Joy surrounds a funny person — circus performer? (10)
I believe the answer is:
charioteer
'circus performer?' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both people as well as being singular nouns.
Perhaps you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'joy surrounds a funny person' is the wordplay.
'joy' becomes 'cheer' (cheering is a kind of joying).
'surrounds' is an insertion indicator.
'a funny person' becomes 'ariot' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'cheer' enclosing 'ariot' is 'CHARIOTEER'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for charioteer that I've seen before include "Ben Hur?" , "Driver of Roman vehicle" , "Old carriage driver" , "Driver common in early warfare" , "Driver of horse-drawn fighting vehicle" .)