Most influential improv shows of the last decade?

[Kevin Dorff]

Here Goes...

Take this with a grain of salt...

I was on Blue Velveeta, the team formed in late 1988 at Improv Olympic. I know this is moving the timeline back a bit so Ill include some credits to hopefully help put some faces to some names. The team included Tom Booker (later original cast of Co-ed), Jay Leggett (In Living Color), Susan Messing (Co-ed/SC), Mitch Rouse (Exit 57), Brenden Sullivan (comedy writer; also the other guy in McBreyers Millstone spot), and Brian Blondell (HORDE tour producer). As with all IO teams the lineup occasionally varied, but thats the core.

Being coached was not a given at that time. We sought out Mick to coach us...for a time we were the only team doing this(I dont know about pre-88). We attended classes together and repeated them.

At that time IO featured formal team competitions, the winner taking the lions share of shows. As a result of a tie there were two house teams when we started: Tequlia Mocking Bird (with Carrane/Noah/Koechner etc) and Fish Stchick (with McCann/Farley/Gomez etc). Six months after being formed we beat both of them and became the new house team. I think we won three more after that.

Our team has been conventionally credited/cursed with bringing music into greater focus at IO. Having Susan, Jay and the innovative Dave Adler on piano allowed us to take chances with music. Musical Option was rarely played (at IO) before we made it a regular part of the show.

Many thought we were the first team to consistently achieve the form of Dels "three and three" Harold. I remember him telling Charna after one really good show that hed "never done it better".

Ask Noah and hell probably say we were good at giving each other careful attention. We didnt often let things drop or just die.

We lacked plenty, too. We never had the psychological dexterity of Tequila Mockingbird. The physical component of our work was occasionally forced and gimmicky. Sometimes wed "act" in scenes...with the usual lamentable results.

The team dissovled over money of all things. We argued for Charna to pay us. Foolishly, she agreed. Predictably, no amount of stage time or compensation satisfied the entire team so we split. Brian Stack and I both played some of the Improv on Wells gigs.

 

[kleonard]

Influences

Yeah, Jethros on it. There was a golden era
of improv that pushed everything forward. You can
see this in Second Citys history from the first
cast to The Next Generation cast that included
Joe Flaherty, Harold Ramis, and John Belushi to
the first Canadian cast (Aykroyd, Radner, Levy, et
al) etc... . We dont really have enough distance
on this era to understand it fully - all guesswork
right now. Its such a young theatrical art form. And
those of us in Chicago are naturally biased to the
work in our own backyard - completely ignoring the
improvisational forms that have been furthered in
Canada and Europe.

 

[Craig Cackowski]

Blue Velveeta definitely included Leggett, Blondell, Mitch Rouse, Kevin Dorff, Susan Messing, and Brendan Sullivan...beyond that I dont know. I think McCann hooked up with them for the three-man show at The Improv. The story that Kevin, Susan, and Charna all told on Inside the Improvisors Studio was basically that the management at Papa Milanos, where IO was performing at the time, approached Blue Velveeta, since they were the most popular team, about cutting out the middleman(i.e., Charna)and headlining on their own. So Charna got kicked out of her space by one of her own teams, she found a new one, the Papa Milanos thing fell through for Blue Velveeta, and everyone eventually made up.

As for Jethros question about the forms of the show...

Jazz Freddy was much more about content than form...mostly just two-person scenes, though there was a structure that you could learn if you wanted to. It was comprised of both IO and Ed alums, Pete Gardner being the link between the two groups. The sheer talent of the group was phenomenal (Dorff, Stack, Dratch, Koechner, Noah, Pete, Miriam Tolan, Carlos Jacott, Chris Reed, Pat Finn, Jimmy Carrane, among others) and the scenework was patient and attentive to detail. The IO people seemed to bring a sense of playfulness and ensemble, the Ed people were just flat-out great actors and listeners who made everything seem real. And perhaps the most important thing was performing the show in an actual theater (the Live Bait) rather than in a bar, which gave longform some legitimacy as theater (Dels dream!). They got raves from the Chicago critics and national coverage from American Theater magazine (a great article, probably from 93, on the Chicago improv scene, thats worth digging up if anyone has the resources). I saw it probably a dozen times over its two runs. A young Peter Gwinn, incidentally, did lights.

