Drew and his crew
The cast of Drew Carey’s “Whose Line Is It Anyway” – and now his new show, “Green Screen” – have shown America how much fun improv comedy can be on TV.
Now they’ll show how much fun improv comedy can be on stage.
Drew Carey and the Improv All-Stars – including Greg Proops, Colin Mochrie, Chip Esten, Brad Sherwood, Jeff Davis and Sean Masterson – are coming to Pullman’s Beasley Performing Arts Coliseum on Saturday as part of Washington State University’s Dad’s Weekend.
Carey is the household name of the group, but the others have become improv cult figures over the last five years.
“And I’m tired of the dead weight of dragging the group behind me, I’ll tell you that,” said Proops, by phone from L.A. “When you’re as gorgeous as I am, my God, what a burden.”
He’s joking.
The reason he likes improv, in fact, is because it involves so little in the way of cutthroat competition.
“The only competition is the healthy competition of trying to hit the ball harder, pushing each other to do funnier things,” said Proops, who was also on the original British version of “Whose Line.”
“As far as competing with each other onstage, I have no interest in it and I don’t think anyone else does either.”
The Pullman show will be similar to the one that Proops and the other cast members did at the Spokane Opera House a little more than a year ago. If you have ever seen “Whose Line,” you have a pretty good idea what to expect, although the live show has more freedom to develop comic ideas.
“Improv is made to be live, really,” said Proops. “The live version will be a little more immediate and we involve the audience a lot more. We have people come out of the crowd and volunteer for various things. If you’ve seen the live show before, I think you’ll agree it’s a tremendous amount of fun to watch.”
The main difference this time around will be the presence of Carey himself. He was not in last year’s Spokane show.
Carey will open the show with a brief stand-up routine, and then dive in with the rest of the cast.
“Drew is one of the boys,” said Proops. “He sits in with us and improvises with us in all of the scenes. We’ll force him to.”
Improv is a daunting art form, forcing performers to do exactly what goes against their instincts – to walk out in front of an audience with no clue about what will happen next.
When did Proops realize he had a gift for it?
“Well, I was born in the bulrushes,” he said, deadpan.
Actually, he’s from the Bay Area (which probably does have some bulrushes) and was a student and budding stand-up comic at San Francisco State University. When he was 19, he went and watched the college’s improv group.
“I thought, ‘I can do that,’ ” he said. “The next week, I went and volunteered, and they asked me to join the group right after that.”
In the late ‘80s, the producers of the original British “Whose Line” came to San Francisco for auditions, and Proops got the job. He spent five years in England before coming back to the U.S. for the American version of the show.
Now he’s on “Drew Carey’s Green Screen Show” (Thursdays at 8:30 p.m. on KSKN-22 in Spokane), in which performers do improv sketches in front of a blank screen. Later, animators fill in backgrounds.
“So, if I said we’re on a pirate ship, all of the sudden, you’d have a hat on and a parrot on your shoulder and a wooden leg and hook,” said Proops. “All of that gets drawn in. They fill in the whole world.”
At the Pullman show, audiences will just have to use their imaginations. However, four video screens will allow the audience to see the performers up close.
The show will be performed in-the-round. Show time is 9 p.m. to accommodate the late football kickoff time.
Drew Carey’s Improv All-Stars