The final show of Switch Committee’s year long run at the famous iO Theater in Chicago.
Thank you to everyone who came out and thank you to Adam Kurschat for filming!
Tag Archives: io
Show tonight with DOGS!
Show tonight with The Ruckus!
Show tonight! With Dual Citizen!
Show tonight! iO at 8pm with Sonis
Warming Up For An Improv Show
How do you warm up for a show? Every improv , sketch, theater, or team in general (ex: sports) does something before a show to get themselves mentally or physically prepared. It is entirely different for everyone. It’s even different on an individual level. For improvisers, groups typically do a warm up of some kind to get their brains working or to untangle their tongues so to say. Like saying, “tip of the tongue, teeth, and lips.” It’s the same process for the beginning of a class or a rehearsal. At a basic level, it’s something as simple as Zip, Zap, Zop and it can ramp up to a Beastie Boys rap. For this post, we thought we’d share what exactly Switch Committee does before a show to get ready. If you’ve ever performed with us or been at iO in the alley prior to our Thursday night shows, you’d know it’s pure and utter insanity. There’s a lot of screaming and jumping all over the place and all over each other. It looks like a bunch of wild animals in ties running around aimlessly without any plan or action. However, there is somewhat of a game plan going on. Specifically, this is what we do:
1. We immediately start killing each other once we step into the alley. No joke. We start slaying each other left and right in every possible way imaginable. Why? Because it’s hilarious. Really why? Because it’s big and physical. It’s a fun way to get out of your head. Getting to strap a rocket on Schwartzbaum’s back and firing him into the dumpsters or stabbing Ryan with a Katana sword and throwing him under a tank that Dave’s joyriding while Collin snipes Alan who’s juggling molotov cocktails is…glorious. We beat the living hell out of each other yet we love the living hell out of each other. The fun here is that anything is possible (duh it’s improv). Really though, if I wanna have panda hands (literally hands that are snarling pandas) than I’m going to do it. More importantly, I’m going to kill my friends with my panda hands and they’re going to love it. In short, find the people you can kill with panda hands before you go on stage and you’re set for life.
2. We pass some patterns around after everyone is good and dead. We do the word association game or theme association through patterns. So with word association, for example, if I point at you and say “Holidays” you may say “Christmas” and then the next person may say “Santa” and then the next person may say, “Gifts!” and the person after that may say, “Birthdays.” You see what we did there? Yes, us too, it was magic. So, we do that, and we try to do at least 3 patterns. That’s the minimum. The more you do it the better you get at it though (just like anything in life). At the moment, we can do 5 patterns without all hell breaking loose. It’s tough, but it can be done. Tip: Try to increase the number of patterns you do. Not only is it fun, but it’s also challenging. It’s tough as hell but hilarious when everyone is rapid fire throwing patterns at your face. If you don’t keep the pattern going, the game is over and all the patterns will be waiting on you. You fail. You die. You’re a disgrace to the group and your family back home. Just kidding, it’s not that serious. It’s just a fun way to get your brain ready for anything that is thrown at you and the ability to juggle multiple mental balls at once. It helps you focus on what’s important at the moment.
3. We find out what’s up our butts… (LONG DRAMATIC PAUSE FOR THE NON-IMPROVISERS WHO HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THEY JUST READ). Well, ‘up your butt’ is a rhyming game and it goes as such:
Ryan: I’ve got a bat up my butt
Dave: I’ve got a cat up my butt
David: I’ve got a hat up my butt
Alan: I’ve got a thermoSTAT up my butt (this one actually makes sense)
Collin: I’ve got an aristoCRAT up my butt
Ryan: I’ve got a diploMAT up my butt!
We got around in a circle and everyone starts and finishes a rhyme. So, as you can see from the above, Ryan started and ended that sequence. You get it. Duh. Why are we explaining this? You’re probably sitting there thinking, “I’m getting too old for this shit” with the voice of Roger Murtaugh in your head. Right? Nope? Just us?
Tips for your Pre-Show Activities:
- Do something. Anything. Seriously do anything to prepare yourself for a show. It doesn’t matter what and you shouldn’t be worried about people judging you. If you wanna lay down on the floor and kick your feet into the air like you’re riding a unicycle, go right ahead, that’s your thing. The hell with anyone who think’s that’s ridiculous. If you wanna sit in the green room and watch inspirational or motivational speech videos like this on YouTube than do it. If that’s what gets you ready for your show than by all means do it. The important part is that you’re mentally prepared. The green room is the calm before the storm.
- Be physical. We’re not saying run a marathon and make the stage your finish line, but get your legs, arms, and groin (especially your groin, wink wink) moving so you don’t end up walking on stage later that night and just standing there like a scarecrow the whole show. Talking heads…the worst. For us, we kill each other. That’s our thing. If you wanna do that too go right ahead. Whatever you need to do to get your blood pumping. Then, pump your friends….wait what?
