UPDATE: MYSTERY surrounds the identity of the “creepy” clown who terrified train travellers at Southern Cross station.

People have been speculating about who the masked man is since he was spotted dressed in a suit and tie calmly carrying a suitcase through the station on Saturday as fellow train travellers looked on.

Reader Andrew said the boy was his stepson on the way to the National Institute of Circus Arts Australia in Prahran.

“Please people just calm down,” Andrew said.

A caller named Andrew also told ABC774 the same story, but readers aren’t so sure.

Allan said the clown didn’t look 14 years old.

“Couldn’t he have put on mask/make up when he arrived at the school?” he said.

Tim said the masked man — or boy — was tall for a teen.

“Should give up clown school and take up a sport,” he said.

A witness said the clown — who had boarded a Melbourne-bound train near Deer Park or Ardeer — acted “menacingly” towards young women at the city station.

Passenger Karen told ABC774 this morning that it was like “being in a horror movie”.

“It was a very scary face,” Karen said.

“It was a clown mask but it was a very angry clown.

“All sorts of things are running through your mind. It is pretty scary.”

Karen said the clown originally boarded the train in the second or third carriage but soon made his way to the front.

“I thought ‘oh great, the clown is in our (front) carriage’,” she said.

“He slowly walked along the aisle until he got to the driver’s door, stood, stopped, turned around and just watched all of us — stared us all down.

“He didn’t say anything.

“The strange part was that he was never pulled up. Nobody stopped him and said ‘hey mate, take off the mask’.”.

V/Line spokesman Colin Tyrus told Faine commuters should report such incidents to platform staff.

“I would urge anyone noticing any disruptive behaviour, let the conductor know,” he said.

FIRST AUSTRALIAN REVIEW: ‘It’ is the great Stephen King horror clown movie we had to have, Leigh Paatsch