I've been working rather intensely with staff at the Royal Children's Hospital recently, helping them practise for extreme Code Grey emergency scenarios. This is very rewarding acting work which challenges me to play various characters in heightened states in a live hospital ward set-up. This was today's character.
Melbourne International Comedy Festival
This is my 5th year in a row of performing in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival! YAY! This year, I'm doing Cliffhanger with my impro comedy group, The Big Hoo-Haa Melbourne. And for my first show of the Festival, I won Cliffhanger with my improvised Children's Musical "Stick Town." Who knew sticks could prove such a vote-worthy storyline with a comedy audience?! Here's me holding the winner's trophy, which is almost bigger than my ego! Come check us out every Tues, Thurs & Sat of the Festival, 10pm-11pm at The Butterfly Club. Book here.
Me with fellow improvisers, Rik Brown and Luke Ryan.
Workshop with David Razowsky
Last week, I had the pleasure of working with improv legend, David Razowsky who is currently out from L.A to both teach and perform. David is the former Artistic Director of The Second City, trained with Del Close at Improv Olympic, and has a strong interest in connecting improvisers to their work through the Viewpoints technique. It was great to be reminded yet again that everything I need as an improviser is right there in front of me at all moments!
Improv teacher and director, David Razowsky. (Image via Monterey County Weekly)
Melbourne International Comedy Festival 2015
I'm gearing up to perform in my 4th Melbourne International Comedy Festival show. This time, it's Hoo-Haa Gladiators, an improvised comedy battle-off, complete with lycra, bad puns and 90s TV cheese! We're on every Friday, Saturday & Sunday night of the Festival from 6-7pm at The Imperial Hotel. It's gonna be fist-pumping good!
Welcoming 2015 with Workshops
I love to kick off any new year with workshops that will inspire me for the year ahead. I've been lucky enough to do an Improvisation Masterclass with Patti Stiles - a globally respected teacher of improvisation, as well as her more experimental Gender/Genre class and her Scenes That Matter class. I've also gone back to my old stomping ground Meisner Melbourne and been working with Clare Dea. And if all that isn't enough, I'm also in the thick of a 5-week ActionTheater course with Dani Cresp, looking at Physical Improvisation. It feels like a wonderfully creative start to 2015!
#TrueRomansAll - my next project
Here is a thing what I find myself in...
It's a special collaboration between Bell Shakespeare and Pop Up Playground and is based on Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. #TrueRomansAll will pull together site-specific performance, improvisation and Shakespeare, all under the umbrella of 'Choose-Your-Own-Adventure.' I will be performing the role of Calpurnia - Caesar's wife - and cannot wait to hit the rehearsal room.
Improvised Singing
I had a fantastic weekend participating in a very fun workshop run by Impromptunes, whereby I learnt some tricks and traps of improvising songs. Generally, when I do impro, I love the chance to improvise a song, but I'd never properly learnt about song structure, so it was great approaching it from a more concrete foundation. I also discovered that I can get away with rhyming "Swamp" with "Forest Gump" (when sung in a Forest Gump-like accent!)
Melbourne International Comedy Festival
I have survived my third Comedy Festival! Back on the belly-laugh bandwagon with my wickedly funny impro group The Big Hoo-Haa Melbourne, we managed to sell out our Hoo Haa Danger Hour season at The Butterfly Club. As well as this, I also guest performed twice in We, The Jury, a fully improvised, high tension, criminal investigation comedy. Recovery is now in order.
Getting attacked whilst singing in Hoo Haa Danger Hour at The Butterfly Club! (Image: Open Cage Photography)