Where is your Vitamin D?! It’s Seattle, and it’s January, so you’re not getting it from the sun. Let us spoon-feed you rich, buttery Vitamin D goodness in the form of improv.

And we know that you just spent a ton of money on the holidays. We know. We did, too. So, for you, these two shows are pay-what-you-can. And because our host, Rik Deskin, has asked for donations to Odd Duck to retire its debt, all of the proceeds will go directly to Odd Duck. If you’re broke, pay a teeny weeny. If you haven’t spent the big check from Grandma yet, consider paying maybe a little more than you normally would to help out a beloved improv institution. Either way, you feel good, you laugh, the endorphin flows. Just like Vitamin D.

So who’s providing this jolt of Vitamin D? Interrobang Improv and Worst Case Scenario, that’s who. If you haven’t seen Interrobang recently, you haven’t seen Interrobang. And Worst Case Scenario is almost brand spanking new to Seattle (previously being part of Milwaukee ComedySportz), so you probably haven’t seen them at all. And you should. Oh, yes, you should.

You’ll feel so sunny, you’ll practically have a tan.

Show runs Friday nights from December 2–16 at Odd Duck Studio (1214 10th Ave.) on Capitol Hill. Tickets are $10, and are available online at Brown Paper Tickets, by phone at 206.679.3271, or at the door.

Guests are:
December 2: Being Humans
December 9: The Mistle-Tones
December 16: Carskee and The Royal Friend Society

Thanksgiving is just around the corner, so there’s no better time for a big helping of Interrobang Improv with a special Mash-Up opening of local improvisers from all over the city!

There are only three weeks of this run so come out and get your Bangers and Mash!

Show runs Friday nights from November 4–18 at Odd Duck Studio on Capitol Hill. Tickets are $10, and are available online at Brown Paper Tickets, by phone at 206.679.3271, or at the door.

Special Guests:
October 7: Super Mega Art Show
October 14: Joel Dale & Doug Willott from Improsia
October 21: Puppet This
October 28: The SheSpot

Tickets at 206.679.3271, online at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/198512, or at the door.

We started rehearsal with a viewpoints-like check in with ourselves. I love this stuff. It’s like the yoga part of improv, where I get to leave my day behind, find my zen, feel my feet connecting to the floor, my breath and movement becoming more integrated and exploratory. We look like a bunch of crazy people, I’m sure, but it’s great way to “step into the space” (thank you Nia). Then we started interacting with our space and each other and played like the grown up fools we are, which always feels good.

Then Dave had us close our eyes and think about great scenes that we have been a part of, and what made them great. He emphasized that strong characters make an improv scene great, and support your scene partner(s) more than waiting to establish a character based on what the scene “needs.” Bold choices are a more generous offer than weak, malleable ones. To practice this, we did an exercise that some of us have done before in workshops with renowned improv guru, Asaf Ronen. Lines are taped out on the floor for improvisers to follow to places on stage facing away from each other. On a start, both improvisers move to the end of a taped line and find their characters/environments by the time they reach the ends of the lines. Initially, they should play only their own scene without worrying about the other improviser (hence, the lines moving to points facing away from each other). Eventually, they start listening to what the other is saying and doing and by adding specifics to their individual scenes, they expand their circles until the circles intersect in some way. That intersection leads to the scene between the two performers. Commit to what you did first and expand on it. It was hard, but by my third go of it, I felt like I was getting in the groove. It was a good exercise to get us out of the rut of one person going out and starting a scene and another going out to support the first instead of creating a scene picture of two strong characters, where the audience starts to make a connection and story between the two immediately and then cannot wait to see how it will play out. I also liked the exercise because it allows us to play real characters with real emotional reactions and connections in improbably situations when two worlds collide.

Our group challenge for our open scene work was to mess with norms we saw emerging. Every scene is two people? Jump in and add people. All of the scenes seem to be the same length? Vary the amount of time before edits. Every edit is a one-person edit? Jump into an edit as you see one person doing it. One scene is very realistic? Make the next one fantastical. I felt like we did a pretty good job of doing this, although sometimes when we started a scene very abstractly, we went with it for awhile and then got nervous and felt the need to justify it.  We had funny themes of dentistry, vampires and elder-hunting woven throughout the long form and with the smaller number of people, we all got to play with each other a lot.

That’s enough from me for now – if you want to see some of this magic in action, check out our October line up at the Odd Duck! 

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