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THE INS AND OUTS OF MAKING IT — OR BREAKING IT — IN NORTHWESTERN’S COMEDY SCENE
February 13, 2019
At Northwestern, there are two paths for aspiring comedians: either you make The Titanic Players improv team freshman year, or you don’t...
AN EVENING OF IMPROV TO FEATURE THE TITANIC PLAYERS
November 18, 2015
The Titanic Players at Stetson is a group that has been expanding rapidly, now performing on campus on a weekly basis.
UW TITANIC PLAYERS CULTIVATE WITTY, GROUP-MINDED APPROACH
April 14th, 2014
Coaches Kathleen Mallett and Ben Heins hope to drill this into the brains of the first-year members of the Titanic Players, the only long-form improv group on the University of Wisconsin campus.
12 COLLEGES WITH GREAT IMPROV GROUPS
August 27th, 2012
Despite their regional differences, it’s interesting how similar many of these groups are. Most have around 9-12 members. All of them are extremely popular on their campuses and play to packed crowds on a regular basis.
TITANIC GOES OFF SCRIPT AT MCTRIB
January 12, 2011
From single words like “aquarium” to the detailed account of the day’s adventures by an overzealous audience member, the four teams create scenes and characters to comical effect.
THE TITANIC PLAYERS WILL TAKE YOUR SUGGESTIONS NOW
December 9th, 2010
A reality sitcom is at Madison’s back door, courtesy of the Titanic Players.
TITANIC PLAYERS’ ‘DADDY MAGS’ ADVANCES TO NATIONAL IMPROV TOURNAMENT
January 24, 2010
‘It’s improv,’ Collins said. ‘There’s only so much you can do to get ready. You just have to go out and perform and have fun.’
SIX SCHOOLS' IMPROV GROUPS COMPETE FOR UAB LAST LAUGH
April 13th, 2008-By James Harrison
College comedians from across the nation descended on the International Center on Saturday night for Comedy Soup, a celebration of improvisational and sketch comedy. The event was sponsored by the University Activities Board, or UAB, and local MSU comedy troupe Your Mom Improv...
MAD TV CAST PERFORMS WITH STUDENT COMEDIANS AT TECH
Feb. 3, 2007 North by Northwestern
Nearly 75 students braved the cold Friday night and trekked to Tech’s Ryan Family Auditorium to enjoy performances from MAD tv comedians and Northwestern improv groups Mee-ow and The Titanic Players...
CHICAGO READER COMEDY RECOMMENDATIONS
04/02/2008-Ryan Hubbard
John Belushi, Bill Murray, Mike Myers, Vince Vaughn, Tina Fey, Steve Carell, Amy Sedaris, and Stephen Colbert were all trained in comedy in Chicago, and primarily at one or both of the city’s two most famous comedic institutions: Second City (1616 N. Wells, 312- 337-3992) and I.O. (3541 N. Clark, 773-880-0199), formerly ImprovOlympic. Second City, often considered the originator of improv, had its roots in a University of Chicago student group called the Compass, whose core members founded Second City in 1959. Since then it’s become synonymous with improvisation, though what you find on its two main stages is more often sketch comedy...
SKETCHCENTER INTERVIEWS TRIPLETTE
April 1, 2008-Sketchcenter-Alexander Zalben
Introducing 20Q(-ish). A new feature in which Sketchcenter, and it’s intrepid Staff, interview the best and the brightest in the sketch comedy community. In this edition of 20Q(-ish) Sketchcenter Staff member Alexander Zalben, member of New York sketch groups Elephant Larry and Madame Funnypants (among other projects too!), sits down with Heather Simms, member of Chicago's hit sketch comedy group Triplette...
NU'S IMPROV GROUPS MAY CURE THE WINTER BLUES
February 21, 2008-By ASHA TOULMIN
Want funny at Northwestern? Look no further. These three improv groups — Mee-Ow, The Titanic Players and Out da Box — are putting on shows over the next few weeks, whether they are professional, playful or pushy....
OLD TOM JAR WINS CIF COLLEGE COMEDY CHAMPIONSHIPS
November 10, 2007-www.cif.com
Old Tom Jar, The Titanic Players Resident Team from Northwestern University, won the 1st annual College Comedy Championship national title, the College Comedy trophy cup, $1,500 from OSTN-TV, and a performance slot in the 2008 Chicago Improv Festival....
SCENE STEALERS
October 27, 2006-By Chris Jones
If you're a young actor, there's no better town to learn your craft. The huge Chicago theater scene is marked by opportunity, openness, dedication and an abiding interest in youth. And there are relatively few of the pesky distractions--fame, agents, lots of money--that an impressionable young actor encounters in New York or Los Angeles. As a result, Chicago stages are littered with emerging talents--mostly hoping to make their mark here and then, in the grand Chicago tradition, move on to coastal careers...
`CLAY' MOLDED INTO A TOUR DE FORCE
September 3, 2006, Special to the Tribune
Matt Sax shoves the brim of his baseball cap low over his face and struts, hip-hop style, across the stage. Palming the microphone, he drops to his knees and begins to rap...
CURTAINUP SAX AND DIXON - THIS PLANE IS DEFINITELY CRASHING
August 18, 2006-www.curtainup.com
In the spirit of long-form improv, Chicago-based Matt Sax and John Dixon weave together seemingly disparate plots into a bizarre but thrilling culmination using only two chairs and their impressive craftsmanship....
