I remember leaving that set in such a good mood that I decided to trot the hour home. I didn't do that often because Ubers were still $6 back then. I took a photo with a string of green traffic lights behind me. "Something is coming," I remember thinking, knowing. And it was! Four days later I went into lockdown and there I stayed for a year and change.
I have a particular relationship with improv. One of my old teammates on the hot Saturday slot at i_ once explained to me, "I've ruined improv for myself. I don't regret. I had to ruin it." He meant, basically, he became obsessed with the art form as a teenager, and chased that obsession to Chicago, and chased that obsession throughout the city, and now it's his full-time job (podcaster). But, he'll be the first to say, I hate improv shows. Comedians are so weird. Some really do despise what we do. Not me.
I don't hate comedy. I love comedy. I also don't hate improv, though I know I am supposed to think it's cringe. I mean, it is cringe but it's also essential. Now me myself doing improv? Harder to say...
I actually don't think I've ever loved improv. I've loved journeying through improv. My college family-friendly group and my grad crew and my indie girls and that weird Missouri "theatre" and all the spots in the windy city and my one class at the boxed wig school and my shows in Scotland and my nights at U__ the first and U__ the second.
There is a ton of unfairness in the artist life, but I'll tell you one major win from the universe on my scorecard is getting to perform at U__. That's the prime comedy theatre in LA. Usually comedy folk move to new cities and have an incredibly frustrating time breaking in. It's a tale as old as time, really. You spend years building up your style and your skill and your reputation--! And then you have to buzz around getting hundreds of people on board all over again. Meanwhile the comedians who have been in the pool immediately kinda hate you for being a maybe threat. The gatekeepers are sometimes overjoyed, like, look, this fully cooked casserole has appeared at our potluck! I remember a moment like this when I moved to Arizona, after I'd been honing my chops for five years (a lot of years for 23). I showed up at auditions as a total unknown and crushed. I saw one of the directors' audit forms when it was all over. He had written, "Number XX is from god."
Other times gatekeepers hate new comedian guts too! I'd actually say, sadly, most of the time. Just as talent doesn't want to be overshadowed, tastemakers don't like their taste to be overshadowed either. They're like, Who is this new voice the people enjoy? I didn't tell them they could enjoy that! It's actually embarrassing. How overly sensitive gatekeepers are. And then they accuse artists of being sensitive?! Babe. Get real.
Anyway! What's so blessed about my crash-landing into LA is my main show I did in Chicago had a slot out here. It was that simple and lucky. Well, and I am very reliable and persistent. As soon as I arrived I was on the producers. "I'm available I'm available I'm available." And one week there was a drop, and wouldn't you know it I was at the theatre, hair and makeup ready, in record time. I know other people who were part of the ensemble for years and never transitioned into the west coast cast. I'm not more talented than them (though not worse). But I have something they don't: an ability to weather about nine million buckets of rejection just to maybe get what I think I want. Overall, though, I'd still only give myself half credit for achieving this particular dream. Honestly, I think that's all anyone ever deserves. There's no business like show business.
So I used to perform at the second U__, which was much nicer but allegedly not as cool. It closed during the plague, so now I get to perform at the original. It is better, which everyone always said. The space is smaller and more intimate and the sound is really well designed. Whispers carry and laughs boom but don't envelop. My first few shows I felt kind of off-balance because when they sell out, they put about 40 people on stage. It took me a minute to get used to belting inches from a person's face, jazz stepping around folding chairs. I am used to the smoosh, welcome it, these days.
Although regular improv no longer interests me, music improv still really really does. I guess because it's more like writing than acting to me. It's such a rush to be mentally writing a musical in your head, as four other people try to write the same musical in their heads, and none of you can talk about it. You just have to leap off the cliff with parachutes all together and hope you land in the same field and maybe that you do a few neat spins while you're falling. My friend SR randomly came to one of my mash-up shows in 2022. It was genuinely fine, but he was floored! Floored! You made all those songs up right on the spot! He came to some other crummy show a month later. He remarked, "Okay so I've seen some of these people before even though it was a totally different theatre..." Yes, I explained. There's like 50 of us in LA, in earnest. And then probably another 100-200 blooming in classes etc. SR asked how we rehearse, I told him we don't. He nodded, you're like flight attendants. What a quirky way to say it, and not wrong!
This post is getting a little long, so I'll do something atypical and write the rest later.
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