Goodbye 3541

I started taking classes at iO in 2007. I didn't go to a show for my first term there because I was too scared to use my student ID and I was too broke to pay for a show. During level 2 I mustered up enough courage to go see the Sunday 10:30 show which turned out to be GhettoBlaster and 3033. The first show I didn't care for much but when 3033 took the stage I was enthralled. They took a suggestion and for thirty minutes danced and interpretively moved to a soundtrack, no dialogue. I remember it being funny but it struck me more as an engaging piece of theater, even more impressive given these five men were big, big but graceful. From then on I was hooked.

The following week I went back on Sunday this time for the whole evening. That was the first time I saw Deep Schwa. I fell in love. They were so fast, so smart, so wickedly playful. I don't remember much about the show but after it my face hurt from laughing. The team at the time was Jeff Griggs, Brett Lyons, Dan Antonucci, Kevin Fleming, Meagan Flanigan, Brian Jack and Colleen Murray. Craig Uhlir got back from Vegas a month or so after I started watching Schwa and at first I didn't like him- too sharp, too mean, too aggressive. As a teacher Craig won me over and that roster of Schwa became my signpost and my inspiration for what improv was and could be. Subsequent additions and returning members like Rob Janas, Brian Wilson, Kate Duffy, Joe Canale, Danny Mora, and Neil McNamara were also incredible to watch. Since that first show back in 2007 I've only missed a handful of Sunday nights at iO, less than ten.

                             

I didn't got on a team after classes, I was crushed and angry. I did some work, auditioned, and made it in. My first team at iO was FireCup, it was a great first team, we really cared about each other and most of the time it showed on stage. It was a huge accomplishment when we started playing downstairs in the Cab, in my mind that was always the stage to play on, the goal, where the real work was being done. My second team was Rick where I think I did some of my best work with the Harold. My third team The Hague was great in its atonal weirdness. My independent team The Album and Julia and I's two person show Salute Jive both got runs in the Cabaret, both were unexpected and I couldn't have been more grateful for the opportunities. Ted and I put up our two person sketch show "A Year Of Saturdays" in the DCT, it was the first thing I did that I felt was in my voice. I found that voice at iO.

I had some great teachers and some bad teachers who talked too much. I had some boring teachers and some creepy teachers and some inspiring teachers. I learned some great lessons, some of them because of how angry and biting they were delivered. Some people were mean to me, I was mean to some people, I embarrassed myself a number of times, sometimes I was too proud. Occasionally I talked too much shit.

I had the pleasure of coaching JaJaJa, Echo my first Harold team the members of which will always be near and dear to me and currently coach Attica. I made a lot of friends, was involved with many interesting projects, got inspired, got motivated, got beaten down and picked myself up. I had a place to go whenever I wanted. I found a home and an art form that excited me. 

I don't have much attachment to the building itself, it's the people that are important, but I'll miss the Cabaret stage, the low ceiling, the simple lights, the way the laughs and indifference sounded. I'll miss watching a great show and getting pumped up to go on after or watching a terrible show and getting pumped up to get the crowd back. I'll miss doing a great set coming off and feeling sorry for the team that has to follow it. I'll miss the challenges and the energy, the heat and the camaraderie. It was such a unique space, part bar part theater, compact and intimate. I'll miss sneaking in the back and watching shows from the hall way and then disappearing during freeze.

It wasn't a flawless place. It could be dangerous both interpersonally and in regards to performance. It could be a place of judgement but also kindness and acceptance. Of contradictions. It was a place where you could seek and find some clarity of purpose. Hone your comedic chops in a classroom or on a stage.

It was a magical place and after tonight it's gone.

Goodbye Ted

Today there was a going away BBQ for Ted, he leaves this week for LA. We went through classes together at Second City and I initially really hated him. He introduced himself to me ten times. By the tenth time I just said "yeah, we've met" in a real condescending way, I don't think he noticed. He was(and still is in some ways) the type of person who deliberately or instinctually talks to the most important person in the room. I also resented his talent, he was obviously ahead of myself and our other classmates as far as creative output and vision.

