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OBERLIN COMEDY IMPROV GROUP HOSTS APRIL 20-22 CONFERENCE FOR JUNIOR HIGH, HIGH SCHOOL, AND COLLEGE STUDENTS
April 12, 2001--Northeast Ohio high school, junior high and college students are invited to attend a Comedy Improv Conference to be held Friday through Sunday, April 20-22 by The Improv Coalition, a group of Oberlin comedy-improv community members.
April 17 is the deadline to register for the conference, which will begin at 1 p.m. April 20. The workshops will be held at various sites in Oberlin, including the College's campus and at MAD* Factory, an area children's theater arts organization that offers teen classes in comedy improvisation; more details upon registration.
Teaching the professional workshop for the junior high and high school students will be members of the Chicago-based ¡Salsation!-- "the world’s first and only Latino improvisational and sketch comedy ensemble."
Other workshops for the junior high and high school students will be taught by members of Oberlin College's student improv group and MAD* Factory instructor Cameron Michalak, a senior at Firelands High School.
"Several OC students have taught improv at the MAD Factory and are working with the teens there because of their strong interest," says Conference Coordinator Sarah Bendix, an Oberlin College senior from Winnetka, Illinois.
"The primary focus of the conference is reaching out to high school and junior high students in Lorain and surrounding counties," says Bendix. "The other workshops are geared toward college students, although adults are welcome to attend."
"We are trying to build coalitions and/or create dialogues with various communities," says Bendix. "Our goal in planning this conference was to appeal to as wide an audience as possible and to try to bring people together that otherwise would not do so."
Among the other professional workshop presenters will be the visiting improvisation group Oui Be Negroes and improv expert Jeff Wirth, author of Acting, Improvisation and Interacting for Audience Participatory Theater.
An all-access conference pass will be $30 for those with Oberlin College identification and $35 for others. Fees for individual workshops, including ones for junior high and high school, plus professional performances, range in price from $5 to $10. Improv Til Dawn, an informal late-night improv session; and panel discussions are free.
Registration packets with complete schedules of workshop times and locations will be available at 9 a.m. Friday, April 20 in the lobby of Oberlin's Wilder Hall, 140 E. Lorain St. For more information and to register, contact Sarah Bendix directly or access her web site.
Workshops for professionals, amateurs and alumni will cover such improv related topics as character and technique development, movie analysis, improv comedy ( basics and advanced), acting, filmmaking, working with masks, improv movement. They will also include a session on contact improvisation, a crash course in site-specific improv and "Improvisation as Instant Compositions" or "Hey, man, have you heard Copenhagen '98."
"Insult Game," a film that was created and performed improvisationally, will be screened during the conference, and two panel discussions will be held focusing on disgusting, degrading, and offensive humor in improv and in life and on underrepresented groups in improv.
¡Salsation! is a diverse seven-member ensemble based in Chicago, which performs 99% in English. The performers--Latino actors from Chicago's improv comedy community--are natives of Chicago and Texas with roots in Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Colombia.
They have studied at Chicago’s premier comedic institutions: The Second City, ImprovOlympic, and The Annoyance Theater and have appeared in films, on television, in television commercials, with The Second City National Touring Company and outreach programs, and at the Latino Laff Festival. They have also appeared at ImprovOlympic under the direction of the late improv legend Del Close.
Media Contact: Betty Gabrielli
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