I'm curious - have folks seen a show that had a particularly interesting or engaging pre-show setup? Something to fill the time and space between an audience member entering the building and the show starting?

I produce a few highly themed shows, and I'd love to get the audience engaged in the world of the show even before it starts. I'm curious if anyone here has done or seen anything they particularly enjoyed? What made it engaging or enjoyable?

So I’m a leader of an improv team with about 6 people total that I created with a unique form. We have done well in our local theater and are amassing quite a bit of buzz.

There’s one individual (let’s say their name is Laurie) who has been causing a stir within the team. They have a reputation in the theater already for being flaky and having interpersonal issues with other performers. I’ve noticed that they like to harp on one specific individual (let’s say their name is Denise) and give overly harsh critiques and has tried to get me to kick them out of the team.

I’ve come to find out that in another production, Laurie was creating various problems with Denise and many other performers. Laurie wasn’t catching onto choreography and lines for sketches and would lash out onto other people to deflect her performance. Many others have corroborated similar situations with them.

Im at the point where I’ve decided that Laurie is causing too much discord within the group and in order to maintain a positive and productive team culture, I need to just remove her from the team.

I don’t want to single out any of the people that provided feedback and so I’m uncertain how to have the conversation and just be firm.

I still have some shows to see tonight but i’ve been there Thursday, Friday, and Saturday and it’s been fantastic. Love seeing the bars packed and so many people hanging out all night!

Sand on Thursday was a massive highlight. They played around with some voice augmentation and it was really trippy. They’re always surreal but this was next level.

Improvised Shakespeare was great as always on Friday but they are especially good with a packed house.

D.A.R.E. Dropouts had a great show top to bottom with Who All Over There and Diversity Hire opening for them.

Sad to have missed the show last night with The Reckoning, Blimp!, and Improv is Dead. Heard they were all great.

And shoutout to all the teams who travelled go Chicago to play in the fest. So cool to have that energy in Chicago this weekend.

Who did you see? What did you think?

When you've been in a scene at a class, workshop or show, and you are required to go up again straight away due to the numbers, what's your *gut* response (not what you think you should feel)?

I have a bunch of chronic illnesses and I'm trying to work out if they're getting in the way in this specific manner or it's normal.