"The Festival will showcase the best and most innovative comedians and performers." Rosa Sottile on the 2023 Brisbane Improv Festival
This week we have some killer shows in a huge diversity of formats from horror to musical to drama to classic improvised comedy - it’s something for everyone!
Murder Village | David Massingham & Brisbane Comedy Festival
Murder Village is great night out for lovers of absurd comedy, Agatha Cristie style murder mysteries and all those inbetween. With a rotating cast of some of the best improvisers in the country, it’s also the perfect introduction to improv and a show you’ll want to see again and again. And not just because it will never be the same show twice.
Queen and Friend | Grimes Productions & Anywhere Festival
With a complete lack of props, set or special effects, they crafted vivid worlds with just their voices and bodies, illustrating the different characters through changes in posture, voice and positioning. A real highlight, I have to say, was watching Imogen portray both the human-eating horse and human being eaten by the horse, both the consumer and the consumed, simultaneously. Bloody funny.
"We were inspired to create an event that celebrated and centred the art of improvisation!" Rosa Sottile on the 2022 Brisbane Improv Festival
We were inspired by the New Zealand Improv Festival and other similar festivals to create an event that celebrated and centred the art of improvisation! Improvised theatre and comedy is so special because every show is completely unique and different - you literally will never get the same show twice.
Cool Story Bro | Big Fork Theatre
One of the coolest parts of Cool Story Bro is that every show night is its own opening and closing night. What happened on Friday night will never happen again, and the only people in the world who got to experience it are those who were in the room. So for all those reading this, I’m sorry, but you will never, ever, get to experience the pure extasy of watching a group of people spontaneously assume the role of sperms and egg in the fight for fertilisation.
“We give a platform to the best improv and comedy shows.” Rosa Sottile on Big Fork Theatre’s dedicated comedy theatre
There are so many great shows on. Every week we have totally new improv shows and also regular stand-up and variety shows! If you want to see improv for the first time I would recommend our classic improv format, ‘Cool Story Bro’ on Friday nights. It’s Big Fork’s flagship show. True stories inspire hilarious improv scenes! Some other particularly exciting shows coming up are the BrisAsia Festival shows – ‘BrisAsia Stands Up’ and ‘Wer Ya From’. We also have some great Brisbane regular shows coming to the theatre like ‘Stand Up vs Improviser’ and ‘Freak Box’, and our first show making a comeback ‘Get It Inya’, an experimental comedy show!
One Night Only | Queen and Friend
It was mighty impressive how they seamlessly wove these stories without any preparation or insight and how the performers never seemed to lose momentum in their hour long run time. It’s one thing to do improv for ten minutes but to do it for sixty minutes non-stop is not an easy feat for the faint of heart. But faint of heart, these comedians were not.
Theatresports Grand Championships | ImproMafia
I counted fourteen different scenes across the show, which I thought was an impressive number for an hour-long show, and served as a tantalising sampler of the wide, wild world of impro possibilities. Over those scenes, the performers each showcased their strong individual talents for improvisation, imagination, and characterisation – and their sheer joy at being on stage was palpable. There was a great sense of chemistry between all of the performers, which allowed them to skillfully, smoothly riff off each other through even the most surprising changes in a scene.
"Some people have likened impro to a drug because it is so addictive." Wade Robinson riffs on magic of impro and the upcoming Theatresport Grand Championships.
Sylvia spoke with show director Wade Robinson to find out more about impro and Theatresports. He also dishes on the upcoming Theatresports Grand Championships where the best improvisors from Brisbane and beyond will battle it out in the upcoming in a side-splitting showdown of quick wits, fast thinking and comedy clout.
In the Dark | Big Fork Theatre
Being almost completely pitch black, it gave the presentation a live podcast vibe or even something reminiscent of an old-time comedy radio show. Not being able to see much also allowed the audience to use their imagination, which made it feel more immersive.
The Great Grandiosa | Act React
If you have ever wanted to know what the winning lottery number is going to be, or what riches are coming in your future, then you might not find that at The Great Grandiosa. What you are guaranteed though is a fun night of hilarious comedy and a peek into what might’ve happened in our past lives as you are swept away by The Great Grandiosa’s psychic charm, tarot card readings and a deep delve into horoscopes.
