It was February 2017. I was a senior in high school. I was on Union’s campus for a Scholars of Excellence weekend. I had no idea what I was doing, but this was the weekend when I needed to at least pretend like I knew what I was doing.
It was a Friday night. I guess I had checked in, and I don’t know what else I did that night. It was one of those events where you get a name tag. You know, the ones that make you stand out—the ones that take away any chance of you passing as a Union student.
On the back of my name tag, I found a schedule for the events of the weekend. This is exactly what I needed that weekend. I could casually look at the back of my name tag and have the details I needed in order to look like I knew what was going on.
“Improv show- Barefoots Joe,” I read on the schedule for Friday night.
I had no idea what that meant, but I am sure that I asked my only friend on campus that weekend if she was going to the show. I didn’t know what I was going to, but at least I had something to do and someone to sit with.
Looking back, I think that I was expecting more of an open mic type of event. I hadn’t heard of an improv team before, so senior me was just expecting people from the crowd to improvise. I’m not really sure what I expected, but it was probably something along the lines of people from the crowd just going on stage and doing whatever they wanted. It sounds silly now, but I just didn’t know.
That night I crowded into Barefoots with a bunch of nervous high school seniors (and some overly confident ones), as well as many current Union students. I sat on the floor at the left corner of the stage and laughed—like the whole show.
This was not what I had expected, but this is what I needed. I needed something else to think about other than the scholarship competition coming up the next day. I needed a reason to laugh instead of worry.
* * *
“They pay us with macaroni,” said Clark Hubbard, captain of Union’s Blank Slate Improv team.
Everyone laughed…again.
The show was in Barefoots again. It was Halloween night 2018. It was a Wednesday night. I had homework due the next day that I had not started on. The show started after 9 p.m., yet there I was sitting in Barefoots.
I looked around me. Extra chairs had been brought in to comfortably accommodate all the students.
“Why are there so many people here?” I thought.
It was a school night. It was late. It was Halloween, yet there were people sitting all around me. I was surrounded by laughter.
“Why do we keep coming out to these shows? What’s so funny?”
These were the questions running through my mind as the show got started.
Maybe it’s because everyone has this desire to be funny, and we live vicariously through the Blank Slate Improv team.
Maybe it’s because our friends are the ones on stage, and we feel like we have an inside track with the team.
Or maybe it has to do with the way improv looks at issues, stereotypes and Union culture from a unique perspective.
Whatever it is that makes people come—that draws people in—I think it ultimately comes from our need for laughter.
College is great. College can also be stressful. Blank Slate Improv provides the campus with a period of time simply to laugh.
Sometimes it doesn’t even take words. One person in the crowd starts laughing at a simple gesture or expression by one of the team members, and suddenly everyone in the crowd is laughing. There’s just something about laughter that can be so contagious.
It’s funny because no one knows what to expect—not even the team members. It’s funny because that’s not the voice he normally uses. It’s funny because the team members have to think on their feet and feed off of each other even if they have no idea what another person is thinking.
It’s funny because we need to laugh.
I mean, who would have thought that a room full of college students would have laughed so hard when a tall guy said, “They pay us with macaroni”?
It was all of the little details of the scene that made the room laugh.
It was all of the little details of the whole show on Wednesday night that made the crowd verbalize their disappointment when captain Ben Johnson said, “Alright guys, we only have one more game.”
***
If you were one of the ones expressing your disappointment at the closure of the show on Wednesday night (or if you are now expressing your disappointment in not attending the show), you still have a chance to join Blank Slate Improv for another show this Saturday, Nov. 3, at 7 p.m.
Blank Slate will be opening for Anthem Lights in the G.M. Savage Memorial Chapel.
Doors open at 6:30 p.m., so pick up tickets in advance at Union Station and be there early for the show on Saturday.
After all, they say laughter is the best medicine.
Photo by Tamara Friesen
