Comedy night: Whose Live Anyway

I was a little nervous going to tonight's live improv show Whose Live Anyway, not because their name didn't make sense to me, but because not all improv is good Fortunately, tonight's show was rolling-in-the-aisles hilarious. It wasn't that they did anything groundbreaking, improv-wise; it was that they handled things in such a funny way.

For example, when they did the "pick an occupation and pretend we're selling a CD of songs about that occupation," the guys didn't just make up lyrics and sing - they sang harmonies. Their voices were ok too and they harmonized really well.

The best parts of an improv show are when the audience is involved. Obviously the audience got to shout out ideas throughout the show but there were a few skits where audience members got up on stage and those were priceless.

The couple who moved the guys around like they were puppets while the guys told the story did a great job. Either they were making up their own story and moving the guys around to that or the guys were able to respond fairly quickly to the way they were moving. The division between the puppet masters and puppets was almost seamless.

The best audience participation were the two young ladies who were supposed to provide sound effects for the story that the guys were telling. It wasn't funny because the ladies were good - quite the contrary. They were terrible in a hilarious way. At one point the guy said that he wanted to say something through a bullhorn and is sound-effect lady said, "I don't know what a bullhorn is" which was sad but also hilarious. Then when the other guy said that he thought he saw a whale, his sound-effect lady said "beluuuuga". I lost it then because of course beluga whales don't say beluga themselves. Oh, it was funny.

These improv guys are very, very good and they know how to engage the crowd. If you have a chance to see them, take it. Hopefully you'll have a great crowd, too, and have the same kind of belly-laughs that I experienced.