Three Mad Rituals was the Familys first show that was separate from the regular Harold shows at IO. Charna produced it, and Del directed. It was upstairs at The Wrigleyside(now Abners Yard), where IO performed at the time. The Family was Matt Besser, Ian Roberts, Ali Fahrahnakian, Miles Stroth, Neil Flynn, and Adam McKay, and the three rituals were The Deconstruction, The Movie, and The Harold, in that order, all inspired by the same suggestion, a line of poetry. The Deconstruction and The Movie had been kicking around Dels classes for a while but The Family perfected them into the forms we know (or dont know) today. The Harold was done after an intermission, and sometimes brought back elements from the previous two forms. It was done on Saturday nights in lieu of a Harold show (we had two teams on Thurs., two on Fri., The Family on Sat.), and every IO performer or student who was serious about improv was there to watch. Jazz Freddy may have been the greatest collection of improv talent that Ive ever seen, but the Family was the greatest team, in every sense of the word. The support was unbelievable, each of them had a defined role on the team that only that person could fulfill, and they seemed to read each others minds (you can still see it today when you see ASSSSCAT, or any combination of two or more of them). Jeff Richmond played piano, and was particularly impressive during The Movie, when he improvised an original score every night (not a typical accompanist just diddling along with the scenes, I mean a fucking SCORE). Although it was in a bar, I think it helped give longform, and specifically IO, some legitimacy and deserved attention. I, incidentally, got to understudy Ian on the night they were reviewed, and Larry Bommer confused me with Miles and vice versa.
Those happen to be the two shows that influenced me the most, mostly because they were the shit in my first two years in town. And I wouldnt puport to say what shows have contributed the most to what were doing now, but I think for every improvisor as an individual, the most influential shows are whatever the best shows are when theyre starting out, because theyll never see improv with that much reverance and awe again, with students eyes. Ive been lucky enough to have people credit shows Ive been involved with as influencing them, and though I first I want to say, "Youve got to be kidding...Jazz Freddy, now that was a SHOW!", I realize theyre seeing my show with the eyes I saw those shows with, and thats kinda cool.

Craig Cackowski

P.S. Is this the longest post in the short history of this board?

P.P.S. It may not have been influential, Mullaney, but wasnt Frank Booth In The Blue Velvet Lounge a good show? Yeah...

P.P.P.S. Oops, didnt see Dorffs response before I posted mine...take his word and not mine on the Velveeta stuff, cause Im going by what I remember from Improv Studio.

[Edited by Craig Cackowski on 02-09-2001 at 01:27 AM]

 

[Monahan]

Innovation

I guess my initial reaction is that if someone wanted to produce a lecture series on the modern history of improvisation, I would be there with bells on.

As mentioned earlier, its probably hard see things in perspective, but it definitely seems like there was a group of people who really changed the scene about 5 or so years ago. They were so dedicated to the work that they had continually push the envelope. I mean, back then were people performing with 4 or 5 different groups at a time? I know Im just as guilty as the next person, but everyone seems to want to spread out these days in the hopes of garnering as much attention from as many different angles as possible. Its gotta be difficult to grow innovation without focus.

 

[Megan]

Naked?

Any thoughts on Naked?

While I was nowhere near the improv scene when it was up and running, I think that Naked has affected much of the improv that I have been involved with and enjoy seeing today. It was such a simple idea - no frills or gimmicks, with the emphasis on real and honest improv, finding the emotional commitment in a scene.

