Paramount Theater, Seattle
June 1, 2002
Alright, actual show info now…..
Greg (sporting a hairdo that looked like either he’d just woken up, or spent too much time out on the upper deck of the Clipper) opened the show with a bit of a modified stand-up routine – saying he was in town for the “Moisture Festival and the Mildew Olympics”, and moving on to his “Hollywood isn’t a city, it’s an idea held simultaneously by a million assholes (some of whom we’ve brought here tonight)”. He talked about the Osbournes - “it’s like the Addams Family, but they’ve got 2 Pugsleys”, and about “W”, of course – “He thinks fellatio is the Italian ambassador!”. He also did a bit about the movie Memento – “Have you seen the movie Memento? It's about a guy who can’t remember anything for more than 10 minutes. Now, I smoke a lot of dope. So now you know what my life is like every fucking day." He went on and explained a bit more about the movie, and then came back and repeated the first part about "Have you seen that movie Memento? It's about a guy who can’t remember anything……….”. Very funny :o)
Then, with the style and use of the English language that only Greg can pull off, he introduced the performers…..Julie Larson, Sean Masterson, Jeff Davis (sporting a new haircut, and who apparently admired Greg’s as well, running his hand over Greg’s head as he passed), Chip, Brad, Colin, Kathy, Ryan, and “the boy who won the radio contest this morning to be up on stage tonight”….Drew Carey.
Questions Only – In an airplane bathroom
They started with Jeff standing right behind Brad, who asked if Jeff would “hold this” for him and then “shake it” as well. Jeff complied with Brad’s requests, but wondered why it was so small. Jeff was thrown out, then Sean and Julie rotated in before Brad was knocked out with Greg on something that “was actually a question, but I’ll leave anyway”. Chip came out with Colin and asked “Why did I marry you” and Colin was knocked out with Kathy, while trying his best to make “screw you?” into a question. The game ended with Ryan asking Drew if he wanted to know why they called it a cockpit.
New Choice - At the Racoon Hut
Brad introduced the game and called the changes for Drew (the customer) and Ryan (the owner) at the Racoon Hut. At one point Brad had Ryan moving through what was in all the cages – “We’re out”, “That one’s dead”, “That’s one of the Olsen twins”. Drew wanted to know if it was “Mary Kate or…or…..the other one”. Ryan, feigning dismay, said “and you work for ABC?”, to which Drew replied “I don’t care what their names are, I just want to fuck them.”. I agreed with Colin’s response to that one – bury your face in your hands and shake your head. They moved on to Ryan referring to his wedding ring as shackles, that his wife keeps his penis in a jar on a shelf and a whole host of other penis related references that we don’t need to go into. The game ended when Brad kept making Drew try to come up with examples to match all the ones Ryan had given. He did come up with a few but eventually got stuck, although I think at that point Brad was laughing too hard to call “new choice” anymore anyway.
Moving People
Sean and Kathy celebrating Cheese Day. And that’s basically all I have to say about this game. As usual, volunteers who really didn’t listen to the performers and just flailed arms around aimlessly.
Freeze
They started with Julie in a back-catcher position, and Jeff’s attempt at Chinese splits. Nobody seemed to know what exactly Chinese splits looked like. Jeff offered that if the audience member who suggested it would demonstrate, he’d gladly do it, but nobody volunteered. That, coupled with the fact that Jeff’s jeans were just a tad too tight for doing splits of any variety (not complaining, just pointing it out *g*), meant that he settled on standing with his legs apart and holding a bowl of chow mein. Ryan came in first, taking Julie’s spot, and saying “You’re out of the box, Ichiro”. Drew came in for Ryan and did something I can’t remember, then Brad came in (before Drew had a chance to get up from the squatting position) and said “Yes Drew, now that you’re older your balls do touch the floor”.
