DAY 31 - ATLANTIC/SECOND CITY ETC

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

JAMES: I don’t think we were quite on the same page for the Atlantic show. It might have had something to do with the fact that I got the suggestion while Griff was talking to someone else, and then refused to tell him what it was. We also played the reverse of what we usually do. I was the crazy one, and he was the one trying to justify the insane things coming out of my mouth.

Then we got the incredible opportunity to play with the Second City ETC cast in their set. And a huge thank you to those guys for letting us dress up in stupid costumes and run around on their stage. I’m not going to talk too much about the mechanics of the set because I was enjoying it too much to look at it with a critical eye. Those guys are so great at the unique form that is the Second City set. It’s not quite short form, not quite long form, but they have it all figured out. So, in conclusion, it was awesome.

GRIFF: Oh man I hated the first show we did tonight. Really over the top with the silly. The “flying farting space dog” I think Christy Bonstell calls it. Don’t do that. Just choose a thing you’ve said and play that out. We had very little emotional basis at the start of our set so I think we were kind of casting around for something that felt sturdy. HIGHLIGHT THOUGH! MY MOM SURPRISED ME!!!! She and my aunt sat silently in the back of the audience wearing spooky skeleton masks. James pointed them out when we took the stage and they still didn’t say anything. After the show one of them came up to me and said “did you say where’s my mother!!!???” and it was my mom. Oh, and our show was largely about me trying to figure out what happened to my mom. WOW! LIFE AND ART WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE!?!?!

Then the Second City’s etc cast was kind enough to let us play with them or their improv set. Holy balls it was weird. Very different from every show we’ve done this month. Those guys go hard and fast for the joke. I was a little overwhelmed and a lot in my head. I guess I was intimidated by the fact that I was performing with professionals who all know each other onstage very well. I kind of wish I had thrown myself out there more, but as a guy who hasn’t ever even auditioned at the Second City, I think I handled it fairly well.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF / JAMES?

JAMES: He’s not afraid to go big with emotions, which is a great thing. There was a couple times that I said really off the wall things tonight, and even if he couldn’t think of anything to say, he would at least show me how he felt about what I had said. It’s a great instinct to have, and it makes playing with him so much easier.

GRIFF: James is very confident, or at least sure of who he is and how to operate. At the etc set his experience really showed. He wasn’t afraid to take the initiative and step out. I was thoroughly impressed. His brain doesn’t get snagged on “oh no what am I doing!?”. He spends very little energy on criticizing his contribution to a scene while in the scene. As someone who almost has an entire conversation with himself within the 10 seconds of a freeze scene, I am blown away by this. James is able to stay in the moment, while hearing everything and taking stock of it...usually. Our first show though, he played more like I usually do. Lots of wacky things that were unrelated but delivered with energy.

HOW DO YOU FEEL / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

JAMES: In our Atlantic set, we were real heavy on the plot and information about other people in the world. We just kept piling more and more info on top of the scene, when we should have just let it breathe a little more. There’s a balance that needs to be found between the banter and the emotion in improv, and we tipped too far in banter in this show. The thing that really makes me mad is that I did feel like I had an emotional connection to Griff’s character, but I didn’t say anything, even when he laid out the perfect opportunities for me.

GRIFF: Slow down and respond to what the other person said as honestly as you can without shutting them down. That is really tough to actually accomplish. You’ve got to remain present by not worrying about it all while still being aware of what has been said and the context. Also, it can take a lot of work to dig yourself out of your head. I’m slowly getting there, but it’s gonna be a little. I’ll update you when I’ve figured it out.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE DINOSAUR?

JAMES: I think it’s called an Anklyosaurus. It’s the one that has the armored back and the big spike tail.

GRIFF: The Jurassic Park T-Rex. I used to run around elementary school roaring and snarling like it.

DAY 30 - THUNDERDOME REDUX!!!!

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

GRIFF: That was a ton of fun. Mashup groups usually make me really uncomfortable, but tonight I was able to relax and have some fun. Of course, the show was disjointed and started dipping energy/commitment-wise the longer it went on, but that’s ok cause duh it was a mashup group.