Megan

 

[mullaney]

Craig did a great job at explaining JF and 3MR, let me take a stab at some of the others on my list.

Pinata Full of Bees: A SC mainstage review that broke every convention of a SC mainstage review. Characters and scenes returned and connected to one another; there were no black outs; the performers changed costumes on stage; the show didnt start with a conventional musical number; the show had an overall style and theme rather than just another collection of the funniest scenes the cast could write; and my favorite--the title was not a pun and actually had something to do with the show.

The influence? It certainly broke SC wide open allowing Mick and Jeff considerable freedom to do lots of interesting things with the shows that followed. I also think a lot of improvisers looked at that show and thought, "Wow, you get to do that when youre on mainstage?" Of course, people always want to work for SC, but I think a lot of people wanted to work for them more.

Ill tackle one other and then get back to work: Asssscat.

Asssscat is structured very similarly to the old format Armando show. The UCB performed that show for a couple of years for free at Solo Arts, and people lined up around the block for it. From what Ive heard it blew people away in NY when it arrived. Most of the senior performers at UCB were the people who watched that show week after week back in 1997 and 1998. That show built their theater.

I think the greatest change they made from the Armando show was inviting non-improvisers to be the monologist. Over the years they have gotten some pretty cool actors, writers and comedians to do the show. That exposed a lot of people to this style of improvisation, first because influential people participated in the show, and second because a lot of people probably came to the show when they heard that people like Janeane Garofalo and Conan OBrian occasionally did the monologues.

Id love to hear what some of the NY people have to say about Asssscat and its influence.

Originally posted by Craig Cackowski
P.P.S. It may not have been influential, Mullaney, but wasnt Frank Booth In The Blue Velvet Lounge a good show? Yeah...

That show had a lot of influence on me.

 

[Jethro]

Thanks

Thank you all for those posts. Now thats what I call an improv resource center.

I know I wasnt involoved in this, but for the benefit of those who werent able to see it Ill take a stab.

<b>NAKED</b> - Performed by Jim Carrane and Stephanie Weir. Directed by Rob Mello. Two people - One scene - sixty minutes. I only saw it once, but I was very impressed by it. They didnt take a suggestion, which was comforting to me, because they knew the audience would accept that. No editing tricks, no time dashes, nothing. The Rob Mello interview covers this quite a bit, but the fact that the magical bag of improvisors tricks has been taken away forces the performer to focus on good scenework.

I was also impressed by the fact that Mullaney and Rob but up an entirely new set of flats in front of the standard Del Close Theater walls. It really changed my perspective. I wasnt watching just another show in the DCT. I was in the Naked space.

My first guess would be that with 60 minutes to a scene, there would be a great deal of fat....stuff that got dropped. The exact opposite was true. They had a great economy of information. Nothing was to be dismissed or ignored. Occasionally something would seem to be ignored, only to see it surface thirty minutes later. It really stressed (at least to me) the importance of patience at attention to your scene partner.

Really inspirational.

Jethro

 

[Craig Cackowski]

Youre dead on, Mr. Monahan, people did not play with 4 or 5 different groups at once back then...it was much more about the ensemble than the individual. While I think the current cross-pollination between SC, IO, Annoyance, Playground, and ComedySportz is good and healthy(the scene was much more factional when I started), I see people spreading themselves thin, playing at as many places as possible, usually with the ultimate goal of getting into Second City. The folks from Jazz Freddy and The Family got into Second City not because they were all over the place, but because they devoted themselves to a tight, single group, and ended up looking great as individuals within that ensemble. Of course, there were fewer opportunities to perform period back then, so maybe people were with one group by default! Theres still examples of that today, nowadays, though...think of Schadenfreude. They were a Level 5 that stayed together to do sketches...they built their own following and got a lot more attention as a grouo than any one of them would get if they were understudying Tourco.

