Click chats to Improvageddon's Trevor Fleming about upcoming Liverpool Unity Theatre comedy performance

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An evening of silliness is about to ensue at The Unity Theatre in Liverpool, with Impropriety staging an ambitious and uniquely entertaining night of Improvised Comedy that sees the best of Merseyside comic talent get to grips with whatever the audience hurls at them ... literally... and all for charity, too. Here, Trevor Fleming tells all to Click critic Chris High...

What is Improvageddon?

Improvageddon is an improvised comedy 'tournament' featuring teams made up of some of the finest improvisers from across the northwest. These teams do battle through improvised scenes, songs and games, which are inspired by audience suggestions and then judged by the audience themselves. The profits from the night go to the winning team’s choice of charity.

What is your involvement, not only in the show but on the production side?

The company is run as a collective and everyone chips in as and when they can. Personally, I help run workshops for the public and for the cast. For Improvageddon, I will be gathering whatever props and bits of costume that we may need for the show to help embellish the scenes we create on the spot.

Why do you find improvised comedy so appealing?

There's a spontaneity to improvised comedy that you don't always get with scripted scenes. It lets you adapt to whatever's occurring onstage so there's a really organic feel to it. There's also a quality of the unknown in any improvised scene that can be very exciting for both performers and audiences alike. Improvisation is also one of the only theatrical forms where the audience and the performers discover something at the same time so reactions are genuine rather than rehearsed which adds another level to it that you don't always get in conventional scripted theatre.

You’ve also appeared in plays across Liverpool and the country. What are the different challenges that Improvisation provides with regards to preparing?

With improv there's a different mindset needed than the one for scripted work. Your mind needs to be open to whatever happens and be ready to react to anything. In scripted work you obviously need to know your lines and your blocking before going onstage. With improv its like playing a game of football, everyone knows the rules, what the ultimate goal is, but every match is different, different players have different styles of playing as do different teams. In improv its similar, some are quick and physical performers whereas others are calmer more cerebral performers

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve been asked to “improvise”?

The one that springs to mind is the time I was asked to improvise a monologue in the style of Dr. Seuss in a Spanish accent whilst performing a piece of interpretive dance. However there are far many more strange and crazy things that I've performed in improvathons where I've been awake for 40+ hours; crocodile doctor, astronaut haunted by the ghost of a potato, a French industrialist with a zombie army planning to kill queen Victoria with an exploding chair, Greek kebab seller being squashed by a foot the size of a million feet. There's no way to predict what can happen on stage in improvisation which is one of the things I love about it.

What can audiences expect from the show?

They can expect a great night of comedy from some of the Northwest's best improv comedy performers. It will be a night of things they've never seen before or will ever again, a unique night out that will stay in the memory.

What’s next?

We've had a really busy couple of months with our Improvathon, 'Back to the Studio' and Improvised Soap 'The Tragical Past and Mysterious Present of Sodem Hall' so Improvageddon is the final big scale show in our spring/summer season whilst we take a bit of a breather. However, that doesn't mean we don't have plenty coming up. We're in the process of planning our autumn/winter season which will most likely include another soap and possibly a series of one off improvised 'genre' shows (an improvised B Movie, Sci-Fi, that kind of thing) Also, really excitingly, we've been asked to be a part of a new online TV channel that's starting up, Opiate TV, who have asked us to create a semi improvised sketch show, ImproprieTV, that will be airing next year so we're in the process of planning and filming that. We'll hopefully have a few 'pop-up' shows over the summer too that we'll be using to test out the material for the TV show so keep an eye on the website and Facebook for details of those.

For further information go to www.impropriety.co.uk and to book tickets for the 3rd July performance go to http://www.unitytheatreliverpool.co.uk