JAMES: Other than Griff, I don’t think I had ever played with anyone from our group before last night. I know that three of them (Rachel LaForce, Casey Whitaker, and Greg Worsley) have done a lot of performing together, and them being comfortable with each other made me more comfortable with them. The show was still a little disorganized, but my favorite moment was Greg and I just yelling at each other about a gavel (you had to be there). There were things that I could have played harder, and moments that we could have explored a little deeper, but for a group of randoms, I can’t complain too much. Thunderdome was the second show we did this month, it’s pretty fitting that it was the second to last show of this run also.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF/JAMES?

GRIFF: James has gotten much more comfortable driving a scene, or at least entering strongly. There were a few times tonight he walked into a scene or tagged someone out that made me all like “nice move”. But it was never for just a joke. Smart lad, that one.

JAMES: Did you guys know his last name is Wenzler?! I’ve been calling him Griffin Weezer this whole time!

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

GRIFF: You gotta play hard and make your own fun. Hopefully someone else notices and jumps on board. Playing well in a mash-up group takes a good deal of maturity. Strong moves need to be tempered with good listening and support. Finding that balance is tough and is something I want to keep working on. Self-sufficiency is the only thing that will keep you going when it seems a show has stalled out.

JAMES: I think the biggest thing that i’ve learned from playing with mash-up groups this month is that playing politely doesn’t help anyone. With groups that haven’t played together before, it might feel like you’re being rude by running a scene, but when someone comes out strong, it’s so refreshing. Be the person that you want to be onstage with.

WHAT IS SOMETHING THAT YOU HAVEN’T DONE YET THIS MONTH IN A SHOW THAT YOU ARE GOING TO DO TONIGHT?

JAMES: Use an accent. BUT WHICH ONE?!

GRIFF: Make zero sex jokes.

DAY 29 - THE PLAYGROUND - HANG SESH WITH BEST BUDZ

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

JAMES: Tonight was the end of our run at “Hang Sesh with Best Budz”. It was a knock down, drag out, hoot and holler kind of a show. It was a loud, physical show and everyone was trying to be the loudest and most physical. We were pretty scattered and unfocused in our group games, but there was some fun stuff in a couple of the two person scenes. Strangely enough, Adam and Sean started the show the same way they started last week’s, as lovers. I don’t know if that says something about their relationship, or if it says something about the rest of us not getting out there in the first scene.

GRIFF: I was drunk.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF / JAMES?

JAMES: What a sentimental fool. I swear he shed a tear when he called our team. He said something like “I can’t believe this is the last time I’m going to be able to say this *sniff*, but please welcome to the stage *tear*, *sob*”. If that’s how he’s going to act, we should change our name to Blubbering Fury.

GRIFF: James did some wonderful things we were all really proud of. There was a hilarious thing where he kept shutting windows. I don’t really remember what was going on though because I was looking for my beer.

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

JAMES: One of the great things about this month is that I’ve learned how to deal with shows when things don’t go the way you want them to. There were plenty of times tonight when the wheels fell off and we got a little bogged down, but we navigated our way out eventually. Moments like that used to give me a panic attack onstage, and I would spend the rest of the week thinking about how I could have done something different, or fixed what we did, or something like that. But doing shows every day for a month really forces you to forgive yourself and move on.

GRIFF: Don’t drink too much. A couple is ok. Six is too many.

WHAT SONG DEFINED YOU IN MIDDLE SCHOOL?

JAMES: Rollin’ by Limp Bizkit

GRIFF: Everything Sucks by Reel Big Fish

DAY 28 - UNDERGROUND LOUNGE - 98.6 FREE SHOW

We write all of our entries on a shared Google Doc. This sometimes leads to fighting and conversations that I (Griffin) deem relevant to the blog. Today, any text in this entry written in red is James. Any text written in blue is Griffin’

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

GRIFF: Tonight we were joined by Sirs Michael Gau and Ryan Nallen for an early show at the almost empty Underground Lounge and we had a blast. I think people laughed. I know I did. I’d say our shining moment was everyone trying to sexually assault me while I was tied up. Ryan and James really enjoy that bit a lot. For such a quiet room we were all able to bring a lot of energy. Normally I would comment that it was too disjointed and weird, but I needed that tonight.