Craig

 

[youngcat]

Great thread. Im a young (in terms of performance) improvisor in New York, still taking classes, and struggling through the different levels, etc... One thing strikes me when reading this thread; I think about the current scene, and how it is developing, how improv is growing and changing in front of our eyes, and cant help but think when I walk into class that this must have been how it was at the actors Studio in the fifties and sixties, after the group theater disbanded, and the method was coming into its own.

And as a young improvisor, in New York (and yes, I take classes at UCB, so Im biased) Thats what it feels like at a sunday night Asscat show. You watch Ian and Matt and Besser and Amy work with people who have "made it" such as Horatio Sanz and Tina Fey, and Jerry Minor, and you see these non-improvisors like Conan and Garafaolo,deliver the monolouges, and you feel like youre in the middle of something special.

And as a student, I learn more from watching than I do from working. You can go watch these "peers", people like you and me, who have gotten a break after toiling in the trenchesfor years, "come home" to hone their skills. Its riveting, inspiring, and funny as hell.

And after reading some of these posts, I have a different perspective on the people Im watching.

 

[Gwyn]

So many things

First; I am so impressed with Kevin, Craig and Dorffs explanations. You guys rock. So much more articulate than I could have been.

Second; I agree with Craig that you tend to be more influenced by what you saw with your "student" eyes. When it was all new. Everything is awe-inspiring. Im so jaded and cynical now.

Third; The 2 things I saw after I had acquired my Jaded Shades, and were STILL able to inspire me were, "Naked" and "Close Quarters" (? Sorry, "Closed"?).
"Naked" because Im entranced, as a player, by the idea of playing one person out. Fully rounding them over time, and discovering them myself as the thing goes on. Id initially experienced that when we did "Mobius American Theatre", an improvised one act play, at the Organic Greenhouse, and I loved it. So "Naked" was the same thing only taking it even further, and that really appealed to me.
Would love to try it.

"CQ" blew me away. Again, as a player, I literally sat there going, "gee, I dont think I could do this!". There were so many layers to keep track of and you gotta be SO on top of everything. So I was in awe of the difficulty of the form (the degree of difficulty you might say), and how cool it ends up being. I mean, really, how many times do you see a FORM you dont think you can do. You can see a great PERFORMER, and say, "wow, I wish I were as good as he is" but not often do you say, "That FORM is beyond me". At least I never had at that point. And not since. Very impressive.

Fourth: Craig and Mullaney, Im confused. Did the Family then take 3 Mad Rituals to the New Theatre on Belmont? Or was that a different show? I know I sat in, there. But it WAS something different wasnt it? It had the Check in....Hmmmm....Im getting old.

Fifth: Thank you so much Kevin(Dorff). I think I definitely remember meeting Brenden Sullivan at Burton Place that time, now that I see his name. Im positive.
Do you remember the JF in which Chris Reed played a character, "Solar"? I thought it was so brilliant. It was not at all characature-y like that type of character sometimes can be. But maybe he played it a lot and you wouldnt remember the night Im thinking of. He camped out in his parents back yard rather than stay in the house because theyd violated some earth-friendly principle of his,....something like that. God, Ill never forget that show.


[Edited by Gwyn on 02-09-2001 at 02:58 PM]

 

[mullaney]

The second show by the Family was Dynamite Fun Nest, I think? It was a cool show which went a couple steps further than 3MR but I dont think it had the impact as the first one, mostly cause it was second.

 

[PJacobi]

This is the best thread Ive ever read.

Wow.

Someone should go on all the other boards and refer them to this.

Regarding the discussion about people playing with too many groups, etc. I think a major problem with group mind nowdays is that nobody hangs out as much anymore. Miles once said that you have to hang out with your teammates in order to play better. I thought of that when Craig mentioned The Family. Whenever I see UCB, or whatver version of ASSSCAT in Chicago, they amaze me because they make moves faster than anyone in the audience can see it coming. Thats pretty rare. They are good moves, but its not the initiation thats striking, its the speed. I think its because they share a brain.

