Greetings once again from TCT. Once again I apologize forthe long delay in returning to my blog, but life sure gets busy around here. This time I wish to dedicate my energy to answering a few common asked questions about one of my favorite aspects of my work at TCT; our improvisational comedy company, Laughing Matters.

So welcome to everything you’ve always wanted to know about Laughing Matters but were afraid to ask; (possible due to a fear of infection!)

How did Laughing Matters start?

When I moved here from Kansas CityI had left behind a very popular improv comedy that I had formed there called Laughing Stock. It was one of Kansas City’s most popular comedy companies winning the “Best of Kansas City Award for Improvisation Comedy”  three years in a row. My experience with improv goes back several years and is one of my greatest passions. However, I really didn’t have any plans forcreating another improv company in Topeka. However, I did teach a class in improv that first year I moved here and after three months of playing improv games forourselves we just had to do a show. That first performance was in March of 1992. We charged a dollar and played to a sold-out crowd at the Warehouse on the Levee. It was such a success the company was immediately solidified after the show and a years worth of performance dates were set on our calendar. Of course, back then we played on Monday nights and I feared our audience would stay home if we stayed on a week night. When I was named Artistic Director the following December one of the first things I did was move Laughing Matters to Friday nights. This proved so successful we eventually played Fridays and Saturdays once a month or basically between shows at the Warehouse. How often does Laughing Matters perform?The number of performances of Laughing Matters each season has varied over the years depending upon the theatre’s schedule. We started with a single Monday night performance after the theatre ‘s newest production opened to a single Friday night performance following the theatre’s production closing to our current two performances immediately following the closing of our main-stage production. But Laughing Matters also performs off sight formultiple command performances every season. We play many “Christmas Gigs” off sight during the holidays as well as some very fun command performances year round at various hotels and clubs around town.We are now as popular as ever and are currently looking to expand our calendar with some additional shows and maybe even some “Laughing Maters Late Shows” with curtains after 10:00 PM. Does Laughing Matters rehearse and how do you rehearse improv anyway?I actually get this question a lot. The company meets almost every Sunday evening for three hours of insane and politically incorrect workshops at the theatre. These workshops are closed to the public and are honestly the best rehearsals in Kansas. We laugh far more than anyone should be permitted to for three hours.We rehearse our games, try out new games, and create our sketches. We even play kick ball until someone gets hurt. For most of us, the workshops are actually as much fun as performing and I personally consider it my therapy that gets me through another work week. Its three hours where we act like children - - misbehaving children, but children nonetheless. Why does Laughing Matters take the summer off?We didn’t used to. But we found that the one time that is hardest to sell tickets to Laughing Mattersis during the summer. When the weather gets nice, it’s harder to keep people indoors. But since Laughing Matters also requires a year round commitment from our performers, it can be a little hard on those performers to keep every Sunday night open for workshops. This gives us a break to spend some time with out families, too. How do you audition for Laughing Matters?Our company is very tight despite its size. We tend to have twelve to fifteen members and vacancies in that company tend to be rare. Once actors join our ranks, they rarely resign and often the only openings we have tend to be when actors move away from Topeka.  If there are only two orthree openings, performers may be invited to join the company without auditions, though I must admit that’s pretty rare anymore. But about every two or three years, we hold auditions for new company members. Usually by then the company has dropped to just around ten members and we are auditioning for four or five openings.  These auditions consist of a three hour comedy workshop where the current company plays games with potential new members. At our last auditions we had only five slots and over twenty five people vying for these positions with our company. The decision is incredibly hard every time and I am relived that we don’t have to go through this process very often.  What’s next for Laughing Matters?We hope to expand our performance schedule to keep up with ticket demands. Laughing Matters continues to sell out and we truly want to beef up our schedule to keep up with demand. But we also want to hear from our ticket buyers. Would you be interested in some late night shows? Would you like us to return to the Laughing Matter’s New Year’s Eve shows? If Friday and Saturday night shows are sold out, would you buy tickets to a Sunday night performance? We’d love to hear you thoughts and ideas so please consider letting us know. 

Anyway I look at it I couldn’t be prouder of this group of lunatics. They have provided TCT with thousands of hours of laughs and a great way to keep our doors open between performances. And if you haven’t seen these guys perform yet, make your reservations forthe next performance now. They’re truly funny people. Weird people, but funny people.

Shannon

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 27th, 2008 at 12:30 pm and is filed under Artistic Directors Remarks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.