JAMES - These shows are all starting to run together. We haven't even been offstage for 2 hours right now, and I can barely even remember the show. I know that we played hey wait look over there------>here? no over and to the right  The fuck are you doing in my house? WHAT SCENES DID WE DO? I FORGET EVERYTING EXCEPT THE TREX AND THE POPE. That's literally what I was just writing. We did the sex thing, the tiny house, the guy that beat up the other guy's dad… Oh yea. Ok. Carry on. with Ryan Nallen and Michael Gau. I know that we started the show by being T-Rexes that all ended up eating each other. At one point I was the Pope answering emails. We played fast, maybe a little too fast.

AT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF / JAMES?

JAMES: I think he's starting to find out how fun it is to play the low status character. He put himself in a pretty vulnerable position at one point tonight and just owned it. He heightened his own sad situation and was just loving every second of it. I hope he keeps following those instincts, because it's going to lead him to some really fun places.

RIFF: Aside from the sexual harassment thing, I learned that James laughs when I mispronounce something or flat-out forget its name and make a new one up. At this point, finding new ways to make James laugh onstage is my main goal. I wish I had something more complimentary to say here, but I already forget most of what just happened.

HOW DO YOU FEEL / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

JAMES: Like I said above, we started the show as T-Rexes. It was kinda hard for me to connect with the piece as a dinosaur. My first thought when I saw that everyone was playing dinosaurs was to be a human, or to find some other meaning to T-Rex that I could play instead. What I ended up doing was just half-heartedly playing a T-Rex. I'm sure that if I had been more willing to give it a shot, I could have found something grounded to do as King of the Lizards, but I bailed on it. I really can't think of a single instance in a show where fully committing to the reality of a scene ruined the rest of the scene, and I should have committed to those bro T-Rexes we were playing. I can't believe how many times I've had to type "T-Rex" today.

GRIFF: Our opening scene was pretty dead. We were all T-Rexes talking about picking up chicks, babes, honeys, or women. We kind of let it fall to the ground and then rushed to get away from it. We then picked the energy and commitment up for every other scene. I think we’re all confident enough to pull ourselves up out of a nosedive of a show, but I really wish one of us had plunged into that harder. I remember seeing a Cook County show where Brendan initiated with what would make a Second City instructor scream, but the rest of the guys jumped on it so hard that it became incredible. I think the line was something like “oh man this cat has to have more kittens or we are all in trouble”. To see that get turned into a show is inspiring. Seeing myself pull back from something just because I didn’t know where it was going made me remember that.

IF YOU DID THIS IN FEBRUARY, YOU'D BE DONE BY NOW. HOW DOES THAT MAKE YOU FEEL?

JAMES: Tired.

GRIFF: Like I am a strong boy with many powers and I will have a long life with many tales.

DAY 27 - The Playground - Extended Play

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

GRIFF: By far the best Extended Play we’ve done. I had a blast. Lots of big moves by everyone. Ryan Nallen basically improvised an SNL audition. That guy is amazing when you put him on the spot. At one point he had no idea what a filibuster was, but still stepped out to give one. No one was very concerned with being polite, yet we were all on the same page. Only issue I could see was that we talked over each other and were a little scattered at times.

JAMES: This was the most fun. Griff started us off on a really energetic note, and Ryan came in with a goofy Australian accent. We played really gamey, super physical, and with all the energy we could muster. Usually with shows like this, I'd run out of steam after about 15 minutes, but I felt like we were all feeding off of each other. Everyone was being so supportive of each other's ideas, we could do no wrong. No one person was running the show or directing the action. Everybody got their moment(s). One of the best feelings is leaving the stage and your face is already sore from laughing at your friends' bits. This was a great way to close out our run at Extended Play.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF / JAMES?

GRIFF: James can justify goddamned near anything. I made some dumb joke about how I had a few ideas to change the government and he jumped in and made us Senators. That one move led to so much more. It became the heart of the show really. I’m glad we’ve done all these shows together. I don’t think I could rely on anyone else as much as I know I can rely on James onstage. Not real life. Just onstage. That guy has some trouble with organization and time management. But onstage, his brain works like a machine.

