Director’s Notes: Improvaganda! was born out of an undergraduate acting class that I taught in 2014. In my absence, students continued to train on their own, finding joy in playing improvisationally. Using that momentum, the ensemble morphed as people were added and subtracted to create the company you will see before you tonight. The actors have been working tirelessly to create a tight ensemble through trust, risk, and vulnerability. We are here tonight to make you laugh, to engage you in the living theatre. This show will vary every night based on the audience and their suggestions, in this way the show is absolutely “FOR YOU,” so please, participate and think up some wild suggestions for us to use. The more we all engage each other, the more fun the entire crowd and company will have. This show is a rare opportunity for the audience to have creative ownership in the creation of live performance. Let’s have some fun together.
Erin Leigh Crites (Director) is an international theatre artist, educator, and purveyor of make believe. She currently lives in Los Angeles after two years serving as the Director of Graduate Studies and Movement for the MFA program at the University of Louisville. This year Erin originated a role in Dario Fo's newest, unpublished play, La Storia di Qu for the International Milan Expo, performed in Kenya as an ensemble member of Clowns Without Borders, sang at the Mark Taper Forum (LA) and Actors Theatre of Louisville in The Christians, and performed at the Kentucky Center for the Arts in Bourbon Baroque’s production of Dido And Aeneas. She also directed HINT! A Masked Murder Mystery, The Man Who Knows, and Commedia Canon! in collaboration with UofL, Theatre 502, and Savage Rose Classical Theatre respectively. Erin teaches workshops in ensemble creation/playmaking, theatre as a second language, improvisation, vaudeville, clown, Commedia Dell' Arte, and physical storytelling. She has a passion for travel and creating community, often through theatrical endeavors.
