Last week was my birthday week. The b-day itself was nothing too momentous, just a normal birthday. My style, though, is to stretch out my birthday to cover an entire week. Being a Cinco de Mayo baby (it’s in the stars that I must love Margaritas), I decided that I would begin birthday week on Saturday, April 29th and treat myself to some good ol’ Chicago style improv. When I first moved to Chicago, I worked for a short while through grad school in the Chicago improv community. From my time spent there, I’ve grown to develop some connections and I’ve seen lots of Chicago improv – both good and bad. And I have to say that my fav groups are hands down the more blue-styled groups. I’ve always been a fan of comedy mixed with drugs and alcohol. Sorry – what can I say? Dirty jokes make me laugh and so does the idea of geriatric S & M. Sue me. I blame it on the genius work of Mick Napier and the Annoyance Theater (where I saw my 1st improv show at the ripe age of 14), but I digress.

The rainy weekend of the 29th was also the Chicago Improv Festival where all the improv big wigs come back to Chicago to make the funny. Writers from Mad TV, the Daily Show, SNL, you name it, flock back to where it all began. I decided to head down to the festival for the Saturday night headlining show of Four Square. I remember seeing these guys at Improv Olympic years ago where the show was free and at the end the audience threw money on the stage as a tip to the performers. It almost took away from the whole experience to see them up on a big stage. The show was good (how could it not be with that cast?!), but it left me still hungry for the down and dirty, gritty improv that I remember from times of yore. I wanted something to make me question my values and well, this just didn’t do it for me.

My good friend Rachel Mason recently joined an improv group called the Hot Karl that performs every Saturday night at the Comedy Sportz. The Hot Karl is a long-form improv group and specializes in “on your face improv.” This show is not for those who, as Tim Chidester says, are offended by words such as “sh*t, f*ck, or f*sting.” So, of course, after the upstanding, headlining big-wig improv show, I called up Rachel to see if I could squeeze in to Karl’s midnight show. This also happened to be the final show at the Comedy Sportz location and since the improv fest was going on, many of Karl’s founding members came out to show their support.

As the Karl began, Tim Chidester walked on stage carrying a giant sign with the word “TAINT” on it. I knew that I had come to the right place and the quick Jaeger bomb that I downed before walking in the door seemed to help things along. As they say, the more you drink, the funnier the actors become. I love drinking and I love laughing at dirty jokes – I was at home. This was the improv that I loved and needed to kickoff birthday week!

Of course the show was funny – how could it not be funny with Frank Caeti as one of the founding members?! But it was also a place to relax and drink and think about sex. It was perfect for a little pre-foreplay before heading over to the photographer’s house for a little night cap. Laughter, I’m a big believer, is an aphrodisiac… which makes me wonder why I’m hardly ever attracted to improvisers anymore. While watching the show, I made the following observations about male and female improvisers.

Female improvisers are either hot, like to show off their tits, or were “theater people” in college. I tend to go for the “theater people” types as the ones who show off their tits are just annoying and static on stage. I think they are there to provide eye candy for the guys while the other women in the group will actually perform and rouse something in the female audience soul. Regardless, both types are entertaining and make me smile.

The men on the other hand are something completely different. It’s very rare to find a “hot” male improviser. I’ve only found one in my years of improv dating… and he really wasn’t all that great looking without his clothes on. Male improvisers try to win you over with their seductive whit, but unfortunately, a lot of the time this comes off as sleazy. OR, the guys are just a little too nerdy to pull off seductive. Basically there are three types of single improv males:

1. The attractive, yet not necessarily hot, guy who would be GREAT for a one nighter or bootycall.
2. The nerdy guys with weak chins who make you laugh when they’re on stage, but tend to have big chips on their shoulders
3. Frank Caeti - who gets his own category because he fills me with joy while on stage. I’ve never really been able to think of Frank in a sexual way, but I’d love for my friends to have sex with him just so they could tell me all about it.

My evening with Karl ended with a little wasted wanna-be comedian giving me his card and hitting on me by dropping names of performers in the group. Lance Nicholls, Professional Asshole/Amateur Comedian - Awww… how cute. I tried to let him down lightly, which I heard was better than the treatment that he received at the bar during the after party where the bouncers physically evicted him. Again – Awww… how cute. Not a bad night for the birthday week kickoff. Now, if I could just remember where I left my pants…

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