JAMES: This isn't something that I learned, but my favorite Griff moment. We started the show with him on the ground complaining about being stung by a hornet. We time dashed a couple times away from that moment, but kept playing the same characters. Then, we started making our way back towards the opening through other time dashes, and then suddenly we did something really physical that he transformed back into the opening moment of the show. He seriously had to wait for people to stop clapping to get his next line out. It was some Cook County level work.

HOW DO YOU FEEL / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

GRIFF: Tonight I felt like the “don’t drop your shit” part of Annoyance training really paid off. Everyone had a weird thing they kept coming back to throughout the show and, having taken care of themselves, was ready to support everyone else. We also played without any regard for the audience…or at least very little. At the end of the show I had no idea whether or not people had laughed. But, I know James, Ryan, and I were almost in tears the whole time. At the end of the day, that’s what matters most to me with improv. There are lots of ways to get there and we found a great way tonight.

JAMES: It's fun. Like, really fun. For a long time this month, we tried to figure out a form that worked for us. But our favorite shows have been the ones where we just said "let's do what feels right". You've got to take the pressure off yourself and have some fun. Craig Uhlir says that you can only be upset about a show for as long as the show was, and then you have to realize that you're playing make believe with your friends. But going into a show with that attitude is just as helpful.

WHAT ARE YOU HOPING TO ACCOMPLISH WITH THE LAST FOUR DAYS OF THIS PROJECT?

JAMES: New best friends for life and improv perfection.

GRIFF: Free beer for life and a job writing for the most creative and hilarious television show ever conceived.

DAY 26 - iO - BYOT

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

JAMES: This is one of those shows that I don't even know if we should write about. My grand plan was to get 24 other people onstage to celebrate our 26th show. I was hoping to get so many people up there that we would have people playing all the props, scenery, backgroudn characters, everything. It ended up being predictably chaotic and hard to follow. So I guess that's why you don't see a lot of 20 person shows.

GRIFF: I thought it was hilarious. We tried to get 24 other people onstage with us but only got 5. Once we got the scene going James and I snuck off stage and left the theater until we heard the lights get pulled and then we ran back in. Classic James.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF / JAMES?

JAMES: At one point, I thought it'd be really funny to just leave. So I went over and told him that I wanted to. And then we left. The theatre. I'm glad that he's onboard when I want to do weird stuff that only we think is funny.

GRIFF: He loves a good prank. Apparently the bartenders talk about our caper TO THIS VERY DAY!

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

JAMES: 20 people is too many.

GRIFF: Do whatever you want. Criticize yourself later.

DONUTS OR MUFFINS?

JAMES: Donuts. I think we can all agree on that.

GRIFF: Donuts, you fattie! MORE DONUTS! Now cry!!!!!!

DAY 25 - KNUCKLEBALL ‘PROV SHOWCASE

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

GRIFF: I was really tired and kind of loopy before the show. I tried to rally and I think I did a good job of going along with the energy Alex Nichols and James brought to the show, but I was definitely in the backseat for this one. There were a few times I found myself laughing at the show as a spectator rather than a performer. It was really stupid...in places  detrimentally so, but on the whole I think a good show.

JAMES: I don't even really know how to explain this show. Me, Griff, and Alex Nichols. It was funny. It was weird. It was very character driven. It felt like we all gave ourselves a game to play at the top and we just stayed on those courses for most of the show. There were some moves made that got dropped or ignored, but that became a game in itself also. I think that Alex and I came out with such strong characters that Griffin was left to justify a lot of what we did. With all that being said, I had so much fun and couldn't keep a straight face for most of the show.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF/JAMES?

GRIFF: I already knew that James could drive a scene from a very grounded place but tonight he drove from a much weirder place. His choices were completely ridiculous and stupid in the best way possible. I don’t think he’s played like that in a while outside of a Gentleman’s Falcon show (his independent team), but even then I don’t think I’ve seen him lead like this. He was also still able to weave a common thread through the scenes which was really impressive.

