Charley

Other Tutorials:

William Penman (video clip)

     Charley is a Mills Mess variation established by William Penman as part of his Hurricane Series. It is essentially a crossed-arm Half-Shower spliced with Mills Mess, a combination that offers a variety of different throws. Before learning Charley, it is important that you already be comfortable with Mills Mess and both the Crossed-Arm Cascade and Crossed-Arm Reverse Cascade.

    To begin learning Charley, start with two balls in your dominant hand and one ball in your non-dominant. Cross your dominant hand over your non-dominant hand, and then act as if you were starting Mills Mess, throwing a ball from your dominant hand toward the center of your body and uncrossing your arms. As your arms uncross, you are going to make a throw from your dominant hand that is almost vertical, much more so than what the second throw of Mills Mess would normally be. You will then recross your arms such that your non-dominant hand is now on top, catching the first ball with your non-dominant hand and then making an under-the-arm throw from your dominant hand toward the center of your body. This ball will pass underneath the vertically-thrown second ball, which will be caught by your dominant hand. The last ball will then be caught by your non-dominant hand.
    As shown, practice this on both sides. Next, you are going to add in the "crossed-arm Half-Shower" portion of the pattern. As the last ball from the previous step approaches your non-dominant hand (which at this point is crossed over your dominant hand), you are going to bring your dominant hand in toward the center of your body and make a short vertical throw underneath the aforementioned ball, catching that ball in your now empty non-dominant hand. Your dominant hand (which is still crossed underneath your non-dominant hand) will then make an under-the-arm throw over the short vertical ball and toward your non-dominant hand, clearing space for your dominant hand to catch the short vertical ball. Your non-dominant hand will then catch the ball thrown from your dominant hand.
    This is one cycle of Charley. To connect both sides of the pattern, simply make a throw from your non-dominant hand and uncross your arms again (as if starting another cycle of Mills Mess). This will set you up to perform Charley on the other side of your body. Charley is only difficult as you learn the order and position of the throws; once those have been mastered, the trick is easy to juggle.