Reviewed by Marie J. Kilker
Thirteen national and
local groups, 55 performers in
all, presented Improv in one-hour
slots in two venues over two nights (5 to 11 p.m.), July 20-21, hosted by
Florida Studio Theatre. Daytimes also featured related workshops centered on
learning different types of Improv as well as improving preparation and presentation. Rebecca Hopkins, FST Managing Director, was the Founding Festival
Director. The Festival was capped by an all-participant free Improv in the Keating, followed by a party at MaximoÕs,
catered by NancyÕs BBQ, on SarasotaÕs Main Street. As for the individual slotsÉ
FST Improv
(Sarasota)
Sketches based on
Improv suggestions reigned. After working out a made-up story about an audience
member, an art teacher whoÕd moved
to Sarasota from Albany, NY, the group turned to presenting an Emotional Genre
Roller Coaster. Material involved different styles of film, TV shows,
directors, and characters from Shakespearian to zombies. Darryl Knapp made a very good one of the latter. A conversation with every word
beginning with an m or a p challenged. An interview with Christine
Alexander doing extremely active translating for the hearing impaired ended the
quick-paced series of sketches that put the local group up with the best
Festival performers.
Just the Funny
(Miami)
Best opening: a man
behind a couple seatedÉwhere?Éworking into a hot session until the man cries
out: ÒDo you mind? WeÕre in the middle of É.Ò Big surprise! The group, well monitored by Carlos
Rivera, acted out their arguments
about the kind of Improv best for a FestivalÉreal Improv, not sketches or
stand-up. A restaurant scene then led to a sketch about sausages, followed by a
discussion of grocery bills in the style of a Shakespearian play. (No one used iambic pentameter,
though.) A cute amusement park horror ride preceded terrible prophecies. Finally, two audience volunteers guided a bride and groom at
a wedding reciting their homemade vows. This sketch just wasnÕt so funny, as
the words didnÕt give much impetus to the gestures that were supposed to be
manipulated by the volunteers.
Improv Boston
This is the one group
I missed because of a booking change that made one choose between two shows,
neither of which would be repeated. Improv Boston claims an ever-evolving form.
The participants take a suggestion
for a first scene and then deconstruct every element from lines to positioning
to physicality, etc. Sometimes
they use music. Artistic Director Will Luera has also been Artistic Associate
of the Chicago Improv Festival.
The Third Thought
(Tampa)
Dedicated to
long-form Improv, The Third Thought took on the idea of a trip into San
Francisco on tour with a Wiener Mobile.
Chris Friday became driver because
ÒIt takes a big wheel to drive a big weiner.Ò That set the tone, and
obviously the plot would involve a pig (which got the most laughs), a Piggly
Wiggly, an invasion of the home of Nancy Pelosi, a shooting, and a golden
weiner. Its best comedy came from varied jokes about beef, pork, slaughterhouses. Political
references had little effect.
DadÕs Garage
(Atlanta)
A theatre company
that offers comedy Improv with traditional theater, DadÕs Garage is literally
and actually central in Atlanta and in continuous play. Here, improvised
signature forms include a soap opera, a competition-type TheatreSports team
play, and a Japanese-style game show. A musical version, called DadÕs Garage
Rockola, builds scenes on songs that an audience chooses as if on a juke box at
a showÕs beginning. At FST, the group emphasized short scenes. For example, in
an art studio, Amber Nash actually painted Z Gillespie, who always wanted
to be art. ThereÕs a perversion of a Superman rescue and not very fast
service at a fast food place. Rueben Medina impulsed a Hispanic-flavored gag as
a guy being flirted with, and toward the end he did a lot of gagging, which was
a good, if gross, way to end the set. DadÕs GarageÕs strength was logic;
incidents werenÕt just haphazzard.
The Hitmen
(Chicago)
Improv proceeded from
the suggestion of a stairwell, and it was pretty hard going with that one,
until the improvised characters left a six-storey building and got out on the
street. Gang humor. A shift of place to an army recruiting station and a
shooting there, leading to depiction of a future with later generation versions
of President Kennedy, Joe Biden, a scandal involving the wife of one, a
memorial to WWIV, and an assignment to go off to see The Wizard. Movement was fast but eventually far
from that stairwell. The pace helped keep up interest. Brendan Hannigan, Thiago
Lima, Colin Espinales, and Justin Drogos worked as a distinctly homogenous
team.