Kathy and Julie came out to see “who could clog the best” and began dancing (not funny, but pertinent in a minute). Greg at one point somehow managed to end up on his knees, right in front of Jeff, and Drew came in to announce “5 minutes Mr. President”. Chip and Brad did a return to the “Let’s see who can clog the best”, but of course, Brad didn’t mean the dancing style that Kathy had done. Then Drew came out and used Chip in his “clogging” position as a chair and said that he shouldn’t have booked his flight on cheaptickets.com. Julie came out and sat on Brad and said her reflection (Drew) just wasn’t the same anymore. Then Jeff came out and took Kathy’s place in Brad’s lap and said "I told you not to let the gay people in", which for some reason prompted Chip to yell "Shut Up!" at Jeff as Jeff was tagged out (don’t think I want to know about that one folks, lol).
I can’t remember who the other performer was, but they had their hands in a position that made Brad wonder what exactly it was that they were doing to his giraffe. Colin came in and went on for quite a while doing his evil Bond villain impression (would an “evil villain” be redundant?). They ended with Greg arriving to have a showdown with the “Canadian Kid” – complete with Western movie music supplied in the background by Chip (although it came out sounding more like a loon’s call. Lol).
Greatest Hits - Songs of the Neurosurgeon
Ryan and Greg presented, and Chip, Brad and Jeff sang the songs. No matter how many times I see the three of them together, they still blow me away. They harmonize so well together. Jeff can (and frequently does) get very dirty with his lyrics *g*, and Chip has an amazing voice that we just never get to see on WL. Wayne who???
I don’t remember the banter, other than Ryan saying that during the Roman Empire they would have been selling songs of the “Nero-surgeon”. Ryan introduced the first song, a reggae ballad (is there such a thing?) called “Where are my forceps”. Mindy wasn’t too pleased with that title, pointing out (quite correctly I’m sure, since it was her suggestion) that neurosurgeons don’t use forceps. It made for some good lyrics from Chip though, something about using the “one-ceps, two-ceps, and three-ceps” before he got to the forceps.
Next came the grunge song from Greg called “I hate my brain”, and evidence that not only is Chip accident-prone when it comes to Ryan, but also when it comes to himself (more on that in a moment). Brad started off by doing a pretty much bang-on impression of Kurt Kobain. If Nirvana ever wants to reunite, they’d have a good replacement for him. Jeff followed him and ended up laying on the stage with his head hanging off the edge. Chip then decided to scare everyone by taking a running start from the piano, leaping over Jeff, sailing off the stage and landing in the orchestra pit with a rather loud thump. It took a few minutes before he got up, but he didn’t appear any worse for the wear. After the show though he did say that about half way through the air he got a little bit worried that he had overshot the pit and was headed for the front row. The last song they did was a doowop hit called “It’s grey, but what does that matter?”.
Sentences - The Days of Death
Colin and Julie played. The funniest part of this game didn’t even come from one of the players involved or one of the sentences. In fact the only sentence I remember is Julie’s “I’ve seen banana slugs bigger than that”. No, the best part was provided by a perfectly timed, off-stage, accidental sound effect. I can’t even remember what Colin and Julie were talking about, but at one point Colin very dramatically threw his arm in the air, and just as he stopped there was a loud bang from somewhere off stage. Colin and Julie carried on, but in the background the other performers were all killing themselves laughing. I think Ryan’s face turned about 3 shades of red from laughing so hard. Turns out, as Jeff so kindly explained to the audience during the set up for the next game, Greg had been off using the bathroom and hadn’t turned off his microphone. Oops! Lol.
