Comedy Corner
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Comedy Corner is a sketch and improv comedy group at the University of Arizona. Started in 1979 by Adam Goldstein, it claims to be the nation's oldest weekly college sketch and improv comedy group, though in recent years it has branched out into doing previously videotaped comedy bits and shorts as well. Comedy Corner was the first documented college sketch comedy troupe to incorporate improvisation into its weekly shows, a practice that has become more common in recent years.
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[edit] History
In the fall of 1979 at the University of Arizona, magic happened. A student by the name of Adam P. Goldstein, a public management freshman, created “Closet Comics.” This group was a weekly comedy show that occurred every Friday at noon in the Cellar restaurant. When dubbed in the Daly Wildcat, the show was called “The Comedy Corner” and later just became Comedy Corner. The show was a venue that served for stand-up comics to do material and also feature other acts such as punk banjo, juggling, and some sketch work. Comedy Corner then had a very low attendance, but it soon picked up over time in its first semester in ’79. Comedy Corner was essentially a weekly talent show. Acts would have to audition on Wednesdays. They would be critiqued and perform on Friday. Sometimes if the act needed work, it was scrapped for the next week's show. The first three-man ensemble to perform skits were called the “Grubby Theatre Company.” Consisting of filmmaker Timothy Gassen, screenwriter Marlowe Weisman, and musician Chad White (and other rotating members), The Grubby Theatre Company performed many original sketches and songs, and released a book collection of their material in 1981. One of their most memorable acts was trying to jump over the audience with a motorcycle; they went to as far as actually bring a motorcycle into the theater! They also did many memorial skits, in addition to the first “roast” (which was of Adam Goldstein). As Goldstein left, he summed up his Comedy Corner adventure by saying in an interview “don’t serve the dessert before the chili” (Comedy Corner, A 10 ½ Reunion, UAB) No one understood this quote but it had some meaning with regards to Comedy Corner. Also as a last act before graduation, Adam had Garry Shandling came and hosted a show.
In 1983, when Adam and the troupe of people who accumulated through his four years in Comedy Corner graduated, Comedy Corner fell apart. It left behind just two guys who weren’t graduating. The result was Comedy Corner turning into a show consisting of boring two-man skits. In order to save Comedy Corner (CC), the guys decided to have the skits and a 15 minute open mic at every show. This failed. After the first fall semester with out Adam, the existing members of Comedy Corner decided to organize a group of people in order to keep the group alive. They put a newspaper article in the Wildcat advertising that Comedy Corner needed more people to become “regulars”. Six people showed up, and two guys named Bill Bernat and Paul Smitherman said they would perform only if they could wear lab coats.
Comedy Corner was then revamped, resembling what it is today. Sketches were in and skits were out. Skits were scenes made by people, while sketches had stories to them. Sketches were drafted over the weekends and then performed on Mondays. Then, on Wednesdays, they were polished up and assigned props and costumes. On Fridays, those sketches were performed. From here it was decided that a theme should be assigned to each week so that when writing a sketch, it could be easier to write it. Examples of such themes are: Safety Week, Fish Week, and Vaudeville is Dead Week. By the end of the spring semester of 1982, CC became a very popular show which many people set out to see on a weekly basis.
As time went on, Comedy Corner went from an open organization to a closed group. People in the group were members, and everyone had to audition to get in. Sketches that were written were TV parodies and commercial re-enactments. Comedy Corner began to have a relationship with its audiences, establishing itself as the best troupe in the desert. Comedy Corner had the school's radio show advertise for it. The show was conducted by members of the group. Later on, the radio show was canceled because someone on air made a joke involving rape.
Later on down the line, in 1985, Comedy Corner got its first and last sponsorship from a major company “Miller Light Beer.” Comedy Corner received a budget of 1,500 dollars from them. All of the money was spent on props for the troupe so they could be used in sketches. The sponsorship only lasted a year. Meanwhile, Comedy Corner was still supported by the Activities Board, support which has lasted from CC's beginning to this very day. In the spring of '87, weekly theme shows were terminated and the shows were then changed. Now, there was a headline read at the beginning of each show, following which were improv and sketch performances. From 1987 until now, not much has changed with the troupe. Traditions and the way things work have been kept in production since.
Comedy Corner was the only comedy group on the University of Arizona campus until October of 1997, when the improv comedy group the Charles Darwin Experience had its first show and a subsequent rise in popularity. Charles Darwin was founded by a former Comedy Corner member, in which the group was strictly just improv. The group is still around today and is composed of mainly theater majors, and is almost completely different than Comedy Corner. Not one troupe is better, they are both just different in their own ways of doing comedy. But what followed Charles Darwin was a surge in comedy group founding at the university, starting with the sketch/improv group Ambidextrous Armada in 1999 (defunct), the sketch comedy group Mechanically Separated Chicken in 2001 (defunct), the improv group New Kevin, which were mostly all just Comedy Corner alumni, (defunct) and in 2002, and improv group The Street-Prov Theatre Collective (active) which was also founded by former Comedy Corner members in 2005, and they still preform in various places in Tucson.
