This is for the misfits the freaks and the runts....

TCIF Day 2 blog - my god, is there still more???

This blog is going to be massive so if you're looking for a quick read on the TCIF please refer to the Strib and Pioneer Press, which have managed the feat of compressing all of this into....nothing. Thanks guys. It's either worthy of a Nobel Prize in physics or further proof of growing obsolecence of the big print media.

Am I grumpy this morning? Surprisingly no, I'm in a fantastic mood and still manage to be a jerk.

Up late and up early again so if this blog doesn't make sense I'll come back and edit it Monday or Tuesday or whenever I wake up. This morning I found myself getting home as the sky was getting bright in the east and racing to get inside and into bed before the sun actually came up, as if that somehow meant that I got "sleep". I only barely made it.

So - my usual outpouring of thanks and a "quick" recap.

I need to publicly ( I like to believe that my blog is read enough that posting something here counts as "public" ) thank all the people that have quietly been making this show run and yesterday's appreciation to the house crew at the BNW could easily be cut and pasted here - they continue kicking ass and they do it with a smile.
But there are a few people that have been completely pivotal for this thing and have jumped in to help, like most everyone else, out of a common desire to put on one hell of a show and I can only hope that our appreciation and applause is adequate compensation.

David Lipkin has been my right-hand, tireless, ready-to-give-it-a-try sidekick since last year and has since kept at it through the IAGG and into this year. It ain't a great or glamorous job but it's importance is huge.
Being able to know that I can turn to him in the middle of a show and fire off any number of random requests and instructions and he'll dive on it or see to it allows dozens and dozens of problems and needs (many of them totally thankless, like running time calls to performers during the show and just being someone that can jump in the booth and make the mechanics of the show happen) to get addressed without anyone knowing they even exist and keeps our show flowing smoothly and since he's doing whatever I throw at him so well nobody ever knows how much he's getting done except me.
Thanks Lipkin.

Nels, Knobel & Ryan -
Nels and I have both been wasting countless work hours on improv junk (or wasting shitloads of hours that could be spent doing improv stuff at stupid jobs - more like it) and he's been running our site and deals with my scattered, last minute requests at all hours and still decided he wanted to work with me. He's been handling the improvement to the TCIF video documentation (which was easy to improve on since last year was lacking in that dept - another thing I told myself I could just do and it would be no sweat) and is turning it into the serious project it should be instead of the last minute thing it was. On top of that he pulled up in a U-Haul* after driving all the way from NYC and jumped in to take over hosting (especially after I went onstage and verbally vomitted by brain all over my shoes....must learn when to sit down and shut up) and making this thing happen.

Knobel -
Eric is another part of the Dream Team that have all organically stepped up to help the TCIF.
I haven't had to think about all the cool stuff Eric is doing for us since he and Nels are all over it but in case you missed Neutrino Video Project or didn't know it - this dude is a pro and his level of work makes our goofy little party seem like the real deal somehow. I can't wait to see how it turns out.

Ryan Haro -
Ryan is the best candid photographer anywhere.
I met Ryan at the Renaissance Festival and he is brilliant, captures the coolest moments and such an eye for what he does it makes me want to do more to give him something worth shooting. For some reason he's decided to lend his talents to taking pics of the IAGG over the last several weeks and over the TCIF this weekend - we get to laugh at all the cool stuff he captures, some of the best looking press photos of improvisation anywhere and the least I can hope to do in return is send him some web traffic and/or business. Support a fantastic artist and buy some prints.

We (Five Man Job) get a lot of compliments on the product of the hard work and talents of these guys - credit where credit is due. Thank you guys.

Recap time: Like any great set you're in it's hard to remember specific details, only this great set is now going on three days long and there have already been so much fun and funny that my face hurts from smiling and my gut hurts from laughing. From the producer's chair I would be proud as hell to put on a show that had a third of the highlights we've had already and we've still got a day left. I feel like I've seen a month of solid genius and I'm sure to leave out lots of stuff.

pH/Election Show -
pH and Election Show are great crews, let's just get that out of the way. As much work and thought as we put into trying to make this the kind of festival we'd want to visit as a performer these guys are prime examples of the kind of performers any festival producers want to have show up. They're tight, professional, know their shit, take it seriously and have a fun doing it.
On top of that they did a really cool double-bill of bigger improvised formats that I really enjoyed. Both had to trim it down for time and the musical is the easier of the two events to pare down into a shorter time slot so pHamily: the Musical was a blast and Election Show was only able to do 1/3 of the actual Election Show. Sorry dudes, it goes on my karmic tab as a producer.

