Thursday, December 31, 2009

The last day of Hannukkah...

Was awesome! I couldn't think of a better way to spend the final night of the festival of lights than with some funny improv people. Improv Open Mic Night was hosted on Friday, December 18, 2009. Not only was this the final night of Hanukkah but it was also my 3 year anniversary since I started this forum back in Dec 2006. Time flies! We had a great group of people with about 30 wanting to perform. There were some new faces in the crowd and some other people who were at the first ever event back in 2006 (thanks Loser Josh folks!). I opened the night up with a karaoke video I made to Adam Sandler's "Chanukkah Song". We had a few laughs and were ready to kick off the show. Some of the highlights of the night were, "Diwali" , "Jizz in a drink" (I don't know how that came into play) and of course the "Amateur Rap Battle". The Rap battle was amazing. In the true spirit of Improv, the other people on stage caught on and jumped in. It was a true "Yo Mama" show in action and everyone was "yes anding"...it was awesome! Some new things I tried was a Superheros game with a large group of people. I think that worked really well and I'll definitely bring it back. Everyone got to perform on stage at least twice and of course we did the lightning round of Lines From A Hat to end the event. Thanks to everyone who has supported this forum for the past three years. It looks like I will be returning on Friday, January 22, 2010 in The DC Improv Comedy Lounge. Sign-up is 6:30pm - 7:30pm and the show will begin at 8:05 pm. See you in the New Year!

Here's an email I received from a new patron to Improv Open Mic Night. I think she summed this up better than I could.
"Last night was totally hilarious and fun in a really supportive environment despite me knowing only 2 other people there, Allyson and Dan. It was fun cool and exciting like if your friends were standing around a trampoline/net thing and had to toss you up into the air and were
responsible and concerned for your safety as well and made sure you did not fall or bounce off, painfully, into thorny bushes somewhere. So that nurturing, watchful, considerate person was Allyson! Go girl and thanks for taking it easy on me and still getting me up on stage.
It was just fantastic and fun! For me, the biggest surprise of the night was the mean, fierce, sick and quick lyrical genius from our own Dan, who was the obvious champion in the Rap Rival scenario. Our whole table ( and yes, we met 6 new people last night who sat with us) was totally proud of Dan in all his scenes. You'd never guess he kept saying he was nervous--his style, with the thoughtful pause and then spewing out something hilarious and unexpected, worked really well. The other hilarious moment of the night was a theme that threaded through many of the acts, and that was Diwali, which then evolved into Diwanzaa and Diwannukah. Globalization and diversity in comedy, man, I was diggin it. You could see the folks using what Shawn's outfitted us with--the who/where/emotional response, the human madlib, and others. It was really funny to see when one actor would come behind another actor to add more waving and spinning hands to liken the Hindu God Shiva/Vishnu/Ram...it was all over the place, it was great!
Just wanted to share with you guys. We are gonna have so much fun, this is cool!
Hope you are staying warm and cozy on this snowfilled saturday.
See you on Monday! shaps"

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

New Date Announced!

The next open mic night will be held on Friday, December 18, 2009 in The DC Improv Comedy Lounge. Sign-up to play is 6:30pm - 7:30pm and the show will begin at 8:05 pm.

I hope you can make it...this is the 3 year anniversary show of this event. Time flies when you are having fun improvising.