And on the topic of shows you see as a student blowing your mind, I have two stories. I first moved here in late 1998 and saw Baby Wants Candy soon thereafter. They had just been named house team (I think). They blew the roof off the place. Cacky sat in and was a marvel as a corrupt Doctor and Kulhan did a song about what this janitor "Old Bob" knows that I have yet to see anyone ever come close to. Since then I still appreciate them, but marvel less at it, probably due to overexposure. Also, the first Trio was mindboggling to me. I went to most of them on that first run and on two occasions I fell out of my chair crying with laughter. Later, in my more jaded phase I saw the last Quartet and it soared, truly. I was ready to look for reasons why it didnt work or why it wasnt as good as previous shows, etc. No way. It completely killed everyone in the room.

Also, the first JTS Brown I saw and the first Armando I saw were truly incredible. In the first Armando I saw, Noah had just returned from LA. Miles initiated a scene by sitting down with a book and saying "Why do they have a book called Poetry to Be Read Aloud in a library?" Noah looked at him and said, "Oh, youre one of those guys." Miles: "One of what guys?" Noah: "One of those guys who watches too much Seinfeld."

So, though I dont know as much about all the older stuff, maybe this will offer some perspective on how a newer type player was and is affected by shows.

Anyway, thanks everybody.

P

 

[Eckart]

Kind of Blue Velveeta

Work is slow here today so Im just gonna throw out some random thoughts...

This "most influental" thread is cool. Im glad were getting some interesting use out of this thing. I find Kevin Dorffs <I><font color="#00CCFF">Blue Velveeta</I></font> info particularly fascinating. I remember driving up from Evanston with my friends every weekend to see BV perform in the basement of Papa Milanos restaurant (during Summers 90, 91 maybe.) Peter Gwinn (who was in my Boy Scout troop) turned me on to ImprovOlympic and gave me a 2-for-1 pass. I xeroxed and used that pass as many times as I could (sorry Charna.)

I hadnt done much improv before (except what Peter taught us on campouts) so I didnt really know much about it--but I remember really enjoying BV. I also remember seeing Noah, Carrane, and Brian Stack perform also (I was afraid of Brian Stack. He resembled a 2nd cousin of mine that had a bitter falling out with my family many years before. So, I was worried that if he saw me in the audience, he would confront me after the show.)

I recall BV being really entertaining, good with music stuff, and very polished. Most crowds at the time demanded nothing more (Papa Milanos was more like a bar than a theatre.) I also saw the three man version of BV at the Improv and, while I thought it was funny, I was disappointed that the whole gang wasnt there. I also remember wondering what happened to ImprovOlympic. At the time, I thought maybe IO was gone, everyone went and got day jobs, and only these three guys from Blue Velveeta were keeping the improv torch going.

Many years later when I got back from college, I went and saw Pinata Full of Bees and was glad to see somebody from BV (Kevin) up there. I loved it.

I was relieved to find out ImprovOlympic was still around and you could take classes there. I signed up for classes and found out that improv had taken some leaps while I was at college. In some ways, I felt like Rip Van Winkle. But still, a lot was the same. They still taught the harold, still did Musical Option (up until a few years ago,) still did the Dream, and still ended with Freeze.

Maybe they dont seem as "groundbreaking" as say Jazz Freddy or The Family, but I think Blue Velveeta was a big influence (on me especially.) I think they helped advance ideas in improv that might be taken for granted now. They showed that an improv show could be as tight and entertaining as a scripted show (maybe moreso) and the importance of teamwork. They had multiple "stars" (like the Trailblazers) rather than one or two (like the Lakers) These seemed like tasty, refreshing ideas back then (at least to me.)

Sorry if weve since moved on from this...or if this is too long. Just my 2 cents.

-George

 

[Gwyn]

Now that you mention it...

the first time I saw Freeze Tag at SC ETC I was blown away.

