DEATH IN A MINUTE WILL HAVE THE AUDIENCE IN STITCHES

A CORE of talented and crazy improvisers are meeting each week at Z-PAC Theatre to hone their skills. The group under the directorship of Marjolijn Dudgeon, who gave us the delightful, heartwarming comedy Long Gone Lonesome Cowgirls earlier thisyear, are gearing up for an improvisation extravaganza. Death in a Minute takes its name from a game where a team of four actors are given a location such as a pig pen and have to, at the start signal, jump into action taking on characters improvising their way to at least one person dying and possibly more in the course of a minute. “This is hilarious flyingby-the-seat of your pants theatre where, without any preplanning, and playing against a ticking clock, trusting your fellow actors to save you no matter what your offer, inspired acting occurs,” said Ms Dudgeon. “Training evenings have been very satisfying because, as well as learning new improvisation challenges, the actors are skilling up and becoming more and more comfortable

with begin thrown in the deep end and coming up gracefully without a splutter and giving creative, witty, graceful and/or wildly zany lines and offers.” “The joy for an audience is the totally unexpected directions that the scenes often go off into and the skill of the actors to complete the required action within a time frame with such glorious aplomb. This is really a celebration of actors and acting.” The extravaganza will have three presentations on Friday 21st and Saturday 22nd October at 7.30 pm and Sunday 23rd October matinee at 2.00 pm. The presentations will be run as a competition with a number of teams of improvisers playing against the clock being given a wide range of theatre game challenges.

The American TV comedy show Whose Line is it Anyway follows a similar format. Performances will be judged by special guest Fraser Coast Mayor George Seymour with experienced local theatre actors/directors, Judith La Forest and Taylor Dunn. This is the third year that Death in a Minute has been staged, returning to popular demand. “As each show is wildly different you can be guaranteed a great new show, with a mixture of some new performers and seasoned players, favourites from previous years, as well as some new games and always different setups,” said Ms Dudgeon. Bookings are open on the Z-PAC theatre website at www. zpactheatre.com.au