This Is NOT Your Un-funny Friend’s Improv Group

We’ve all been there. There’s one friend in your circle, which if you were questioned by a stranger you may say is just an acquaintance. And he thinks that he is a laugh riot because someone told him once that he is “so dramatic,” which was not meant as a compliment. So he joined an Improv Troup that performs in a church basement somewhere on the last Thursday of the month, and he wants you to go. Now, you don’t even really like the jokes he’s had time to think about, let alone the ones he makes up on the spot, and he mostly quotes Will Farrell movies out of context. But another friend (you know the one, the woman who gets really excited about stuff no one wants to do) “put a group together” and now it’s on your schedule. And you sit on a folding chair in that basement wishing someone would hand you a “name a sharp object” so that you could “name a verb you do over and over” in your “name a bodily orifice that would hurt if stabbed.” If you are someone who has had an experience like this, you are of the belief that Improv is for people who are not funny enough to do stand up, and not talented enough to act.  

This is not that. At all. The improv you have known, the one your “kinda” friend does, is not the real stuff. You’ve been putting sticky brown sugar water on your entertainment flapjacks all these years, and this is Grade A Vermont maple. This is the real deal, and it is glorious. The Providence Improv Fest runs from September 18 through 20 at the creative space that used to house Perishable Theatre that is now creatively called 95 Empire St. You can get tickets here: http://pif-11-pass.brownpapertickets.com/

This level of improv is a quick witted, well-acted wonder to behold, and when you see it live it’s difficult to believe the performances are unscripted and unrehearsed. Do yourself a favor and see how entertaining improv can be.