I specifically remember Jane Morris and John Michalski, and I confess to stealing the bit she did that night. It was never funny when I did it.

I was in HS and our Play Production class went.
We started playing endless games of Freeze after that, for warm ups.

You never know what will end up influencing you. Its funny.

 

[Don Hall]

$0.02

Im surprised that no one has mentioned Bang Bang (Paul Dillons maverick group). I see their influences on a lot of the darker stuff going on right now.

Reiterating what has been said before, Jazz Freddy and early Upright Citizens Brigade shows seem to have impacted what we do more than any other two styles/influential shows in the last ten years.

 

[goldfish boy]

Dynamite Fun Nest

I remember this show not being nearly as good as 3 Mad Rituals. Im sure part of it is the "newness" had worn off, but then again the last "3MR" show was as awe-inspiring as the first.

In my memory-impaired opinion, it was not as good because:

1) the forms were not necessarily as good -- the impressionistic horror probably looked good on paper....

2) the Family was distracted -- some of them were in tourco, others were working on other stuff, the UCB was doing that show with Rich Fulcher

3) Jeff didnt accompany them every week. IMO, the movie in particular cries out for musical accompaniment, and I think this every time I see "Feature Feature." I mean, music is crucially important to most films!

4) there were too many absences/understudy performances, and some of the understudies they had at that time simply did not mesh well with the Family. In 3MR, if I recall correctly, the only understudies were Laura Krafft and Craig Cackowski, and they meshed seamlessly. (I didnt see Gwyn understudy in DFN, so Im not talking about her not fitting in; Im thinking mostly about Kara and Paul.) Madeline Long was an official cast member for the first few weeks, and she didnt fit in either.

Sorry this post is so long, but this is such an interesting thread.

 

[Gwyn]

Yeah, I didnt fit in

either!

 

[JohnBowie]

Influenza

Look!!! The Subject is a pun on Influences, only its a disease!!! God, I'm clever.

Enough Chicago stuff for a moment. 3 years ago, Secunda hassled me into going to see The Swarm at Solo Arts Group. That was the first long-form I ever experienced, and I remember incredible specifics -- Joanne Morrison and Michael Delaney pulling a thruline about community theater out of nowhere. Secunda doing a layon "We see a banner over these two players that reads: 'TAKE BASKETBALL BACK FROM THE NEGRO.'" They will tell you it was kind of an off night, and I guess it was, because I looked at it and found it very accessible and doable. I didn't see Asssscat until I started taking classes (first monologist Sarah Miller, guests were McCann and Joanne again) and that blew me away -- I remember a classroom scene that ended with everybody ganging up on the teacher (Besser) and hanging him. Then came Burn Manhattan -- holy shit, these guys don't even take a suggestion? IMPOSSIBLE! Since then, there's a ton of things that have jazzed me -- the seamlessness of Dratch and Fey, the awfully brutal confessionals of Marc Maron and Secunda (again), the incredible character work of my girlfriend, ASSSSCAT again and again (even though they think its a blowoff) and every quickly edited, brilliantly initiated Level One Show I see at UCB.

 

[Brian Stack]

I'm glad that a few people mentioned Ed as an influential group. As proud as I am of Jazz Freddy, our group wouldn't have existed if it hadn't been for Ed. Many of the ideas and rehearsal techniques that Pete brought to Jazz Freddy had their roots in Ed. Pete definitely put his own stamp on them, though.

I unfortunately never got to see Ed perform but I ended up working with several of its members in Jazz Freddy and was lucky enough to marry one, too. Sadly, it wasn't Koechner.

 

[Brian Stack]

Actually, Koechner wasn't in Ed now that I think about it. Sometimes, it seems like Dave was in everything.

Oh, and sorry, Mr. Eckart. I didn't mean to resemble your disturbed cousin. Thanks for coming to the BV show even in my fearsome presence.