Comics go for bigger laughs

By Frances Grant

Auckland's experts in the art of creating instant, riotous comedy on stage are billing themselves as big league players for their performance at the Sky City Theatre.

The name of the game has been glammed up from ordinary old Theatresports to the Allstars Theatresports - and there are good grounds for the inflation.

The line-up of players for the Sunday night special includes the recently crowned national champions Oliver Driver, Craig Parker and comedian Cal Wilson. Driver was a member of the winning Kiwi team at last year's world championships in Amsterdam.

Theatresports - in which teams of actors are given a few, often absurd, instructions to improvise scenes - has also conquered the box.

Sunday night's trio of national titleholders also star on TV2's Scared Scriptless, a local answer to the improv show Whose Line Is It Anyway?

The Allstars also feature actor Irene Malone (who plays the farm woman in the "bugger" commercial) and ex-Shortland Street stars Glenn Drake and Dean O'Gorman (in the New Zealand feature film When Love Comes).

Auckland Theatresports has been running seasons of weekly shows for 11 years and has now become a limited liability company.

The move to a more formal structure has been accompanied by a decision to stage bigger, monthly events with bigger prizes for the players, says Driver.

The company plans to turn its next performance into a fully fledged game show called The Choice is Yours.

Driver is confident the monthly shows will strike a chord with the punters. He points to the sell-out success of Auckland Theatre-sports' improv soap, Trash, which ran for 12 weeks, and the added exposure that local improv artists have had from Scared Scriptless.

The new-style stage performances are part of a push to establish improv as part of the comedy scene.

"When people think of live comedy, they think of stand-up," he says. "But improv can be as funny and there's also major interaction from the audience."

What: Allstars Theatresports

Where: Sky City Theatre

When: Sunday, 7.30 pm