Family Fun From Beginning to End

by Michael Staffa

Show reviewed August 10, 2001

ComedySportz is a well-established name in the world of shortform improv, and well-crafted and energetic shows have allowed them to continue their years of success. Minneapolis Comedy Sportz continues that tradition.  Before the show even started, the players set the tone of a sports game by walking around the theater acting like vendors selling programs and chips. The show is a blend of many different sports. There is a referee, fouls, points, players, and even a coin toss (which here was substituted by a game of "Rock, paper, scissors").

There was even a "mid-season replacement." Jill Bernard was late for the show and came onto the stage while the referee was getting suggestions from the audience. It was distracting, but Ms. Bernard came up with witty excuses for her tardiness that blended well with the sports theme of the show. The group was short handed this evening, but ComedySportz wasn't about to disappoint fans by canceling. Ms. Bernard's late entrance was true to improv form in that anything can happen.

The show began with the referee (Michael Ritchie) entering to the cheers from the audience. It was Mr. Ritchie's job to engage the audience, get their creative juices flowing and collect suggestions from them to be used in the skits of that evening, and he did a great job of trying to use as many of the suggestions that he could.

The first game played was a miming format called "Debate." Doug Ocar was pitted against Michael Franssen. The audience had selected a verb, noun and adjective for each group and Mr. Ocar and Mr. Franssen had to guess them using only the mimed actions of their respective teams. This game highlighted the group's ability to work together and show off their mime skills. 

Next they performed "Forward Reverse" in which the blue team had to create a scene at a non-geographical location and, at his discretion, the referee could make the team go reverse and then go forward again. The location was Taco Bell, and who knew that there could be so many selections on the Taco Bell menu? Brian Kelly portrayed a teenager who just started a job at Taco Bell and his humorous character barely knew the menu. He became his character taking on the traits of a raspy voice and unique stature. The team had great chemistry, and paid enough attention to what they were doing while going forward so that they could accurately do it in reverse.  The red team's first team game was "Emotion Pik-a-Mix." The team gathers
suggested emotions from the audience and then has to build a scene incorporating those emotions as the referee calls them out. The group pushed themselves by adding accents. Ms. Bernard handled her transitions beautifully, moving from a stubborn Croatian one second and a sly Frenchman the next.

The blue team provided one of the show's rare shaky points with the scene coming off thrown together. Playing "Musical Comedy," the blue team had numerous moments where all three players were singing different things at the same time. This added confusion to the scene; the actors needed to listen more and wait to speak or sing. 

For "Five Things" (which is the bread and butter of many ComedySportz shows) Alli Barber left the theater while the rest of her team solicited five actions (e.g. tandem biking, chess, bocce ball, curling and giving a manicure). Then the team had the audience switch the usual things associated with those actions with things that were more unusual. Instead of tandem biking on a metal bike, the bike was made of pork, and the tandem biker was actually monkey versions of the Rolling Stones. Ms. Barber had to guess all of this with the help of her team who mimed some actions and spoke to her only in gibberish. Ms. Barber knew her stuff as she eased through what were tough suggestions.  The audience challenged the blue team with more puzzling suggestions, such as "curling a P.T. Cruiser." The group mimed superbly. Not only could Ms. Barber understand what was being depicted, but also the audience followed along rather easily as well.

As in any sport, there are fouls. And some of the fouls that ComedySportz calls are those to ensure a clean, family show. A foul was called on Mr. Ocar for his rendition of Sonny Bono skiing into a tree and dying, and Mr. Ocar was given the chance to apologize to the audience (the apology was more of a comedic convention than a serious apology). The audience accepted his apology by emphatically clapping for him, showing that they were not all that offended by his scene in the first place.

The players of ComedySportz Minneapolis were up to whatever challenges the audience threw at them. The players showed a great sense of humor and intelligence, and used them together to come up with the best skits possible. ComedySportz definitely knows what is funny, and exactly how to give this humor to their audience. The players had an energy that was contagious and the audience was hooked from beginning to end. If you ever want to laugh for two hours, a trip to ComedySportz might be right up your alley.