by Joe Janes

Improv Team Meeting/Rehearsal

Walt’s One Bedroom Condo

Tuesday, 11/14, 2017 8:30pm

Attendance: Walt, Jeff, Chad, Rick, Neil, Rick (late), Randall (late), Tim (late)

ABESENT: Matt, Kevin, Rich

Notes taken by Walt

-       Hootie and the Blow Me – We discussed whether we should keep our name as is or change it to something more appropriate, like Hootie and the Blow Us, since there is more than one person on the team. We will keep it “me” until we run out of customized stickers.

-       Walter and the Mostly Whites was also suggested but was considered potentially deceptive since we are all white. We could go with Walter and the Whites, but we don’t want to have to change it if we ever get someone not white in the group.

-       The issue of diversifying our group was brought up. Tim texted us that he knows a black guy at work who is thinking about taking classes at Second City. Fingers crossed. He also texted us that his Uber says he'll be here in 10 minutes.

-       Rick was 30 minutes late, but justified it because he left another improv rehearsal early to be here late.

-       We also discussed our issue of not being able to keep women on the team. Jeff needs to stop giving new women members of the group shoulder rubs and lengthy welcome/departure hugs. “We’re all family, here” does not justify the physical contact. Our official policy from now on is high fives only. Rick is also forbidden from opening any scene with a woman with the line, “Hi, Honey, I’m home.”  Finally, Martin needs to stop trying to kiss women in scenes. We will no longer “yes, and-” his tongue.

-       Randall was 45 minutes late and brought a stinky broccoli and garlic stir fry from that place under the El. I think I’m going to vomit.

-      We got philosophical.   If we do an improv show and no one shows up to see it, do we still get a suggestion?  If we sweep edit our own scene, does the audience just think our character is running away? If we are cut from the roster at iO, do we still exist? Word on the street is that we won’t be on the next schedule because no one showed up to our last show.

-       Tim arrived (70 minutes late). We think he was either high or had been drinking. He mumbled something about the Uber and then went into the bathroom.

-       We explored other performance options. Chad’s cousin has a restaurant in Skokie we can perform in any time we want and if we have a different team open for us each week, they’ll bring an audience.  We’ll need to move some plants to make a stage area and then move them back when we're done.

-       We talked about doing a new form that would make us stand out, but for this Sunday at the 10pm show at the Crowd Theater, we’re just going to do a Harold, and by that we mean montage.

-       We talked about bringing in a coach, but no one wants to spend the money since we all spent our salaries on classes. Plus, it seems like a waste since we never all make it to our meeting/rehearsals or shows.

-       We talked again about all wearing the same colors or t-shirts to look more like a team. We decided everyone will wear an untucked button-down shirt and shorts, since that’s what everyone will likely be wearing any way. Neil is no longer allowed to wear his cowboy boots. They were too loud and too many people got hurt. Chad is also not allowed to wear skinny jeans as it limits his ability to do environment work. All his palm trees had a bulge and had trouble swaying in the improv breeze transitions.  

-       We concluded the meeting. Tim came out of the bathroom and we did some improv scenes. We gave each other extensive notes as we improvised. It made each scene last 15 minutes. Worse, every scene we did smelled like overcooked broccoli and MSG. I hate Randall.