Comedy: Improvising is a skill

Friday night I attended Gotham City Improv’s “Off the top of our heads“. Gotham City Improv hosts several shows throughout the week including Off the top, Master Debaters, and Show & Tell to name a few. The cast has so many different shows throughout the week so they rotate to keep things fresh. Gotham City Improv also has improvisation classes for any of you that may be  up to the task. New York City never ceases to amaze me with the infinite amount of shows and talent that you can find on display here.

How can I drive my experience home? After the show, one of the actors, Mary Hynes came over to my group and said “this guy right here (pointing at me) had this HUGE smile during the entire show!” That sums up my experience, I had a huge smile during the entire show! We really enjoyed ourselves and laughed our butts off. On a side note, Mary Hynes appeared really focus and in character during her performances, I don’t recall us ever making eye contact during the show, but somehow she saw my huge smile, that’s real acting skill right there!

This was my first time at a real live improv show and what a great first time it was! The cast was extremely talented and really funny. Each one of them was a comedic mastermind in their own right. This being an improv show, it really challenges the comic’s ability to think on their feet and to create dialogue out of thin air. I was very impressed and literally laughed out loud during the show.
The host, Marc Adam Smith was very entertaining, he kept things moving along nice and smoothly. He provides direction to the actors while requesting audience participation. Yes, audience participation is encouraged! You give suggestions and different tasks for the actors to follow. I think that we can all agree that it can get interesting when audience members participate. The suggestions we provided ranged from a strip club to the Vatican and everything between!
In a nutshell, the actors are randomly called up, given random scenarios (some details are provided by the audience) as to their circumstances, location, etc, and then they have to act out the parts and make us laugh. It’s really entertaining and quite fun. These guys think very fast on their feet and they have amazing memorization skills in order to remember all the details of a given sketch. The venue is a building studio, the auditorium style seating is very comfortable and looks like it can accommodate a large number of people. Thanks to host Marc Adam Smith and publicist Susanne Pinedo from PinedoPR we had front row seats, but the truth is that the venue is intimate enough where any seat is a good seat. Check these guys out for a great time!
This post originally appeared on BeingLatino.us

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