Somehow I'll make it up to the member of pH drove them all the way here last year and was eliminated 4 minutes into their show. It was funny and everyone had a good laugh but if I made the haul to Chicago for 4 minutes of stage time I know it would still suck.

RampleSeed/Irish Mutts -
I got to see much less of RampleSeed than I wanted as FMJ was warming up. I know they were great, you know they were great.
Irish Mutts did some fun, relationship heavy scenes and I had a ball doing some lights up/lights down for them. Since this is my blog I get to focus on what was cool for me, right? Seeing the silly glee when they discovered the breaking plates gave me a big grin.**

After that there was a big wall of stress forming in my brain that blocked out all else as it finally came time for Five Man Job/Coldtowne - I can't really review my own set but it was an important one for me, maybe the most important set in the festival for me and it totally overshadowed everything else going on for a while, being on the other side of it is both a monsterous relief and understandably bittersweet.

What can I say about Five Man Job that I haven't yet?
I love Five Man Job and our set was every single reason why.
I had so much fun, it felt like what improv should feel like and we had fun with each other without jerking off onstage and leaving the audience out, they always get invited in for the joke and I'm proud to say that we're very much ourselves onstage. I was getting a little choked up during the curtain and could've gone on and on about it but Dan will be missed.

That centaur was so retarded.

I'm sorry I missed the beginning of Coldtowne because we were outside having one last post-show laugh with each other, sweating and trading some hugs. Everything I've seen from the Coldtowne guys tells me I would have loved every bit of it. Now I get why people kept telling me I need to see and meet these guys. Super fun.

Girls,Girls,Girls/Pimprov -
At this point I was already so euphorically happy with the TCIF that this show almost seemed cruelly funny. Sides hurting, brain already buzzing from seeing so much in terms of great performances and then we get a full-on musical AND a Pimprov set that shook the walls??

An old familiar feeling started to creep in that somehow 'we've taken too much...we're never coming back down'

and THEN Neutrino Video Project. Sweet Zombie Jesus.
There's no such thing as karma. Nobody deserves a night this kick ass. No room full of people anyway, not with jerks like me dragging down the bell curve.
I am a little ashamed to say this is my first time seeing the Neutrino even though I knew it was brilliant and I've been telling everyone else they need to take their excuses and cram 'em because it's brilliant and they should go see it.
This show is what is ruining the rest of my professional life, when I run into technicians on the road that whine and tell me they can't adjust things because there's just 'no time' and it would be 'too difficult' my brain always sends back the rebuttal that these guys can make a movie in the time it takes to watch one. And it is awesome. The rest is just excuses.

Neutrino is technically precise, a great video/cinematic experience and still manages to feel like a very personal and energetic experience in the room even though we're all essentially watching a screen, the show goes beyond the story and into the giant production effort - I don't know if I'm applauding for the really really funny film or the fact that they just achieved something that blows my mind or the fact that they made Vitamin Water a starring player in the their movie (especially after I got onstage and talked shit about our sponsor to justify the fact that I didn't belong onstage...ah that'd make a great ad......anyway. Focus) or all of the above. I just know it was fucking cool. and that I suddenly want a Vitamin Water for some reason....

Holy. Shit. That was just one day. There's MORE.
the Onion Writers are improvising on top of their Onion talk and should have books and autographs to go around if you bring yours.
Ferrari McSpeedy and the Josh & Tamra Show will literally end homelessness and disease
Brave New Workshop and BASSPROV fills our 'improv as high-art' quota
Survivors of the Undead Plague and Darby Lane (with Joe Bill) is sure to be madness and I am going to get a little (ok, a-fucking-lot) tech crazy. And then it's party time.
it's ALL been party time.

thank you everybody.
Don't just read about it.
Come see.














* that's not exactly true, I think he dropped the truck and got back in his Del Sol but U Haul somehow sounds cooler than his Girl-Car.

** Andy got compliments all over the place for his hawk and chainsaw work, people coming from out of town don't even understand when we say we have good techs that will take care of them. I know it's supposed to be our nature to be modest here in the midwest but I have simply taken to telling people 'that's what we do here' because Minneapolis is the only place you can find it, performers think they don't want it because they've gotten crappy tech so many times and when people get it I hope it's hard to go back. This is one of the huge things I want to wake people up about. Am I bragging a bit? Are we showing off a little?
You bet your ass we are. Our techs are the best.