The UBC Improv Farewell Tour
I'm just going to go through the entire show with all the points of the improv that were extrordinary. If it ends up seeming as half as monumentally wonderful as it was then I will have acheived my goal. And now, laides and gentleman, the greatest improv show we have ever put on: The UBC Improv Farewell Tour
Before the show the audience had been listening to a mix CD of songs that were mostly "Goodbye" songs, but which included, sneakily enough REM's "Man on the Moon", more on this later.
Jules and Cassie from the Junior Team approach an audience of 200. Jules warms up the audience and then says "Let's bring out the improvisers!" But none of us come. Cassie runs backstage and explains to Jules and the audience that we're not there. Wondering where we are... Jules turns on "The Improv Signal" which is actually her turning on our video projector/screen.
The improv movie starts. It involves all of us meeting up and rushing to improv doing strange and wonderful things. Sean plays with his Spiderman toys, Owen is playing Britney Spiers on his guitar, Chris is eating out the Godess of Democracy, just to name a few. Then... once we are all gathered at the entrance to the auditorium in thefilm we come bursting through the doors right as we are bursting through the doors of the video, wearing the same clothes we had in the video and to the strains of the live verison of Talking Heads' Burning Down the House.
The applause is huge. We get up onstage to chairs that are allready set up with our names taped onto them. We sit down and start the show. Sean and Owen host (of course, it's our last show) and recurring characters from past shows return to introduce the games we're playing today. The first half is poppin... you can cut the energy with a knife. We're all on the top of our form. Then I am asked onstage as my angry Frenchman character, Maurice. Maurice is introducing a new game never played by UBC improv that he loves. This game is called Oxygen Deprivation (God Bless Ryan Iverson). 3 actors are on stage with a bucket of water. As two actors are onstage, the thrid actor must submirge his or her head in the bucket. When the person drowning gets too uncomfortable, one of the people in the scene must justifty leaving the scene, tagging the other person and submerging their head in the bucket. Then the sopping wet actor who has just almost drowned must enter the scene and justify why they are wet in the scene. Payne, Rachel and Mark were masterful. To say that hilarity ensued would be an understatement.
The first half ends on this high note. We all leave to go backstage. We enter in the second half all dressed in uniform UBC improv t-shirts. The first game of this half is "Laserprov" - a game in which Sean and Andrea were equiped with Laser Tag Sensors and guns were given to two members of the audience. Whenever they were shot, different things happnened. The first time, they had to deliver a monoluge based on their last line. For the second one, a song based on their last line. The last one, they just have to die. And the other person has to justify it in the scene. It worked beautifuly. It is a game I will carry with me for the rest of my life and WE invented it.
Next up was dubbing, in which an old film is projected onto a large screen and the actors must fill in the voices for the characters. The film I chose for this was Godzilla's Revenge a terrible film featuring Godzilla's creepy son Minya. It was magical and wonderful.
Skip to the end of the show in which we decided to make the audience perform for us. We got everyone up on stage that had seen 5 or more shows and we lead them in a huge flock dance. This is when there is one leader danceing and everyone else must follow them. It was a joyous way to end the show. But that wasn't the way the show ended.
I came up on stage and explained that becuase the audience had been super good that night that we were going to have a treat. I then brought out signs, one which said "Milk" and the other which said "Cookies". I then made the audience read the signs outloud and then said "And now, if you'll follow members of the junior team, they will take you all out for Milk and Cookies." And the audience followed the junior team backstage. As the people were streaming into the back stage, my professor Alyson and my two classmates Caroline and Michelle smiled at me. Alyson said "Louie, I have a feeling we're being lead down the garden path." And I just said back, "We'll see!"
We took the audience out for milk and cookies. We transported 200 people to an entirely different building. When they got there a funk band was allready playing waiting for their arrival and there were jugs set up for people to pour milk and enough otmeal chocolate chip cookies for everyone. And that was our last improv show.
It was our masterpeice.
Before the show the audience had been listening to a mix CD of songs that were mostly "Goodbye" songs, but which included, sneakily enough REM's "Man on the Moon", more on this later.
Jules and Cassie from the Junior Team approach an audience of 200. Jules warms up the audience and then says "Let's bring out the improvisers!" But none of us come. Cassie runs backstage and explains to Jules and the audience that we're not there. Wondering where we are... Jules turns on "The Improv Signal" which is actually her turning on our video projector/screen.
The improv movie starts. It involves all of us meeting up and rushing to improv doing strange and wonderful things. Sean plays with his Spiderman toys, Owen is playing Britney Spiers on his guitar, Chris is eating out the Godess of Democracy, just to name a few. Then... once we are all gathered at the entrance to the auditorium in thefilm we come bursting through the doors right as we are bursting through the doors of the video, wearing the same clothes we had in the video and to the strains of the live verison of Talking Heads' Burning Down the House.
The applause is huge. We get up onstage to chairs that are allready set up with our names taped onto them. We sit down and start the show. Sean and Owen host (of course, it's our last show) and recurring characters from past shows return to introduce the games we're playing today. The first half is poppin... you can cut the energy with a knife. We're all on the top of our form. Then I am asked onstage as my angry Frenchman character, Maurice. Maurice is introducing a new game never played by UBC improv that he loves. This game is called Oxygen Deprivation (God Bless Ryan Iverson). 3 actors are on stage with a bucket of water. As two actors are onstage, the thrid actor must submirge his or her head in the bucket. When the person drowning gets too uncomfortable, one of the people in the scene must justifty leaving the scene, tagging the other person and submerging their head in the bucket. Then the sopping wet actor who has just almost drowned must enter the scene and justify why they are wet in the scene. Payne, Rachel and Mark were masterful. To say that hilarity ensued would be an understatement.
The first half ends on this high note. We all leave to go backstage. We enter in the second half all dressed in uniform UBC improv t-shirts. The first game of this half is "Laserprov" - a game in which Sean and Andrea were equiped with Laser Tag Sensors and guns were given to two members of the audience. Whenever they were shot, different things happnened. The first time, they had to deliver a monoluge based on their last line. For the second one, a song based on their last line. The last one, they just have to die. And the other person has to justify it in the scene. It worked beautifuly. It is a game I will carry with me for the rest of my life and WE invented it.
Next up was dubbing, in which an old film is projected onto a large screen and the actors must fill in the voices for the characters. The film I chose for this was Godzilla's Revenge a terrible film featuring Godzilla's creepy son Minya. It was magical and wonderful.
Skip to the end of the show in which we decided to make the audience perform for us. We got everyone up on stage that had seen 5 or more shows and we lead them in a huge flock dance. This is when there is one leader danceing and everyone else must follow them. It was a joyous way to end the show. But that wasn't the way the show ended.
I came up on stage and explained that becuase the audience had been super good that night that we were going to have a treat. I then brought out signs, one which said "Milk" and the other which said "Cookies". I then made the audience read the signs outloud and then said "And now, if you'll follow members of the junior team, they will take you all out for Milk and Cookies." And the audience followed the junior team backstage. As the people were streaming into the back stage, my professor Alyson and my two classmates Caroline and Michelle smiled at me. Alyson said "Louie, I have a feeling we're being lead down the garden path." And I just said back, "We'll see!"
We took the audience out for milk and cookies. We transported 200 people to an entirely different building. When they got there a funk band was allready playing waiting for their arrival and there were jugs set up for people to pour milk and enough otmeal chocolate chip cookies for everyone. And that was our last improv show.
It was our masterpeice.