all improv business these days, folks.
The TCIF is now a scant 2 months and 27 days away and my stress level jumped as I watched the little countdown clock on my desktop pass the 3 month mark. There is much to do and I find myself scrambling to get some of it done, which seems strange considering we laid a pretty good foundation last year and it should be simpler, until I realized that I was toting around everything I needed for TCIF 1 on my laptop last year and working on it in airports, planes and hotels about every chance I got and now that I'm grounded to the desktop machine ( I know, boo-hoo for the modern man's problems ) I'm not able to make use of all those random times, instead I'm further dividing the already-scarce time I have at home.
In any case, things are actually very close to done. Or at least as done as they can get at this point. The whole process is one of hurrying to wait to hurry so we'll scramble a little now and then spend some time redoubling preparations for the big hustle.
Improv A Go Go stuff -
the IAGG continues to be a source of joy. that is all.
the deadline for the summer season lottery is the 1st at noon so if you're a performer and reading this make sure you're entered if you want a chance to play this summer.
We have to start thinking about the 6 year anniversary show, which is always fun.
PUNCH OUT -
Last night the gauntlet was thrown down by Fiscally Responsible. Mike Fotis immediately picked up that gauntlet and used it to slap them around for a few angry minutes.
This Friday 11pm | $10 |
the schedule for the upcoming bouts is just about locked down and I have to say the audience is in for a hell of a time. This is the one thing that I'm nervous about as it remains the one thing that still confounds most of our efforts. Getting people to the shows.
My deal on improv in general in this town -
We stood onstage almost 6 years ago and told our audience a very simple truth: if you come see these shows we will do more of them, if you don't we will stop. And over the last several hundred shows they have come and had a great time, laughed and I think in general we've earned our fans every step of the way.
time and again I hear from audiences how they'd like to see more improv and yet time and again when we mount different shows it feels like a struggle to get people in the door to see them. That's cool with me, I'm down for putting in the work but we can't drag people in the door, at some point we've done all we can and they have to choose to come.
I always tell people it's their loss for not seeing what we do and that's true in a lot of ways (there's something extremely sad about a phenomenal performance that goes unseen), both in the sense that what we do will never be duplicated and if you missed it you missed it (I realize the only remedy to that problem would be to see EVERY improv show, which I don't expect anyone to do...I wouldn't) but it is completely in their power to have more improv shows.
if you want more improv in your city you have to go see it when it comes.
for our part, we will put up the best damn shows we can. In the end the shows support the festival, the festival brings in the workshops which challenge the performers to get better, which makes the shows better and the whole cycle is pretty awesome considering it's all fueled by mutual enjoyment of what we do and (and fucking cheesy as this sounds) just having some laughs. that's pretty cool.
in the end everyone wins, we get to do more of what we love and there are more good shows for you to choose from to come and laugh yourself into a coma.
this might seem like I'm being down on our audiences but that couldn't be further from the truth, we're just all in this together if it's going to work and I'm all about the audience taking ownership of their part of this thing getting bigger and the people that are already coming to see the shows in town (IAGG, Neutrino, the Monday show, the BNW sets, Stevie Rays, CSZ...ALL of them) are already doing their part, there's no way I'm pointing the finger at them.
it's the people we haven't reached yet that we need to win over, maybe introduce to improv for the first time. Taking more money from the people that already support us isn't the answer, we need to get the word out to everyone, not just the people at the IAGG and make the same deal with THEM.
Getting the word out is what our audience can do best. They say word of mouth from one person can reach 210 people. That is their job.
We can make our case 200 people at a time (since that's what the theater seats) and that is our job.
So the deal has been revised a little.
If you come see the shows AND spread the word about them we will do more. More shows of more kinds in more venues. More entertainment in your city
Oh, and by the way.... the improv that is already happening in your town is top-shelf.
Come and see.
and bring a friend that hasn't seen it yet.
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