"Farce Side Comedy Hour"(active), a sketch comedy troupe at Arizona State University, was born from Comedy Corner member Mike Sterner, who transferred schools. His brainchild was initially also called "Comedy Corner," although it was based on the ASU campus. As a result, the UofA's Comedy Corner can be credited as the foundation from which every college sketch comedy troupe in Arizona is derived.
Despite the surge in the number of comedy groups, Comedy Corner remains as the de-facto sketch group on campus, with many new students coming into the group every school year through an audition process. Prospective members can audition as writers, performers, or both.
[edit] Positions
Comedy Corner is part of the University Activities Board, which is responsible for scheduling and funding all events at the University of Arizona. Each year Comedy Corner's membership votes on leadership positions for the following school year. The group traditionally designates one member as a producer and another member as a director.
The producer, who must be approved by the University Activities Board prior to his/her enactment as Comedy Corner's official producer, acts as a delegate to the University Activities Board. The producer handles all budgeting, finance, and organizational responsibilities. It is also the producer's responsibility, along with the director, to organize some of the aspects of the annual S.I.C.K. Festival, which takes place in the Spring semester. The producer also has a desk in the UAB office. At the desk, posters and some sketches are made up by members in the group.
Comedy Corner's director is responsible for the "artistic" element of the group's weekly shows. This involves leading discussions, writer's meetings, and rehearsals, creating a weekly show order, and introducing the weekly shows, or making arrangements for some sort of introduction, if one is necessary. Also it is also the duty of the director to keep the group together, by making sure everyone is in good spirits when preforming and during rehearsals. The director must bring to the troupe new ideas for sketches, and new improv games. Through this the director has to teach the troupe new improv skills, and how to perform better overall on stage. Both the Director and the producer spends about 20 hours a week dedicated to the group.
[edit] Auditions
Comedy Corner holds open auditions at the beginning of Fall and Spring semesters. The audition process changes as group membership changes, but there are some consistencies in the process in recent years: typically those who audition as writers submit samples of sketches, which are then read by all current members of the group and a majority vote decides if the prospective member becomes a writer. Those who audition as a performer typically cold-read one or two sketches aloud and perform one or two improv scenes, either with other auditionees or with current cast members. They are evaluated by the members of the group present in the audition and a majority vote decides if the prospective member becomes a performer.
[edit] Rehearsals
Rehearsal processes vary from week-to-week depending on the nature of the week's show. Typically, the group's writers and performers will meet on Sunday evening for a writer's meeting, where they discuss ideas and topics for sketches. More promising or developed ideas are then hashed out into first drafts of sketches, which are then run at the week's first rehearsal on Monday evening. The group then decides collectively to keep the sketch as-is, return it to the original writer or another group member for revisions, or scrap the sketch altogether. The group then meets for their second rehearsal on Wednesday evening, where writers and performers can re-submit re-written sketches, submit new sketches, and run sketches that were accepted on Monday. At the end of this rehearsal, the show's material is decided upon, and the group's director is responsible for creating a show order for the Friday show. Each member spends just about 15 hours, or more in some cases, a week dedicated to Comedy Corner.
The performing cast also practices improv during rehearsals. Performers often play games and run scenes, also participating in workshop-oriented exercises. These exercises are not intended as performance pieces, but rather they encourage the development of skill sets that can be utilized during improv games and scenes.
[edit] Weekly Shows
Comedy Corner performs its weekly sketch and improv comedy shows on Fridays starting at noon in the Cellar, located at the bottom level of the University of Arizona's Student Union building. Shows run approximately one hour long, and consist of sketches, improv games and scenes, and music and video presentations created by writers and cast members.
Themed shows are a growing tradition in Comedy Corner. Currently, the cast, led by the director, creates two themed shows per year. The first, "The Halloween Show", takes place on the Friday before Halloween. This show traditionally features a collection of sketches that are arranged to form a linear storyline. The Halloween Show often features excruciating amounts of fake blood, and usually some, or all, of the cast members "die" in the show's storyline. Comedy Corner also creates an annual "Blasphemy Week", which takes place the Friday before Easter and features Jesus Christ as a character in every sketch. Other theme shows have included "Trading Places Week" wherein each cast member takes on the persona of a different cast member and "The Show from Over There" which took place on the balcony of the cellar in the old Student Union while the audience sat on stage. Some themed shows also occur spontaneously at the discretion of the cast and director.