Styles
I don’t think Jeff ever actually gave this game a name, but Styles works well enough for me. It’s like a modified Film, TV and Theater styles – instead of getting all the suggestions before starting the game, Jeff just yelled freeze periodically during the scene and got the suggestion from the audience at that point. The scene was an earthquake and Kathy and Colin played. They did the movie “style” of Crimson Tide (yep, apparently that’s a style now and not a specific movie), and a musical (during which Brad got up and did a chorus line- by himself - across the stage behind Colin and Kathy. I’m pretty sure he was expecting Ryan to follow him though, since he gave him the finger on his way back to the stools and Ryan was just laughing at him *g*). The best one though was the Kung Fu – Kung Fu as only Colin Mochrie can (and would) do it. Leaping and bouding across the stage, contorting his body into odd martial-arts-like poses. Lol.
Sound Effects
Played by Sean and Greg, as skydivers – featuring a man from the audience who felt it necessary to give his wallet to his wife before coming up on stage (Ryan had a bit of a field day with that gesture) and, yep you heard right, our very own Quink on the microphone. Despite what I’m sure she’ll tell you, Quink was not horrible. Aside from continually trying to back herself into the curtain and having to be gently pushed back on stage by Brad, I thought she did very well. And judging from the proud look on Chip’s face throughout the entire game, he agreed. After all, what else is there to do for Greg’s new nickname of “Tony the Pony” but whinny like a horse? In fact, there were several good sounds courtesy of Quink – good enough that Greg would repeat his action and try to get her to make the sound again, but alas, it was not to be. As Greg said, “I guess it only works once.” :o)
Jeopardy
Hosted by Brad as “Alex Trebek, the most annoying Canadian after Celine Dion” (no argument here on that one). Kathy was first in line as Marge from Olympia who worked at a fish hatchery but was also a topless dancer by night to supplement her income. Drew was Earl, who was a big loser all through school but was now in airport security so “screw ‘em all”. Ryan was Bill Gates, which prompted a lot of computer jokes, the only one of which I can remember is Brad asking whether Ryan was “hard or microsoft” to which Ryan replied that he had a lot of RAM *g*. Chip was Antony (speaking with a Bronx accent), the Treasurer of the Soprano’s fan club and an out of work hitman.
The first category was “Desserts” and the answer chosen was “Yogurt”. From Chip: “How do I call my friend Gert?”. And from Ryan: “What has more culture than Tacoma?”. Drew buzzed in to give an answer but then blanked and said “oh fuck me up the ass”, to which Ryan (ever the smartass) buzzed in and replied “What is fuck me up the ass.” Next came “Everett” and the question from Chip of “What’s the name of that big fuckin’ mountain?” and then “Thong”, which surprisingly enough didn’t bring out Ryan’s tried and true “what do two of not make a right” but instead the answer came from Drew of what he liked to fondle in peoples’ luggage at the airport. “Moped” (the quasi-motorcycle-type automobile) was next and Chip buzzed in with “How do English people pronounce moped” (“moped” as in moping, being depressed). Under the category of past presidents we got “Roosevelt”, which seemed to stump everyone for a bit. Ryan eventually buzzed in, but I think it was just to relieve the silence since all he came up with was “Who is Roosevelt?”. Cities in China gave us “Oolon Bator” (don’t ask if I spelled that right, I don’t know) which Kathy claimed as her dancer name.
The category for final jeopardy was “Southern States”, which brought up some interesting geography points, to say the least. Kathy was first and got “Alabama”, where “it’s legal to marry your cousin”. Hmm...any comment on that Mindy? (Yes, my comment is.... We may be racist rednecks but we don't marry our cousins..... That's Tennessee.). Drew got “Florida”, however my notes for his answer only say “Flori-duh” – so make of that what you will. Ryan’s state was “Arizona”. He bet four trillion dollars and came up with “Who is Air Jordan’s illegitimate cousin?”, which didn’t go over well but he didn’t care because he “owns the world”. And last but not least, the infamous state of “Puerto Rico” for Chip. Well, I guess if Africa can be a country, then Puerto Rico can be a state, Lol. Chip bet the wallet that he “stole from that guy’s wife” (a throwback to the earlier SFX game) and came up with “What did we say when Derico got hit?”.
