Vancouver Improv Fest brings the laughs to the Cultch and home screens, October 12 to 17
A highlight of the 2021 festival is Mind of a Snail’s mash-up combining live projection, music, shadow puppets, and improv performers from Australia, India, the UK, and Canada
Mind of a Snail is a local award-winning shadow-puppetry duo.
Vancouver Improv Fest runs at the Historic Theatre at the Cultch, Culture Lab at the Cultch, and via livestream October 12 to 17.
BACK FOR ITS 23rd year, Vancouver Improv Fest is mixing it up with a blend of in-person and streamed shows as well as live and virtual workshops.
Founded in 1999, Vancouver Improv Fest (formerly known as VIF) is one of North America’s longest-running improv festivals.
The 2021 event’s most ambitious show, Improv in Five Dimensions, is a never-before-attempted improvisational mashup. Local award-winning shadow-puppetry duo Mind of a Snail will direct an international ensemble in a performance that combines live projection, music, shadow puppets, and improvisors from Australia, India, the UK, and Canada.
The show can be seen live at the Historic Theatre at the Cultch on October 15 and 16 at 7:30 pm and will also be streamed live for home viewing.
"We’ve really had to get creative and think outside the box. But the good news is that that’s something the improv community excels at,” Vancouver Improv Festival organizer Amy Shostak said in a release. “This mix of live and online performances is actually enabling us to try a lot of new things, work with artists around the globe, and reach audiences and students that never would have otherwise been able to participate.”
One of the themes of this year’s festival is how to continue to create live performances in this new pandemic world. A panel discussion on opening night will examine how the pandemic has impacted people’s relationship to performance and comedy and how community members feel about returning to the stage.
The festival line-up also includes Fistful of Kicks, a local ensemble of East-Asian improvisors who draw on their shared cultural upbringing and the cast members create stories based on a single word of inspiration from the audience.
Bloodfeud is a stand up versus improv show hosted by Matty Vu from CBC's Next Wave of Stand Up and Malcolm McLeod, from the Second City Toronto.
Queerprov features LGBTQ2SIA+ performers from the improv, standup, theatre, and drag communities, while Baby Syrup’s “Meeting at 1 pm” format was born from the “need for more corporate meetings”, with the improv gatherings “almost certainly could have been an email”.
For show schedules, workshops, tickets, and more information, visit www.vancouverimprovfest.com.
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