The last weekly show of each semester is a designated "Best Of" show, wherein the cast and writers choose their favorite sketches of the semester and showcase them in an encore presentation. In the past, "Best Of" shows have run longer than traditional weekly shows, ranging from ninety minutes to two hours, but in recent years the cast has decided to schedule their "Best Of" shows within their normal one hour timeslot.
[edit] Advertising
Comedy Corner is allotted an advertising budget by the University Activities Board. The primary means of advertising are print ads and postering. Weekly advertisements appear in the UofA's daily newspaper, The Arizona Daily Wildcat. Comedy Corner also blankets the university's campus weekly with posters, which are usually custom made and often feature humorous pictures and text, show information, and Comedy Corner's recognizable logo. In its earlier years, Comedy Corner's posters were drawn by hand weekly, and featured extravagant and eye-catching artwork. In recent years, the posters have taken on more of a collage format, often utilizing clipart and photography in combination with text.
Advertising for the annual S.I.C.K. Comedy Festival is allocated from a separate budget developed solely for the Festival. S.I.C.K. advertising is usually much more elaborate, utilizing posters that are larger and more colorful. The group also occasionally experiments with unconventional advertising techniques in order to create intrigue and chatter within the UofA community.
[edit] The S.I.C.K. Comedy Festival
Comedy Corner hosts an annual comedy festival, the S.I.C.K. Festival. S.I.C.K. is an acronym for "Southwest Intergalactic Comedy Kermis."
The festival began in 1992 and is typically a showcase for Arizona college comedy groups, though occasionally has brought in professional talent to perform, such as comedians David Cross in 2001 and Lewis Black in 2003, Demitri Martin in 2005, and The Upright Citizens Brigade in 2006. The Act for 2007 was Comedy Corner, and in 2008 it was The Second City, both being amazing performances.
Comedy Corner treats the festival as a showcase for more elaborate new material, rather than a "best-of" event. Traditionally, Comedy Corner's S.I.C.K. performances are more extravagant and elaborate, both technically and comedically, than their weekly shows, and tend to develop a show-length story arc that ties sketches and scenes together.
[edit] Members
Below are the current members as of May 10, 2008
Director: Scott Syme Jr.
Producer: Daniel "Box" Kirby
Alan Fullmer
Katie "Kage" Gault
Ryan Lawson
Julieta Lewis
Vanessa Lopez
Stephanie Nabors
J. Tyler Robison
Ryan Stedwell
Amy Wieseneck
[edit] Notable Alumni
- Nicole Johnson - actor - "Mad TV"
- Graham Elwood - actor/writer/producer/director - "Cram", "Strip Poker"[1]
- Peter Murrietta - writer/producer/creator - "Greetings From Tucson", "Jesse" [2]
- Paul Goebel - actor - "Beat the Geeks", "Curb Your Enthusiasm" , "My Big Fat Independent Movie" [3]
- Andrew Shemin - actor/writer/director, co-founder of NYU's sketch comedy group "Wicked Wicked Hammerkatz" [4] [5]
- Arnie Niekamp - Improv Olympic Alumni/Performer, writer - Video Game "You Don't Know Jack" and current cast member of Whirled News Tonight
- Steve Yager - actor/director/producer [6]
- Micah Ian Wright - writer of comic books, videogames and animated series as well as a series of controversial anti-war propaganda posters "You Back The Attack, We'll Bomb Who We Want" [7]
- Timothy A. Bennett - actor/writer/filmmaker/musician best known as Hawk the brain-damaged roadie in the rock band Van Stone [8]
- Robert Carillo Cohen - producer HBO Emmy-nominated documentary "Hacking Democracy" [9]
- Alex Baze - writer "Saturday Night Live" [10]
- Marlowe Weisman - animation writer "My Gym Partner's A Monkey" [11]
- Drew Antzis - cameraman/editor Gary Sanchez Productions and FunnyOrDie.com
- Terry Owen - musician best known as cult songwriter Fish Karma currently on Jello Biafra's Alternative Tentacles record label [12]
- Ron Friedman - writer - "Open Season", "Chicken Little", "Brother Bear" not an official alum, but produced a Comedy Corner documentary in 1992 [13]
- Andy Creighton - musician - fronts The World Record and plays in Aden, Ashtray Boy, Let's Go Sailing and Annie Hayden.
- Mick Dalrymple - eco-builder - partner in the company a.k.a. Green [14]
- Danielle Egnew - musician/actress/activist "All Access Magazine Best Pop/Alternative Female Guitarist 2006" [15]
- Phil Klinkon - architect - lead designer for mass-transit rail systems
- Greg Loumeau - author/musician/artist - comic strip "Fish Shtick", children's books "The Endangered Alphabet," "The Magic Tree" and music project/children's book "Eyes of the Bicycle Horse" [16]
- Andy Mosier - artist/writer - comic strip "K-Rat" [17]
- Timothy Gassen - film director - writer - musician [18]