Five shows for enterprising private eyes
The Anywhere Festival is always one of the best places to see shows that allow you to fully immerse yourself in the action. And we're not just talking immersion, we're talking the kind of shows that give you the full starring role, where you solve the case, and take home the fortune and glory.
Immerse yourself into the inner world of fellow commuters with Transported by improv masters ImproMafia
The show seeks to explore the private world of people on public transport. In this space, the audience is invited to physically become part of the journey as fellow passengers, effectively blurring the line between audience and performance. The venue also works to evoke a sense of familiarity in the audience- we’ve all had to catch public transport before- but allows them the unfamiliar experience of getting a glimpse into the inner-world of their fellow commuters. Ryan hopes some audience members will leave the show with a sense of curiosity regarding their fellow man that carries over to their own interactions with public transport in the real world.
TOME is not your average impro theatre; It is ordered chaos, a hurricane in a bottle.
What is your creative process like? In a word: Chaos. The question that I constantly get asked when going through rehearsal process is ‘how do you direct an impro show?’, and it’s a good question! Rehearsal for TOME is about developing trust and communication between improvisers, critiquing the technique that the performers use rather than the content of their scenes. During rehearsal process, there are hundreds of incredibly heartbreaking, chaotically funny, and spine-chillingly scary scenes that will never be seen by an outside eye, but after the hours of improvising, team building and technique learning, the quality of the work and comradery of the team is astounding, and every scene is as exciting and thrilling as the next.
Authentic, improvised storytelling of the relationships, drama and struggles of high school students
The show takes place in the library of an actual school in Brisbane. The fact that the show is set in a school as well as being physically performed at a school allows the audience (and the performers) to immerse themselves in the stories of the characters and feel as if they are actually experiencing real life school drama unfold.
Cattle | Kate Coates and Cale Bain
As per many improv shows, Kate and Cale set up their scenarios with prompts from an audience member. What sets them apart is that some of the best laughs of the set came from in depth discussions with an audience member that followed the prompt. The duo’s natural responses to people’s (over) sharing that came from a place genuine surprise, curiosity and the right amount of gentle teasing was a joy to watch. When they received a response too sincere and moving even for them, they could only respond with, “We can’t mock that!”
Untitled Relationship Experiment | Big Fork Theatre
One part that stuck with me in particular was Samantha’s character’s strained relationship with her mother who refused to see her daughter’s committed lesbian relationship as anything more than a close friendship, even after marriage. It brought to light the combination of humour and pain found in the common queer experience of dealing with family members who are for the most part loving and yet wilfully ignorant or unaccepting of who they are
The Secret Super Hero Galaxy-Travelling Family Band Show & Jam | Big Fork Theatre
I interpreted this scene as a powerful statement about what art at its core is really about; not striving for an illusive ideal of perfection but rather, supporting each other through the process of making something together, going with the flow, embracing imperfection, and having plenty of fun along the way.
Cool Story Bro, Culprits & Interstate Mates | Brisbane Improv Festival
Scenes developed at a rapid pace and build and strange, weird and wonderful directions. They go forward and back in time, explore the most obscure ideas. The improvisers jumped in whenever they got an idea and everyone was given a chance to play and lead. Jasmine’s love of peanut butter and disappointment in how small the containers are at the supermarket, unfolds as a scene of a couple’s illegal obsession with tiny anthropomorphic foods and Aarons tale of travelling in a tiny sleeper train in winter develops into a son taking his parents to school for a career day, who just happen to be stuck living in a fridge.
Those meagre descripions are in no way doing justice to the chaotic hilarity that unfurled before us.
Improvised Dr Who | D4WH
We enter the theatre and seats are filled. The lights switch off, the Spotify play list cuts, the mics not on, we laugh, the audience laughs. We hear “We're having a tech issue, so talk among yourselves”. So, what do a couple of women do seated behind me? Sing the Dr Who theme song, so of course, I join in as do others with a rendition no fan would think was worthy – out of tune, with a couple of dog howls - but what the heck, we were ready to jump in the Tardis to travel to an alternative dimension full of aliens, Daleks, Cybermen and save the world cliches.