Ted and I finally became friends about two years later when we were on HouseCo together at Second City. I found a great collaborator in Ted, we had similar comedic tastes and instincts. With him I figured out what it looked like to pitch effectively, to write-on-your-feet and find traction within a premise, how to refine a raw idea. I wrote one of my best sketches specifically for Ted, he was a gay Drill Sargent after the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell.  Our creative partnership naturally became a friendship. We were both going through some personal stuff when we were writing and putting up the show and leaned on each other.

Afterwards we decided we wanted to keep working together. We wrote a two-man sketch show called "A Year Of Saturdays". We gigged around for two months months, putting up ten or fifteen minute sets honing the material. Ted set up all that and he taught me a lot about discipline and doing the work. We were both really happy with the show, it was personal and had some edge, it was the first time I felt 100% ownership over and satisfaction with the material I was doing.

After that I didn't see much of Ted, I think we both would have liked to have kept working together but Ted had other projects with more ambition. He was trying to sell Shrink in LA and he went to Switzerland to film a version of his web series Break Ups. We grew apart.

I'll always be proud of those things we wrote together and I know Ted will land on his feet out in lala land. He's a networker of the first order.

Good luck, Goodbye.

Inciting Incident 4

I ask friends "When did you first feel the need to perform?" This comes from my beloved collaborator and Shrink creator Ted Tremper.

A Year Of Saturdays: Reflections

This is the running order for Ted and I's show A Year Of Saturdays which just finished up at iO this past Thursday. Writing and performing the show has been the most satisfying artistic experience I've had since I played Eddie in Rocky Horror in college. The theme that we set out with was honesty. We tried to create a show with honest heartfelt moments as well as fun goofy moments and I think we were successful. Even with the goofy or more over-the-top scenes we tried to base them in some kind of emotional truth whether it was estrangement, sorrow, or anger. Each week we shared personal stories about how we felt about each other as well as stories about ourselves. 

I've seen a lot of sketch shows and a lot of comedy since moving to Chicago and Ted and I both agreed we wanted to do something different. That was another goal. Do something that we haven't seen people doing. And for as much funny things that there are going on there isn't a lot of truth. People don't get very personal or vulnerable on stage. We tried to walk that line and I think we were successful. We had a lot of great feedback from people that came and one of the things I heard a couple times, which I loved, was that it was touching. Sketch comedy doesn't need to be a succession of sketches that make people laugh, it's an art form just like any other. You can make people laugh, make them think, and then pull on their heart strings in the course of a few sketches and that's what we tried to do.

The writing process with Ted was great. We would meet two hours before a midnight open mic at Second City and write a new 15 minute set for that particular show. We did that for about seven weeks to generate material. We wrote and tested material all within a matter of hours. We refined stuff that worked and through out things that didn't work. After we had enough material we got a slot at iO and brought Jamison in to help us shape it. We all have the similar senses of humor and sensibilities and Jamison structured it and clarified some sketches so that the show really flowed. 

I'm so proud of the show, so proud of the message, and had such a great time performing it. It's so refreshing to perform a scripted show that you wrote and conceived, where no compromises were made, and the goals that you had for it were realized by the audience. I'm so grateful to Charna and Baz for letting us put up the show the at iO, so grateful for collaborators like Ted and Jamison, and so grateful to those people that came out.

I'm glad it's done. Ted is out of town for two weeks. When he gets back we start writing our next show.

The past is history, the future mystery.

U Who?

Ted and I played with Craig in U Who? tonight. The show broke down in an interesting way. It had three acts which had a lot of the same moves and patterns: talking to the dead, going out to eat, and a vicious attack. Raul was the focus of the second act.

Ted and I have one final performance of A Year Of Saturdays this Thursday 10:30pm at iO. Come see the last time the show will ever be done!