- Connect. Right before we get on stage we huddle up like we’re the Permian Panthers. We each look into eachother’s eyes, touch each other’s backs and simply say, “I’ve got your back.” So simple. So basic. Yet this is ESSENTIAL. It might even be more important than everything else we’ve done prior to that moment. It’s the time where we all know that we’re on the same page together and that no matter what we’re going to support one another. You need to connect with your partners before you step on stage. Even if you’re on stage and just got a suggestion, take a second to look into your partners eyes to express “we’re in this together.” Too many times (usually during auditions), Wally Wackadoo will just run onto the stage without connecting with his partners and just start doing his own thing without even acknowledging or listening to anyone. He’s just sitting in all the seats, breaking the fourth wall, and throwing out one-liners galore. Don’t be that asshole. Connect with your partner. It will change the entire way your partner and you work together (stress work together) to create art.
NEW PODCAST!!!
We’re getting back on the podcast bandwagon after a real long hiatus. Here the guys ramble about the upcoming Star Wars films, customer service, violence in video games, football/soccer and the astronomical cost and uncontrollable power of cable companies in Chicago. They even agree to kill each other via a ‘euthanasia pact’ should the time come. Nonsense.
Show Thursday 10/17/13!
Review from the Chicago Tribune! :D
Thank you so much to all who came out. We recently got reviewed by the Chicago Tribune’s Nina Metz and we cannot explain how happy we are. We’ve copied and pasted the review below:
Switch Committee
Good improv — the kind that has an almost seamless quality as it rolls from one scene to the next— is a long-haul proposition. It can take years for performers to really settle into a groove together. And then before you know it, one person after another scatters to the wilds of Los Angeles or elsewhere to pursue more lucrative work in TV and film.
That sweet spot in between — when an improv team is just seasoned enough to leverage its internal chemistry, but not restless enough to skip town just yet — is where Switch Committee currently resides. The five-man group, in their shirts and ties, has the right kind of playful but down-to-business approach.
They are the type to literally climb the rafters, for bits that included a riff on men’s gymnastics, a performer-as-human pinata and a treehouse mom got in the divorce: “Now it’s her bachelorette pad.”
Alan Linic is especially strong when it comes to playing a specific sort of dumb (intent but dense) and there’s huge potential down the line for this sort of thing. The standout is Ryan Nallen, who brings to mind a Michael J. Fox-like “what, me?” mock innocence. He was the one hanging from beams, which became obviously painful after a time. As one of his fellow cast members attempted to help him out, the others decided, nope, we’ll keep him suspended up there with every narrative contrivance we can think of. That’s pretty cruel, but also funny. And Nallen, good sport that he was, let you know it was OK to laugh.
Thursdays through Nov. 21 at iO Theater, 3541 N. Clark St.; $12 at ioimprov.com/chicago
Link to the review: http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/ct-ott-1011-on-the-fringe-20131011,0,1234768.story
Thank you to the Detroit Improv Festival!!!
We went to our first ever festival this past weekend and it was an absolute blast. We went to the Detroit Improv Festival in Ferndale, Michigan and had the time of our lives. Personally (you have no idea who’s writing this but you can guess), I think we became even closer as a group after doing this festival. I know what you’re thinking, “how can you guys get any closer? You slap each other in the dicks on stage?!” Sure, we’re real close, but when you’re running around jumping off of hotel beds in your boxers screaming the Blurred Lines lyric, “WHAT YOU DON’T LIKE WORK”, it takes your friendship to a whole new level.
For starters, the ride down there was filled with screaming, singing, sleeping, and snap-chatting. If you didn’t notice, every one of those things started with an S. Completely coincidental or was it? Queue dramatic Inception music. We didn’t know what to expect going to this festival. You never know how things are going to go when you’re away from home. However, oddly, we collectively agreed that we weren’t nervous. It was weird. We just felt like we fit in there. Our hats (if we wore them) go off to the people who helped run the festival as they were very kind and supportive and never made us feel like we were outsiders. As soon as we got there, we felt right at home. It didn’t feel like we were doing a show in another state, it just felt like another show.
We had the amazing opportunity to open up for TJ & Dave. A show that one of the heads of the festival said, “sold out 4 days ago.” Needless to say, the place was packed to the gills. As for the show, it was explosive. We were physical. We were silly. But most importantly, we were having fun. Right from the start, we could feel a warm and inviting presence from the audience. They were there to have a good time. They weren’t just sitting at a bar and happened to catch a comedy show on their way to the bathroom. They had left their house to go and see a comedy festival. They were there to laugh. And it was our job to make them laugh. We played fast and we didn’t miss a beat. Some of the characters we played included a boy with a worm arm (who was coincidentally a baseball pitcher), a Mormon hell bent on selling Christ (chasing people on a roller-coaster), an umpire that had no control over his arms and was trapped in a house of mirrors (everyone flailed their arms on stage), and an alien girl with octopus phalanges sent down to Earth by her father to repopulate her species. Yes. We know. Absolutely insane. Yet absolutely necessary.
When we walked back stage, TJ & Dave were standing there to say two words. “Great show.” Together we melted into a puddle of slime. After the show, we were approached by audience members and other groups that had nothing but nice things to say about our show and about the way we play. We were and are so grateful. The support from the crowd, the inviting “right at home” feeling we got from the people who ran the festival and the groups that attended, and those two words made this trip an experience that we will never forget. It brought us closer together as a group and more importantly as friends.
Thank you Detroit. Thank you Ferndale. Thank you to everyone who was a part of the DIF.
You’re awesome.
– The Boys
Switch Committee!!! 