Scene from a Play - At a bowling alley
Once again, can’t remember if that was the actual title they used for the game, but it works well enough. Colin, Drew and Julie played a scene set in a bowling alley, but Colin was only allowed to read lines from a play he was given, while the other two could say whatever they chose to. Drew was attempting to rent a ball and some shoes from Colin, while Julie just wanted Colin to come home. Colin, however, had other things on his mind, as the lines of his play kept creating situations for him to be leaving the scene….”bye now”…….“I’m off to see Chuck”…… “Ta Ta”. It was quite funny watching Drew and Julie continually having to find ways to stop Colin before he got to the stage curtain and bring him back to center stage, especially since the very next time he spoke he’d be trying to leave again. Lol
Song Styles - An Opera, to Maggie
You know, there are times when you should just leave the audience members that really don’t look like they want to be volunteers alone. This would be one of those times. I felt so bad for the girl that they picked out for this one. She looked to be about 16 and like she absolutely did *not* want to be on stage. Her name was Maggie, and after trying to get any kind of information out of her that Chip and Jeff could use as song material, all that they ended up with was that she liked to watch sitcoms. I’m sure Chip and Jeff’s song was wonderful (I’ve seen them do opera before and they were great), but I honestly can’t remember any of it.
Mousetraps
Greg did the intro for this game while the others set up the traps and provided us with yet another inadvertent Gregism – apparently mousetraps is the most “territizing” improv game ever invented. Territizing you say? Yep. Even Chip claimed that he was “territized”. Lol. Sean and Brad played and were cleaning house. However, as usual, after the opening line by one player (in this case Brad telling Sean to “come over here and get the broom”) the actual scene really doesn’t matter. It’s all about watching the non-players laughing at the performers and trying to strategically place traps behind unsuspecting feet. That, and how creative they can get with ways to get out of stepping on traps. Sean jumping on Brad piggy-back style seemed to work well.
Conducted Story
The story of Dinglehopper, who lives in Yelm, and is a reconstructive dentist. I could tell right off the bat that Drew thought he had something good – he was bouncing up and down, practically begging Ryan to start with him. So, Ryan points, and Drew starts in on something about Dennis Hopper. Now, I believe Drew was actually going to go somewhere with his Dennis story – I mean, I think he said Dennis on purpose, not because he’d forgotten that it was supposed to be Dingle - but I’m not the one running the show, Ryan is, and he cut Drew off and pointed to Jeff, who quickly pointed out that Dennis was Dinglehopper’s brother. The name itself set up almost a test of wits between the players to see who could keep coming up with rhyming words for “hopper”. Brad brought in Doodlehopper, the coppers, and the fact that Dinglehopper was a pill popper. Tony the horse made a reappearance, and I believe it was his teeth that were being reconstructed when we went back over to Brad who brought up the Big Bopper. Off to Jeff, who had everybody ordering Whoppers, while Chip felt they should be playing the “Mammers and the Poppers”. Sean brought up the fact that Tony’s father was a “fopper”, which I don’t think won Ryan’s approval because Sean’s next line (directed at Ryan) was “Hey, I’m trying asshole!”. And then, despite all the hoppers, whoppers and boppers, the funniest moment of the game: Ryan shifted away from Chip just as he was in the middle of saying “proctologist”. All Chip got out was the “proc” before Ryan pointed at Jeff, who apparently wasn’t paying attention or needs a hearing aid, because his ending for the word was “per”. So, Ryan pointed back at Chip, who repeated “proc” in Jeff’s direction. Back to Jeff, who ended it again with “per”. Back to Chip…”proc”…..back to Jeff…..”per”….back to Chip……”proc”……back to Jeff….”per”….back to Chip….”proc”……to *Colin*…..”tologist”!! Ryan rotated through a few more players before going back to Jeff. Jeff was on the ball this time though, and with a big grin on his face proudly announced “tologist!”. Lol.
