On Saturday nights after the current drama or musical is over at Theatre Memphis the lights on the stage do not go off, because there is more to offer. On Thursday nights at Bally’s casino in Tunica there is more to offer than a bunch of money grubbing slot machines.
Vertical Imbalance is the offering. It is an improv comedy troupe made up of twenty and thirty somethings who are dying to be funny.
“I like to laugh and I like to make others laugh,” Greg Childers, director and founder of Vertical Imbalance, said.
Childers started the group after previously working with another comedy troupe in Memphis from 1991-1995. He finds members through auditions and interested comics contact him through the group’s website, www.vertical-imbalance.com.
Childers said it isn’t a requirement for the members to be “looney” but he has found that most “normal” people are boring. Boring is bad for improv troups according to Childers and he has no use for boring people in his shows.
“I saw them at the Memphis Comedy Festival and asked if I could audition,” troupe member Becky Flaum said.
The audition involved playing a game called Interview where the panel asks questions and the person who is being interviewed must make up answers. Another part of the audition was playing games with the other members.
These games are the bulk of what goes on at an improv show. Mostly the audience is asked to think of different jobs, phobias or objects that are then used in games. The game can be something as simple as having one member guess what the person’s phobia is, but the laughs come when the phobia is really odd.
“Like being afraid of the color blue is one that is really original,” Flaum said.
Even though the group has two gigs a week, they didn’t start out so lucky. One place the troupe performed was The Looney Bin, but it closed recently. Childers used his former experience to keep the group together even when they had nowhere to perform.
Although the troupe performs at two places in the Memphis area, the audiences are quite different.
“In Tunica it is really fast paced and we have to keep the jokes coming,” Flaum said. “At Theatre Memphis we can try new things.”
The improv group, however, is not all off the cuff. The members normally have a certain character they tend to do in scenarios.
“My character is this cafeteria lady,” Flaum said.
She combined a friend’s stories which involved a cafeteria worker and receptionist at his school, Adelphi University.
According to Flaum, developing a funny voice is not enough.
“You really have to develop the physicality and know the past about the character,” Flaum said.
Often times, the troupe feeds off of audience response.
“An audience who is original and are engaged in what we are doing really makes it more fun,” Flaum said.
If you feel you can contribute to the troupe, Vertical Imbalance would love to have you in their audience and if you just want to watch — that’s fine too.
