Comin’ At Ya!

Summer is revving up and I wanted to share a couple of cool things in the news. The Lucy-Desi Fest is coming up, and I’ll be teaching there. I was honored that they mentioned my INNY award for best improv coach in a recent article about the festival. There must be an improv nerd working at the newspaper. You can read about it HERE.

And Benita Arceneaux interviewed me recently after one of the free classes in my hometown of St. Louis, MO. She was so sweet to put together a lil’ commercial for The Improv Trick as well.

INNY Winners Annouced

I’m very honored to announce that I have won the INNY award for “Best Improv Coach”. I found out from Bill Finkbiner, who texted me as I was driving around my home town of St. Louis. Bill is an Original Trickster and one of my first students in St. Louis. I’m glad that I found out about it in St. Louis, because I was awarded for my work at St. Louis’ Improv Trick.

So much has happened in the St. Louis Improv scene since I first started teaching classes in St. Louis in 2006. I’m proud to have been a small part of it. The work I do as a teacher and coach in St. Louis would not be possible if not for the hard work of all of our Improv Trick performers, teachers and students. But it’s not just Improv Trick that makes up our wonderful Improv scene. K.A.R.L. improv  won the award for “Best College Troupe” and The Improv Shop was nominated for Best Training Program.

If you’re reading this blog, you’re responsible in part for this major achievement for St. Louis improv. I posted here a while back encouraging readers to “Vote for St. Louis”, and it looks like you did. And in overwhelming numbers. Thanks to you for making this possible.

The full list of INNY Award winners is HERE.

I’m a Foreigner, not a Stooge!

Those of you who read this blog regularly know that I was up for the part of “Curly” in the Farrelly Brothers’ Three Stooges movie. It’s mentioned in an article on Split Sider. You can read all about it HERE.

The film opened last weekend to mixed reviews as can be expected. I have not seen it yet because I’m in Fayette, MO where there is no movie theater nearby. But I hear from some friends that it’s actually a funny movie. And I’m glad to hear anything that keeps The Farrelly Brothers churning out new Nyuks.

Why oh Why am I in Fayette, MO? I just completed a four day run of a play called The Foreigner. The Sedalia Democrat wrote a nice article about it. The play was at Central Methodist University’s “Little Theater”, the same place that I performed plays throughout college.

The cast included: Jordan Brennan (senior, Marshall) as Froggy LeSeuer; Shamika Pegue (junior, Kansas City) as Betty Meeks; Jeff Byous (sophomore, Peculiar) as Rev. David Lee; Kate Kellner (sophomore, Strafford) as Catherine Simms; Josh Kirby (senior, Armstrong) as Owen Musser; and Dakota Gladbach (junior, Brookfield) as Ellard Simms. The understudy for Charlie was Roger Weaver (sophomore, Overland Park, Kan.) The students did a GREAT job, and made me feel so welcome that I felt like I was going back to school at CMU again.

It was a really fun show, and I’m so glad I was able to make it out here to be a part of the show. The audiences were AMAZING. I played Charlie Baker (No, that’s not a code. That’s his name!) It was great to work with the cast and crew at CMU’s Little Theatre. And I’d really like to thank Mark Kelty for asking me to be a part of it. Mark did a fantasitc job of directing the show. I plan to have some pictures of the show up soon. I’m looking forward to seeing how we looked. I was onstage for most of the show and so I didn’t have a chance to pop out and catch any of the action when I wasn’t in a scene. But below is a picture that was taken by a student in the dining hall where we did some spontaneous theater. We performed a scene from the play where Charlie tells a story in a language that he’s making up on the fly.

Have you ever seen The Foreigner? I know it’s performed a lot, and Matthew Broderick played Charlie recently off Broadway. I’d be interested in hearing people’s favorite lines, or interesting performances that you’ve seen.

 

Invisible Children Need Bandages

I can’t believe that the tragedy of Invisible Children has ravaged Africa. The country of Africa has had so many difficulties over the ages, and now this!

If the problem with The Invisible Man weren’t enough, we now have to take it upon ourselves as the Greatest EVER Generation to solve the problem of Invisible Children and even more tragic, Invisible Babies. As you know, the most important thing that invisible people OF ANY AGE need are bandages. I don’t know why, but the best solution for making someone visible is bandages. Of course over the years in movies and TV several other things have worked: paint, make up, and in the case of Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man – steam.

Let’s not kid ourselves, there is no greater tragedy than an Invisible-American not being able to be seen. Of course, they can use invisible powers to their advantage. For example, they can help other people win at darts, they can watch people dress and undress, and if they decide to use their powers for good they can help solve crimes.

But often, the invisibility “serum” can cause people to be criminally insane, which would be a tragedy if it happened to a child or worse, an Invisible Baby.

With your help, we can raise enough money to buy bandages for these children and babies in need. Think about a world in which a child is SO INVISIBLE that Santa cannot find them!

How can you help? Firstly, you can re-post this article to make others aware of this horrible problem. Re-posting articles is the best way to stop a tragedy. So many tragedies have been averted thanks to social media. So, thank you social media!