Vintage Whine
(Sarasota)
An assured Senior
Team, Vintage Whine takes suggestions and twists them into performance. George Pochos was the male among leader
Fae Beloff, assertive Marie Kropp, droll Lynn Means, Southern charmer Susan
Morin, stylish Nancy Rand, and
outspoken Paula Morissey. Their fine skits exploited pet peeves, questioning
foreigners and translating their answers (well-timed), a debate over the value
of roundabouts, suspicions of infidelity, and a case of a coupleÕs minds going
blank and their having to have audience members help them. Due to extenuating circumstances, this
team had its time cut short, and we were all entitled to whine about that.
Lazy Fairy Improv
Troupe (Sarasota)
With many of the same
performers as FST Improv, Lazy Fairy can be relied on for laughs. For the
Festival, the troupe did a long-form play, ÒMeet the Family,Ò conveying the
suggested general mood of malaise among Gothic rednecks. Darryl Knapp captured
the spirit as a sprawling family patriarch leading the setting up of obstacles to confused Joey Panek,
who just tries to pick up his date. Added interaction with flirty Angel Parker,
goofy evangelistic Christine Alexander, and childish Catey Brannan involves a
Big Prayer Requirement thatÕs more raw than religious. This grim but mostly
clever piece was followed by a scene showing a place to go on the weekend. Darryl was a stitch as Snooty the
Manatee at the Aquarium in Bradenton.
Stacked (Chicago)
An all-female Musical
Improv group, accompanied by versatile Eric Bair (if often a bit too loud) on
piano, made up song, lyrics, and story following the suggested subject of
peanut butter. Nothing that
followed bested the opening song for cleverness: ÒYou think youÕre so smooth
but I know youÕre a little nutty.Ò Erin Goldsmith, Sacey Smith, Jenna Steege,
and Katie Yore displayed temperaments as different as their physical
featuresÑfanciful, realistic, sexy, couldnÕt-care-less, needful. Yet they
played in as coordinated a fashion as their black and white outfits. Most of
their talk was about men, fat and food, exercise and auditioning. A man behind me laughed so loudly and
so continuously that I missed much of the humorous dialogue and lyrics, though
a pratfall or two and Erin sneaking rolls from a patron at a table near the
stage seemed to be humorous enough. This one struck me as too long to do too
little.
Jester Theater
Company (Orlando)
The fun began at the
theater door with Baliff Benson (Jay Hopkins, also Director) collecting from
some of those waiting specific
opinions to be placed in sealed envelopes for use in the Trial that
would be held inside (under Hopkins next as Judge Mintday). Jester Theater
Company, an all-comedy organization, revived its original creation Near-Sighted
Justice, created in 1996. In addition
to the sealed improvised opinions,
the Trial was for a defendant (Tom Cook) from the audience. (Info he gave about
himself was used subsequently.) Tom was accused of (suggested) panhandling,
which was taken to mean actually handling pans in an inappropriate mannerÉin a Jewish templeÉand so on.
Witnesses to the deed and for the defendantÕs character were all played by Mike
Carr, a hoot becoming as different as a Jewish police officer citing his
grandmother, a French entomologist, and a boss at a Cracker Barrel . The Trial
also involved a love affair between
Gemma Fearn, defender, and Chance Gardner, a whiz at making up crime
details as prosecuter. This inventive,
beautifully acted and
staged comedy, in my opinion,
topped Festival offerings. Diana Hopkins was Stage Manager.
Available Cupholders (Austin)
Four men and a gal
(Kaci Beeler, who played two women with almost the same name) had fun
improvising a one-act play happening in Alaska at GregÕs Plant Service. Its owner (Ace Manning, morose) is
about to lose to a member of the Alaskan Mafia (Bill Stern, threatening) for
not being able to meet his rent.
GregÕs friend (harried Michael Joplin) tries to help with a scheme
involving marijuana. Jeremy Sweetlamb, Director, also tries to help Greg and
the gal in a rather confusing sequence that takes place in an Ice Lounge. The
moral of the play: DonÕt fool with the Alaska Mafia! Sum-up: more plot than laughs, but the players worked hard
to keep up audience interest.
SAK Comedy Lab
(Orlando)
Mike Carr (playing a
second time and happily received) helped set off a stream of comic bits in
which Chris Dinger and Greg Yates often acted as a team. One of the funniest short sets of the
Festival involved an interview about
(suggested) glassblowing to which the latter guys responded as Siamese
twins in improvised unison! SAK
indulged in musical love songs about (suggested) dolphins and staged part of a
Spanish soap opera. A final act
employed a lot of physical humor, as it involved characters who werenÕt
comfortable talking. After two days of Improv, many of the
performers and audience could sympathize with them.