The Daily Princetonian
Thursday April 2, 2015
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PAGES DESIGNED BY LIN KING :: STREET EDITOR
FUNNY PEOPLE In honor of April Fool’s Day, Street takes you behind the scenes with Princeton’s resident jokesters — the improv comedy troupes.
FUZZY DICE LIN KING Street Editor
“I COUTESY OF REBECCA SICHEL ’17
LOBSTER CLUB HARRISON BLACKMAN Associate Street Editor
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n 2011, Nick Lavrov ’15, Nicky Robinson ’15, Preston Kemeny ’15 and Yegor Chekmarev ’15 had a vision: a no-audition improv group at Princeton. “We wanted to do improv comedy and the only way to do it was to make a new group for us to perform in,” Lavrov said. Their vision manifested as Lobster Club, the first and only no-audition improv comedy troupe on campus. It was founded around the same time as the ¿Shruggers? organization, which would eventually become a
no-audition coalition with Lobster Club as its f lagship organization, according to ¿Shruggers? president Ethan Gordon ’17. “The intent is to provide a space for anybody interested in performing arts to have the opportunity to explore all that the performing arts have to offer,” Gordon said. “[It’s to] help combat an underlying culture of selectivity that’s especially prevalent in performing arts communities really all over Princeton.” Running a no-audition performance group has its challenges, particularly in preparing for shows. “We need[ed] to figure out what would a good system be for no-audition but for still putting on shows,” Lavrov said. “You can’t just have
someone perform in shows without ever having done anything before.” To ensure this, Lobster Club members are required to attend at least two-thirds of practices in order to perform. In some respects, Lobster Club functions as both a performance group and a group that builds improv skills. “There’s no experience necessary,” Lavrov said. “We have a lot of people in our group where this was their first time was doing improv.” “We put emphasis on teaching the skill of improv, so our workshops are open and anyone can come to them,”
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QUIPFIRE! DANIELLE TAYLOR Contributor
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ounded in November 1992, Quipfire!, Princeton’s oldest improv comedy group, has developed its particular style of improv over the past two decades. “They started off predominately doing short-form improv,” artistic director Jake Robertson ’15 said. Television shows such as Whose Line Is It Anyway? use shortform improv, which consists of smaller premise-based games, but Quipfire! has since expanded their repertory. Quipfire!, according to Robertson, now performs more long-form improv, which is currently more prominent in the professional improv world. One example of Quipfire!’s application of long-form is its improvised “Musicals!” shows, the latest of which took place this past weekend. The audience gave suggestions for a title of a musical, and the group improvised a musical production with many interlocking scenes to create a vibrant, unique and hilarious story
each night of the performance. Despite the deviation from its shortform roots, the group still maintains close ties to its alumni predecessors. “We switch between generally three places now,” Robertson said. “We’ll do New York one year, and Chicago and then Los Angeles. Those tend to be places where there is a lot of improv going on.” Quipfire! does a set of shows during Frosh Week to get students interested in auditioning for and watching the group, according to managing director Lauren Frost ’16. About 100 people auditioned this past fall alone. “I think we get a lot of people to audition because it’s something that doesn’t really need experience,” Frost said. “Improv is something that a lot of people haven’t done before, and a lot of the members that we get haven’t done it before.” “We also try to emphasize that we keep our auditions really fun,” Robertson added. “Sometimes people say, ‘Oh, I’m just glad I auditioned because I had a great time.’” Quipfire! performs a variety of shows throughout the year to showcase
went over to her room and I had this whole bag of activities we could do: we could do makeovers, we could do facials … and then I pulled out a magazine and said, ‘Or, we could write a murder letter by cutting out letters!’ ” No, this is not a fan-made sequel to Mean Girls. This is Fuzzy Dice, one of Princeton’s three improvisation comedy troupes, during downtime. Executive director Paulina Orillac ’17 (responsible for the conspiracy quoted above) said that part of what distinguishes Fuzzy Dice as a group is its emphasis on the social atmosphere, which she described as “chemically unbalanced” — in the fondest way possible. “We try to become really close-knit, we try to get to know each other outside of the rehearsal room,” Orillac said. “I think that’s something really special about Fuzzy Dice as a group, especially in Princeton.” On the more technical side, artistic director Angad Anand ’16 added that while all three groups on campus are friendly and supportive of each other, each has its own style. “We have a more holistic, scene-based improv where we really try to create some sort
of objective,” he explained. “We really try to tell a story.” In shows, the group makes a point to incorporate as much audience involvement into its improv games as possible. Publicity chair Cat Sharp ’18 explained that a signature game, called, unsurprisingly, “Fuzzy Dice,” has four scenes going on at once, all inspired by the audience’s suggested keywords. Another staple is called “Paper Chase,” which invites audience members to write anything they want on pieces of paper that are collected outside the theater before
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COUTESY OF CAT SHARP ’18
new forms of improv with which it is experimenting. In October, Quipfire! did its Gravid Water Show, which involves having actors memorize one person’s lines from a scene, and then pairing those actors with an improviser who does not know the scene and must come up with its responses on the spot.
“People really loved it,” Robertson said, “We’ve grown throughout my experience into a group who experiments a little more. For example, Gravid Water was a one-off show, so we just did one evening. And I think that we’re making that into a thing we do more often.” Quipfire! is performing another Gravid Water in April, as well as a set of shows
in May. “These shows will probably be Armandos,” Frost said, “where we have a guest, probably a professor, give a monologue based on a suggestion, and then we improvise based on that.” According to Frost, Quipfire!’s future
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COUTESY OF WARREN RIEUTORT-LOUIS