So, what’s been going on? Had a house warming party which was oodles of fun, (thanks to those who came out). Sold a fair amount of jewelry at an art show recently. Chipping away at house projects…trying to stay focused and sane despite a torrent of horrible weather.

Recently performed at an improv show and I have to say it was one of the worst shows I’ve ever participated in. This includes the years of cabaret gigs and fringe festival shows from years back. It was basically a recital of sorts, all the different levels from the Improv School I attend getting onstage and performing with their class. I’ve been working with this theater on and off since 1997. There was a keg in the lobby of the theater and the audience drank copious amounts of beer. My class this quarter was underwhelming due to the fact that it contained way more men than woman. You need a little feminine energy in an improv show simply because it’s tiring seeing the same old white guys get up there with their shtick, wit, and gagging for laughs.

Anyway, one of the guys in my class is a stereotypical actor: young, ok-looking, self-absorbed, narcissistic, and will drag you across the stage if it means he looks good. Unpredictable, he’s a loose cannon on stage, doing whatever it takes to get a laugh, all the things I hate to watch (and participate) in an improv show. Some improvisors can get away with breaking some cardinal rules, but this guy only alientates his fellow improvisers with his no-let’s-do-my-idea-instead and occasional ‘humping dog’ routine that’s so played out I have to look the other way everytime I see him start gyrating on someone’s leg. He and a bunch of other guys in the class have formed a rookie improv group which they talked about incessantly during class. This also meant they were constantly onstage together doing inside jokes and laughing at themselves. The rest of us in the class were left with this weird, left out sort of feeling.

Halfway through the quarter I realized this certain actor, let’s call him “Jo Bob” was (surprise!) extremely hard to handle…and suddenly, I made the realization: he’s a misogynist. I started tallying how many times he would start a scene with a fellow female improviser with a negative relationship, a super violent physical character, or, even worse, start bossing her around the stage. Now, granted this guy rarely ended up on stage with any of us because he was always drawn to his buddies…but we had this showcase coming up and I realized he was going to have to play nice or we would be massacred onstage.

Yeah…you know where this is going. Dude shows up, starts drinking beer, and starts heckling the other classes as they go onstage to perform. Our class went last, and I was trying really hard to stay positive. Two other girls in the class had told me previously that they didn’t want to do the showcase because of this actor. I had ranted and raved about how we needed to bond together and be strong, girl power, etc…Now I was regretting the decision. The whole class started on stage, preparing to do a long form of improv based on a poem. Our teacher read the poem aloud to the audience and then left us in silence as we absorbed the writing and prepared to transition into a scene.

We all stood in silence for about a second when, suddenly, Jo Bob halls off and hits one of the girls on stage in the face. OK…he stage slapped her, so I don’t think he made any contact, and after he was done he marched off the stage with a wicked grin on his face. I’ve never had such a shocking stage moment, and that includes when I shattered a glass during a production of “Tango” and started bleeding profusely onstage. If I had ever doubted his issues with women…well, they were no longer doubts. I KNOW this guy did this to shock the audience (and us), so I pretended to slap myself in the face and ran offstage after him. I furiously whispered, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING? You’re supposed to support us onstage, not bitch slap us!” The rest of the long form was spent either avoiding this guy or enacting revenge, and the cast eventually rallied around me…during one abstract part we literally blew Jo Bob off the stage. When he came onstage during my interpretive poetry reading I endowed him as a stick man who shattered into a thousand pieces. He did pay me back, however, by throwing himself across me during an underwater scene involving a stage block…I managed to support him with my ribs and debated launching him into the audience. I was so mad at this guy, you have no idea… my class was on for about 20 minutes when we eventually imploded and had to throw in a quickie ending.

After the showcase was over, I found Josh in the audience and left. No basking in the glory of a finished show, no drinking a celebratory beer, and definitely no hobnobbing. I didn’t want to risk running into this guy off stage and I was feeling really defeated. Josh and I walked around the city while I reflected on the evening’s events…I was totally let down. While I write this post I want to give props to my former comedy troupe buddy, Jeff, who always did a fine job of making sure the male energy in the group didn’t overwhelm and who, as far as I know, has never started a scene with a man hitting a woman in the face.