NY THEATER REVIEW - SAX AND DIXON - THIS PLANE IS DEFINITELY CRASHING
August 17, 2006-NY Theater.com reviewed by Alyssa Simon
Matt Sax and John Dixon are two recent college graduates who have put together a show, This Plane Is Definitely Crashing, to showcase their comedic skills. The script, developed from improv, has more than 20 characters of both genders and a variety of ages, races, and nationalities....
TWO BIT REVIEW - SAX AND DIXON - THIS PLANE IS DEFINITELY CRASHING
August 16, 2006-BROADWAY.COM REVIEW-Katie Riegel
It was a family affair just before the first performance of Sax & Dixon: This Plane is Definitely Crashing, as Saxes and Dixons of all ages mixed and mingled and fresh-faced college grads dressed in their finest vintage tees scrambled for seats in the sold-out Gene Frankel Theatre. On stage for the following 85 minutes, ...
BLEEDING FOR THEATER
October 14, 2004, Play Magazine
When pigs, trumpets and breakfast cereal unite, the product is bound to be a comedic Triplethreat. Triplette, a Chicago-based improv group composed of three Northwestern alumnae, opened its second sketch comedy show Wednesday. Triplette's sophomore effort, a dramatic farce entitled "If it Bleeds it Leads," opened Wednesday at the Playground Theater in Chicago. The show pokes fun at the news media and Americans' obsession with negative current events...
FROM THE COMFORT OF YOUR OWN CAMPUS
July 6th , 2004-Robert VerBruggen
There are plenty of distractions in and around Chicago. With a trip on the El or a walk around Evanston, Northwestern students can go to numerous concerts, shows and movies every weekend. But all that travel may not be necessary. Courtesy of the University and countless student groups, NUers can find entertainment without setting foot off campus...
STUDENT'S HIPHOP PLAY GOES TRANSATLANTIC
May 28, 2004, The Daily Northwestern
Walking into Matt Sax's apartment, he asks to go outside so he can smoke a cigarette. "Sorry if I chain smoke, I'm pretty stressed out," Sax warns. And with good reason. Sax is taking "Clay," a one-man hip-hop play that he wrote and stars in, to the Festival Fringe in Edinburgh, Scotland this summer....
'DOORS' SWINGS OPEN WITH LAUGHS
Published December 20, 2003 written by Chris Jones
Early in Joshua Funk's edgy, daring and formatively superb 90th mainstage Second City revue, "Doors Open on the Right," we see a woman and a baby standing atop a burning Chicago highrise. "Throw down your baby and I'll catch it," says a firefighter.
SECOND CITY SHOWS THE WAY TO REALLY FLY
December 19, 2003-DAREL JEVENS Staff Reporter
The composition of Second City troupes has fluctuated over the years, but it's unlikely there's ever been an ensemble made up of three men, three women and one disembodied voice. The first sounds you hear in "Doors Open on the Right," the new revue on the Wells Street mainstage, are the chimes that every L rider knows as the preamble to a recorded announcement. Then up comes that familiar intonation, the very same authoritative yet avuncular voice that signals the stops on the CTA, only this time he's telling us to turn off cell phones and avoid flash photography....
'LADY' FRIENDS TAKE THE STAGE
The Daily Northwestern November 06, 2003
The laughs didn't stop at graduation for Rebecca Fox, Heather Simms and Laura Grey. The Northwestern alums got their start in improv five years ago with The Titanic Players, and their sketch comedy show opens tomorrow at The Playground Theater, 3341 N. Lincoln Ave. Here's what Fox and Simms had to say about performing in their group, Triplette...
TITANIC TEST OF COMEDIC SKILL
October 16, 2003-Sarah Sheridan
Eight people enter a room and are instructed to run around in a circle. Some keep pace with the others, some hop, some gallop erratically, theatrically tripping and landing in contorted heaps. They gather in the center of the room, form a huddle and let out eardrum-piercing screams when they make eye contact with another person in the human circle...
NU PERFORMANCE GROUPS TAKE MANHATTAN ON BREAK
April 04, 2003-Eric Martin
Two Northwestern performance troupes took rhythm and laughter on the road during Spring Break. Boomshaka, NU's percussion and dance ensemble, lit up television screens across the country appearing on MTV's "Total Request Live" in New York's Time Square on March 26, while improv comedy group Titanic Players toured the Northeast.
COMEDY ON A WHIM
October 16, 2002-Jennifer Leopoldt
Even though the actors in Northwestern's Titanic Players exhibit quick wit and spit-fire ideas, their brand of improvisational comedy takes time to perfect. "You can't get up, tell your fart joke, have people laugh and sit down," group member Sarah Graber said. "You have to be able to sustain the comedy and humor throughout a longer scene."...
IMPROV GROUPS OPENS FESTIVAL
March, 2000, The Daily Northwestern
Meatloaf, bathtubs and Broadway musicals prompted sketches by the University of Chicago's Off-Off Campus improv team Thursday in Shepard Residential College's lounge...
THE RISING OF TITANIC
October, 1995, Insider Magazine
In a dimly lit corner of Yesterday’s restaurant in Evanston, amid old college sports paraphernalia and antique odds and ends, a chatty group crowds into the booth. Ordering a slew of Cokes and a few “Overload burgers,” they take a minute to catch up with their regular waitress, Bev...