A Year Of Saturdays

Ted and I's sketch show opens tomorrow. I'm so proud of it. The first thing I've done that has no compromises. I love every sketch, I love the message, I love the two guys who worked on it with me.

I can't wait for you to see it.

Two Guys Yelling 3

Yesterday Ted got added to Rick and he rehearsed with us for the first time. Tonight Ted and I rehearsed our sketch show with Jamison, did the Rick show, and rehearsed some more. Ted is a great audition to the team and we had a fun runner of football players with ridiculous names starting with Ted's Bruiser Magerk. The show overall was good not great but whenever a new member is added there is a little adjustment time.

The running order for our sketch show is pretty much set. We just have a couple transitions, the opener and closer to polish up before it's ready. I love working with Ted and Jamison. Ted always challenges me and furthers my ideas. Jamison has been great about distilling and clarifying our theme as well as structuring scenes. It's really coming together and I'm very proud of it.

A Year Of Saturdays Thursday 1030pm, iO September 6th through October 11th.

Great News!

 Two Guys Yelling present A Year Of Saturdays got a run! Ted and I's sketch show which we conceived in January and wrote April through June got a slot at iO. Jamison will direct! We don't have a lot of prep time because our opening is September 6th but I'm so excited! It feels so good to have a passion project come fruition. I get to work with two guys I love and respect and who have similar ideas about comedy as me. We get to do what we want how we want to do it.

After Ted and I's HouseCo experience we really wanted to work together on something that was entirely ours without any restrictions from an institution. And iO has given us that opportunity, just another reason why I love iO. I think some people get jaded about the place but it has been nothing but nurturing and open for me.

Punam and I saw the Second City Mainstage this week and it was underwhelming. But it also got me really juiced up about this show. Seeing a show that is ok but which panders for laughs at points makes it clear to me what I want to do, what message I want to send, what I want to do differently.

Our goal is to put up something unique. Come see if we succeed.

Two Guys Yelling 2

Tonight Ted and I had dinner at Fat Willy's for some BBQ and talk our show. This is a list of all our sketches with times. It's around 70 minutes in total with some tangential ideas still floating around in the ether. We also talked directors. I love working with Ted for a number of reasons. The biggest one is because he can take one of my ideas and clarify it. Refine it and come at it from a more scenically defined place. Give it shape. I know I'm good for Ted cause I can keep up with him, push him, and shut him up. Ted is a strong creative personality and sometimes gets a bad rep because of it. Because he won't slow down unless you slow him down. Some people aren't capable of that. I'm not one of those people.

Our show has a lot to do with relationships, with family, with death, and also with repetition. Our show will be emotional scenes juxtaposed with gamey repetitious scenes or a combination of the two. I know it's funny. I think people may be surprised with how dramatic some of the subject matter is and how funny we make it. We're angling to get a run at iO. You should be able to see it soon. Our sketch group is called Two Guys Yelling we have a title for our first show:

A Year Of Saturdays.

Two Guys Yelling

I went to meet Ted to do some writing, before which I watched The General Slocum show. It was really fun as they always are, the above is Jamison with two chairs on him. They were calling him 'chair face'.

After the show Ted and I ate at a vegetarian place to do some writing. We're writing a two person sketch show  to put up late summer/early fall. I did HouseCo with Ted and we really enjoyed writing together so decided to write our own show. For now were calling it 'Two Guys Yelling' from a note Jim gave us once. We've also thrown around 'A Year Of Saturdays'.

It's great writing with Ted. Once we started talking the ideas started coming really easily. Talking about the show in the abstract generated themes, scenes, and general ideas that make me feel like were getting off to a great start. Something that will definitely be us. Honest, sweet, biting and pointed. It feels like something different too, which is what I want it to be. With Ted I feel like we both are on the same page. We want to do what we want to do and with us it's the same thing.

It was a great start and felt really productive and satisfying.

My artichoke, green olive, feta, tomato sandwich was pretty amazing too.