Austin Improv

We would love that, Justin.

MARTY!!!

AIC are most comitted improvising doods!

big ups to asaf and jeremy for a fun frickin show.

and big up ups to brad and justin for lights/sound. brought sound clips for everyones character? yep. sure did.

andrea wrote:big up ups to brad and justin for lights/sound. brought sound clips for everyones character? yep. sure did.

Thanks, Andrea. You all made the show awesome, not us. Everyone was on tonight, and the constant high scores from the gigantic audience proved it.

It was a fun opportunity and not too hard to dig up sound clips / songs for everyone a couple of hours before the show. All the performers spent time preparing/dressing up to put on a good show, so I figured it would be fun to do some preparations of my own. Sorry I wasn't prepared for Tara Reid. I checked to see if "American Pie" was on the computer, but no Don McLean could be found.

If I could offer one piece of advice for people working sound in the future, it would be to use an mp3 cutting program on songs you want to use for transitions. Although this website looks cheesy, you can find a really simple free program to take samples of mp3 files and save as separate mp3 files for cues at http://home.hccnet.nl/p.luijer/ .

With a little extra work (20-30 minutes at a time), you can put together a whole show's worth of songs for use in transitions and burn it to a CD to bring to the Hideout. It's way more effective to start firing up "Danger Zone" at the exact right spot you want with a cue rather than at the beginning. I left some in the Theatresports playlist folder, if anyone wants to use mine in the future. I also left a folder marked "Celebrity Maestro" that has all the files I used tonight on the desktop.

Finally, I unloaded 16 CDs worth of professional grade sound effects onto the computer. They're in a folder called "Blue Box Sound Effects" on the desktop. I tried to separate them into categories as best I could for now. They're good for ambient noise in scenes (public bathrooms, coffee shops, etc.) as well as specific sound effects (drum rolls, gunshots, 18 million different bird noises). There were some on the computer before, but these are worth giving a look too, because they cover the vast majority of scenes that happens on stage.

Alright, that was way too long-winded. Thanks for the commendation tonight. It was great to be a part of the show. I think I can speak for Justin as well when I say we both really appreciated it.

That show was super badass. Everyone was firing on all cylinders tonight. We had the audience in the palm of our hand.

I truly appreciate everyone coming along on this crazy idea that I had. It is this kind of group embracing of something that is why I moved to Austin.

You all brought it, and brought it big. I love you all for it.

I tip my hat to every performer in tonight's show.

They say that the audience pays to see risk, and in this case, tonight's show could've been worth millions. You had to perform in-character while improvising while doing several challenging games, and you not only succeeded, but surpassed my expectations!

As for the individual performers that caught my eye...

Asaf, Capote could not be a more perfect role. It had to be the wittiest performance I've ever seen.

Jeremy, at first, some of us were a bit questionable on the accuracy of the Christopher Loydd impression, until we heard the clip from Back to the Future, and then we figured out you were dead-on the whole time. Awesome work!

Jason Vines, your 70s era John Travolta could not be more perfect! Also, great innuendo, perversion, and antics!

Troy, your William Shatner was godlike! And congrats on winning!

Kristin, the Andy Kaufman was a pleasent surprise (a lot of people couldn't even tell if it was a guy or girl playing), and even featured some Kaufman-esque eccentric antics (such as dissapearing before elimination, and popping out during that one skit).

Majcher, the outfit screamed "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" when I first saw you, and your performance, from the erratic drugged-out paranoia, down to the pipe and the gun, should've deserved an award or something. It's such a shame you got eliminated so quickly!

Dav, that Shaggy impression deserves a Scooby Snack. Who knew that Shaggy could speak Fijinese? Zoinks!

Andrea, nobody in the audience knew if you were truly hammered or just doing a really good Tara Reid impression. We all swore you were drunk... Were you?

Aden and Andy both played singers, Bette Midler and Kenny Loggins, which kind of didn't effect them that much, but were pretty awesome to watch, anyway. They were kind of like the straight men for the hyperrealistic portrayals from everyone else. (By the way, I told my dad about Kenny Loggins doing a German gangsta rap, and he had an overwhelming look of confusion on his face, and my response was, "You had to have been there.")

Jessica... Queen Elizibeth playing a Quentin Tarentino movie character... Somebody, get this woman a trophy!

Eric, I don't really have much to say but you did an awesome job as Slim Pickens.

Great show! I'll be looking foward to another round of Celebrity Maestro if you guys are up for another.

fuck slim pickins!

I had a great time and I know everyone in the cast is hoping Celebrity Maestro happens again. And if it does, it will not be initiated by me. I need someone else to do it so that I can get onstage and do some Christopher Walken.

Also, Jeremy and I discussed the option for the future of having the directors be non-celebrities to get better control of the show.

Firstly- Asaf, you rocked as Capote. The voice was perfect. Kudos to all. That was one awesome mess of a show!

IMHO, everyone should've won that Micetro collectively (including the directors). The impersonations were absolutely inspired. I can't remember a recent Micetro where I was laughing so hard from the bench, or shaking my beautifully messed up brain at a "what the f??? was that" moment.

Kenny Loggins dying from a bullet wound to the head, doing German hard core rap, and uttering "ich bin ein berliner" as the lights faded made my weekend. I'm laughing now as I think about it. Thanks to you, Crouch.

that show sucked balls.

bradisntclever wrote:

andrea wrote:big up ups to brad and justin for lights/sound. brought sound clips for everyones character? yep. sure did.

Thanks for the commendation tonight. It was great to be a part of the show. I think I can speak for Justin as well when I say we both really appreciated it.

He most certainly can speak for me here. I was in the box office, so I actually missed the introduction of the first few players. Most of the tech booth kudos go to Brad because I didn't join him up there until shortly after Category Die. He had all the songs cued up and ready to go. I only threw the spotlight up in a few key scenes and was able to use the red light once with Troy's powerful Shatner singing.

beardedlamb wrote:that show sucked balls.

It sucked your balls and tickled them with its tongue, and that's why you loved it so much.

I heard a lot of raving about the show from audience members afterward. My girlfriend, who has been to a few Maestro shows that I dragged her to, said this was one of her favorite ones. You could really tell how much fun the players had, and the energy was definitely high. Both seem to be good indicators of a great show.

TexasImprovMassacre wrote:fuck slim pickins!

will do.