With a worldwide energy shortage close on the horizon and people expressing more and more fear about total economic collapse, it’s important to remember that there’s never been a time when the human race more desperately needed joy. And by joy, I mean live improv comedy.
We’ve long known that art has the power to change the world. Remember when a group of street artists took to the Berlin Wall in the 80s to paint murals that conveyed the dangers of political division? This is like that, except it’s six of us assembling into a big line across the stage and pretending to be some sort of locomotive with a zany personality.
This whole oil bottleneck stuff is scary. I’ll say it. But our troupe, GOOD GRIEF, has the power to remind people that there is more to life than energy, resources, democracy, electricity, and global infrastructure. There is also the chance to watch six aging art school grads miming an unhappy school bus. Like, we took an inanimate object like a school bus, but had the idea to personify it and make it totally off its rocker. Think Kramer from Seinfeld, but with big rolling wheels. The original idea and the staging for it might’ve been mine, but that doesn’t mean I don’t value my troupe and each of their contributions, no matter how small.
What folks are craving right now is not a “stable job market” or a “guarantee that they will own a home in 3 years.” They are craving a performance from people who have put blood, sweat, tears, a year of practice, sometimes even 2, plus $650 of their child’s college fund into the Upright Citizens Brigade. Some of us have put up to $800, and these things definitely show up when you take to the stage, not that it matters or anything.
The point is, as artists, we have a responsibility to our communities to continue our crafts, whether people are asking us for it, if they’ve forgotten how to ask for it, or if they are literally on their hands and knees begging us to stop. It’s our unspoken contract with the world. We bring you an hour of joy and imagination, and you bring us $15.50 and your cousin’s friend who’s in town, whom I’ll casually sidle up to at the bar and ask who they think stole the show, if they’re being honest, until they scoot away to the bathroom. How’s that for a crisis of energy?
