environment,” says Susan Wippington, Human Resources VP of the Memphis-based Sellsperg Group. “The fact that their faces are painted white and they don’t talk should not make a difference.” Sellsperg – which currently employs 17 mimes – recently issued the following guidelines to all 1400 employees:
- It is often necessary for our mimes to stop whatever they’re doing in order to peel an imaginary banana, and then eat it. If this happens in a meeting or brainstorming session please pause to allow for completion of the task.
- Mimes often encounter sudden windstorms, which slow them down as they fight dramatically to push their way through. Thus, they should always be allowed a six-minute window before being declared officially late.
- If a mime is more than six minutes late, however, someone should go looking. There is a good possibility that he or she has become trapped inside an invisible glass cube.
- Be cautious when walking with a mime. An invisible staircase may suddenly materialize out of nowhere, which the mime is required to walk down. Likewise, an invisible rope may appear, which the mime will need to climb but which you should not.
- While you aren’t expected to memorize all 13,000 mime gestures, you are required to learn these three: Pulling up the corners of the mouth with the index fingers to express happiness, squinting and rubbing the chin to show concern, and swiping the palm across the forehead to indicate the task force meeting is about to convene
