It still might be blazing hot outside, but at Big Blue Door we’re already looking forward to the cool autumnal days ahead and an amazing lineup of fall classes and performance runs. It’s our biggest slate ever! Everything is still subject to last minute changes but we couldn’t help letting you know what we’re planning. We expect to offer Improv I, Improv II, Improv 4, Middle School Improv I, Middle School Improv II, our first ever Improv 5, and a reprise of our summer pro team with an exciting new task!
Well be returning to Vinegar Hill Theater and Studio 20 in McGuffey Art Center, and our improvisers are invited to perform at the Magnet Theater in New York City!
Plus much, much more!
Let’s start with our first ever Improv 5: Show Making! This is a course for experienced improvisers who have performed with multiple Improv 4 teams and want to dig in and explore a particular type of show–not just a form–but how a form relates to an audience, how the performers work with one another, and how to create vulnerability and suspense in a live performance.
For our first-ever Improv 5 we want to explore the Nambrod! Pioneered by Big Blue Door veterans Nauder Namaky and Brian Weisbrod in 2015 and used in our Administration sets ever since, this form creates an improvised radio or podcast that becomes a source scene for exploring points of view, emotions, usual language, and details. It can work well for short or longer sets and groups of different sizes.
Improv 5: The Nambrod will meet on Sunday evenings. It will anchor our First Friday shows, perform at Vinegar Hill, and perform at the Magnet Theater in New York City on October 10th.
(If you can’t make the NYC show, don’t sweat it; you can still take this course!)
Wait! Did we say New York City?
Yes, we did! The Magnet Theater is the wonderful off-off Broadway theater in Manhattan! It’s where co-founders Jen and Joel took classes, where Joel performed, and where we took a lot of our educational model (with permission). We brought our first house team up there in 2014 and had a great time! So on October 10th we’re going back!
This time Big Blue Door has been invited to present a one-hour block early on Friday evening to share unusual sets, forms, and programs that aren’t like what they usually present in big-city improv!
We’ll be bringing our fall Improv 4, Improv 5, and Middle School trio!
We hope to make this a regular trip with early shows for three groups in the fall and late night shows for two groups with longer sets each spring.
The core of our performance program is our beloved Improv 4, and this fall we want to take a break from Harolds and similar structured forms to explore performing in a large venue with lots of audience energy and interplay. After all we have a large venue; let’s use it!
This fall we present Dear Diary!
Dear Diary asks the Charlottesville community to bring old diaries, old love letters, journals, and other slices of hilarious and embarrassing revelation! Audience members can read passages or ask our performers to read to preserve their anonymity. Improvisers will initiate scenes in an open-ended format that will focus on engaging with the public, deconstructing their experiences, and following patterns!
This is a big banger of a form for as many as a dozen improvisers. We’ll meet on Tuesday nights. This team will anchor the September and October Vinegar Hill shows, perform a short set in one First Friday show, and perform at the Magnet Theater in New York City on October 10th.
(If you can’t make the NYC show, don’t sweat it; you can still take this course!)
Of course no Big Blue Door season would be complete without Improv I: Character & Scene, our amazing introduction to longform improv comedy! We’ve got an Improv I starting Sunday afternoons in September! If you haven’t taken Improv I, this is your chance! We believe this is one of the best courses you’ll ever take. Hey, it’s not bragging if it’s true!
After scheduling problems in the spring and summer this is our long-promised Improv 2: Cuts & Callbacks, our in-depth expansion of scenes and scenework for graduates of Improv 1. Who says sequels can’t be great? Block out your calendars on Sundays starting in September for Improv 2!
Graduates of previous Middle School Improv classes will be part of the lineup at Magnet in NYC, so it’s only fair to give some new kids a chance to join.
Middle School Improv I is real live improv training for 6th, 7th, & 8th graders! It’s Saturday afternoons and it culminates in a completely improvised shows! We’re hoping to have MSI 2 in the winter and create new, larger middle-school teams.
Whether your Middle-Schooler is interested in performance, comedy, theater, or just getting by in this imperfect world, Big Blue Door feels that improv helps us have fun and keeps us sane, and who needs to have fun and stay sane more than kids in Middle School?!
We might have saved the most exciting news till last! We’ve invited the cast who anchored our amazing hit show How to Get Away with Improv and the crew who put together our winter hit show, The Last Improv Show on Earth to develop a new comedy show for Charlottesville!
It’s so new it isn’t even named yet, but we’re sure it’s about time Charlottesville had a monthly professional comedy show, featuring great local improv comedy, but also open to stand-up, music, and guests from afar!
We’ll still see these funny folks contributing sets to September and October shows, but on November 1st at Vinegar Hill mark your calendars because they’ll be unleashing something new!
We’ll be posting classes online for sign up over the next two weeks so why not add your email address to the slot on the upper right of our website to get updates every time we post a class or show?!
Oh, and speaking of shows, check out the last performance of our summer run at Belmont Arts Collaborative!
Questions? Concerns? Email info@bigbluedoor.org!
Remember, this is all for YOU! So join us!
Big Blue Door 