JAMES: It was really funny to see Griff play the straight man tonight. Usually he's the one that is bringing the crazy to the table, but Alex and I kind of forced him into grounding us with the choices we were making. It showed a lot of growth on his part that rather than trying to make the show more insane than it already was, he found the calm and collected energy that the show was lacking, and played that.

HOW DO YOU FEEL / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

GRIFF: I noticed tonight that playing with people who are very confident or mashup teams doesn’t make me uncomfortable. It is trying to follow behind someone else’s idea or letting them drive everything. It isn’t always easy for me to jump on board enthusiastically if I don’t understand the game that is being played. For the rest of the run I’m going to push myself to play  harder when I encounter something I don’t get or am not comfortable with.

JAMES: I got a little in my head about how much time we were going to get onstage tonight. I notced that the other teams were getting what felt like 10-12 minutes each, which is pretty short for a Knuckleball show. For most of the show, we played one scene with multiple characters that travelled to different places. We should have just played that out for the entire show, but I pulled an edit because I thought the scene had come to its end. So what we had was a show that was 90% one scene, and 10% anonther scene that we didn't even have time to establish names in. So basically what I learned is that if it feels like you've done a long enough scene to warrant staying in it until the lights get pulled, just commit

to it.

IF YOU WERE THE FIRST PERSON TO ENCOUNTER ALIEN LIFE, WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TO THEM?

JAMES: I wouldn't say anything. I'd just sit them down and show them "Independence Day"

GRIFF: I be all like, “damn gurl you need some makeup or sompthin ‘cause you ugly, dang!”

DAY 24 - THE ATLANTIC AND STAGE 773

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE SHOW TONIGHT?

GRIFF: Touched a lot of butts. Made a ton of jokes about families getting melted to death in a fire station.  Killed Jonbenet Ramsey at the top of a mountain. Uhhhh yea. I’d say THAT’S a good show. Adam Levin saved the day by setting up this show. He, myself, and Bill Letz did a group scene at the top of the show and branched out from there. We took our time but it definitely wasn’t a slow show. It’s always easy when you play with friends who know what they’re doing.

JAMES: I played in The Funeral at Stage 773 with Kelsey Kinney, Amy Thompson, and Eric Harrington. The Funeral is a form that was invented by Danny Bischoff, and it’s one of my favorite forms to do. The nature of it really forces you to focus on relationships rather than plot. It also facilitates gift giving better than most other forms. Tonight I got to play a kid who was just despised by his father, no matter what he did. There’s something really fun about playing the character that gets kicked around by everyone. It gives you permission to be pathetic.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT GRIFF/JAMES?

GRIFF: James is really good at performing the Funeral because that is an improv show you really have to see to understand. Like, it’s form is more than just an excuse to set up a collection of entirely improvised scenes. You really need to study it to get it. No way I could have pulled that off. They probably did some really experimental edits that someone like me would never understand.

JAMES: He’s not bitter at all and is able to get over things that are out of his control really quickly. He is never the guy to write passive aggressive things, you know, like how a child would if they didn’t get their way? Not Griff.

HOW DO YOU FEEL / WHAT DID YOU LEARN ABOUT IMPROV?

GRIFF: I’ve started having better shows when I take it slow. I need to focus on that. You still need to make deliberate moves and react to each other, but you’ve gotta find a way to be natural about it all. Sometimes I get in my head because everyone around me is saying hilarious lines  and I can’t think of anything or don’t understand the joke (cause I’m real dumb). I shouldn’t worry about forcing a funny or insane line. I say those things naturally and should let them just come to me. Tonight was a good reminder of that.

JAMES: Like I said above, The Funeral is designed to bring out relationships rather than plot. You set up how you feel about another character in a monologue, and then play an everyday scene with them. Rather than following a story, you learn about how these characters get along with each other, how they react to different situations, that sort of thing. I get really caught up in trying to shoehorn clever plot devices and twists into shows a lot. After doing shows like this, it’s good to remind myself that I’m working too hard. Improv is a lot easier than I’m making it.

IF YOU WERE A BOOK OF POETRY, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR TITLE?

GRIFF: Lizard Man, Lizard Mind, Human Heart

JAMES: Jimmy Lightning’s Big Book of Rhymes and Feelings.