Secondly, you can donate to the 2012 Compass Improv Festival. Click the link to donate.

How can donating money to an Improv Festival help? Well, first of all, it’s very humid in St. Louis. Until we can find enough bandages to cover every child, humidity will at least shed some water on the situation. Also, the Ace Bandage was invented in St. Louis, Missouri. Perhaps with your help we can produce enough bandages so that there’s money left over to send them all to Invisible Chldren the world over. So please, donate and then re-post this article wherever you can….twitter, facebook, and wherever else it would be inappropriate.

 

Why you should vote for St. Louis –

“The entire history of improvisational theatre was balanced on a pinpoint there in St. Louis. It was one of the most amazing things that ever happened in world theatre, a creative experience unmatched perhaps on the planet. There’s never been anything like it.”

- Del Close (from “The Compass“)

St. Louis is in the middle of a Renaissance…an improv Renaissance. If you’re not familiar with St. Louis’s part in the history of Improv, I highly recommend that you click HERE for a bit of back story.

In the past few decades, St. Louis has been reclaiming this history. And now the national improv scene is starting to recognize that. Three St. Louis improv organizations have been nominated for INNY Awards. The INNY awards are awards for excellence in Improvisation.

I’m nominated for an award as well, but I’d like to shine the light on two other nominations that are perhaps even more important than my own.

Firstly The Improv Shop. This school and theater has been nominated for Best Training Program. In addition to training and showcasing the homegrown St. Louis talent, The Improv Shop just opened a new program called The Road Show which welcomes out of town acts to their home stage at The Tin Can. The Improv Shop recently celebrated a 2 year anniversary and has become a new focal point for Chicago’s top longform acts.

One of Chicago's top acts, "FELT" plays at The Tin Can

The Improv Shop has made it possible for Longform Improv to flourish in St. Louis, and of course The Improv Trick is very proud of that achievement because many of our students and teachers participate in The Improv Shop.

Secondly K.A.R.L. Improv is nominated as Best Collegiate Improv Troupe. If you’re not familiar with them, you should know that they’ve already garnered some great attention. Such as…

Official Selection at the Southern Illinois Improv Festival
Official Entry at the National Collegiate Improv Festival
Official Selection at the St. Louis Improv for Charity Festival

So much great work has come out of this group and I’m sure there are even better things yet to come….starting with this nomination for a national award! K.A.R.L. Improv represents some of the best of the nation’s college improv talent. Very few colleges had an improv troupe when I went to school, which is one of the reasons I return every year to teach at my alma mater, Central Methodist University. K.A.R.L.’s focus on improv at the college level will allow their graduates to be ambassadors for the St. Louis improv scene as they move forward in their improv careers.

And my nomination as Best Coach is quite an honor, but my work as a coach and teacher in St. Louis is only possible because of the hard work of everyone at The Improv Trick. I’m in LA most of the year and can’t hope to provide classes myself year-round. I hope you’ll honor six years of hard work on their behalf by voting for me as Best Coach.

So, if you’re an improviser who wants to help celebrate our mutual history, or a St. Louisan who is proud of our part of this international community, I hope you’ll vote in the INNY‘s as follows:

The Improv Shop – Best Training Program

K.A.R.L. Improv – Best Collegiate Improv Troupe

Bill Chott – Best Coach (The Improv Trick)

And the next time you’re out and about in St. Louis, support the St. Louis Improv scene. Take a class, see a show, and laugh LOUD!

Awards Season….Wins and Nominations

Thanks to supporters like you, I’ve won a Broadway World Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical, and now I’m up for a Best Improv Coach Award for the INNY’s. You can vote for me (only takes 2 minutes) by clicking HERE. Things like this only happen because of your support and your help in spreading the word. Please consider spreading the word to your friends on Twitter, Facebook, Google +, etc.

2012 is already an amazing year! Thanks to you it’s about to get even amazing-er! Too bad no rewards for grammar.

My New Year’s Wishes?

 It was standing room only at Mad Art Gallery for the 6th Annual Christmas Jam in St. Louis. I was so happy to see Improv Trick alumni return for the fun. From Chicago, Tricksters Mark Hardy, Ryan Dalton and Simon Ahmed dropped in. From New York Tim Keough, and from LA BJ “Honkey” Lange led games late into the night at our afterparty.

We had so much fun helping to raise funds, awareness and two whole bins of canned goods for St. Louis’ needy. Thanks to everyone who was a part of this huge success. When we asked current and former Tricksters to join us for the annual holiday photo the stage was full. So full you can barely see me in the picture below! I’m the one with the mic! How great to be surrounded by the very best St. Louis improvisers, the kind who think of others first.

My New Year‘s Wishes are that your year is as full as fun, laughter and love as mine has been. I know I promised to blog more this year, but it’s been a doozy. But I promise there will be more coming soon. A regular reader of this blog passed along a fun link for fans of SNL. To read an article about 10 Saturday Night Live cast members you forgot, click HERE.