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Theatre

I have always loved the theatre and acting in general. In college (WPI), I joined an acting group called Masque and did some work with another student theatre group called M.W. Rep. I even directed once for WPI's summer theater festival called Sunburns. Eventually I was invited to join the national theatrical honor fraternity Alpha Psi Omega. I wish I had kept up with it after college, but time is a commodity, nowadays.

I actually made an attempt at writing a play, once. It was my humanities project in college. The name of the play was All the Non-Conformists Are Doing It and it was WAY too serious. I have been using my experience in Solo Improvisation to get out of my head, and actually had a play accepted by my college's 21st New Voices Festival for 2003 titled "Of Mice and Mensa". (Word format) I am going to try and use this page as motivation to actually write some more plays and sketches.

Improv comedy is one of my favorite things to do. It's a great way to stay quick and exercise your brain. When I was in college, I worked with a group called Chain Link Fence (notice black shirt above) which has since evolved into Guerilla Improv. Recently, I took a class with a local group called the Skinny Lincolns. It was a blast, but they didn't do it very regularly at the time and it costs money. I then tried a free class with Knock Your Socks Off (or KYSOff) and Quick Wits and enjoyed that immensely. After going to a few workshops, I was invited to perform with the KYSOff troupe for two shows on November 10, 2001 at Trolley Square Live and it was a LOT of fun!

Since then I have performed regularly with KYSOff and Quick Wits, performing at the showcase of the fifth annual Chicago Improv Festival in 2002 with KYSOff. I also travel a lot to perform, learn, and teach improv. In 2003 I attended the Chicago Improv Festival (and performed at Improv All Night), the Del Close Marathon in NYC(performing with the team The Saint), and Dirty South Improv's 24:Live (performing with The Saint and as a rotating ensemble player) in North Carolina. Most recently, Joseph Kyle Rogan and I have formed JoKyR and Jesster, a two man improv group that travels around Utah and to different festivals.

Below are links to the video of the show I was in during the Chicago Improv Festival in 2002 (Windows Media - 30 mins). Pick your bandwidth and click away.
56k modem (choppy) | ISDN (128 kbps) | T1 (broadband)


Here's a pic of me with the rest of KYSOff at the fifth annual Chicago Improv Festival.


Squint real hard and you'll see me with all the other folks taking classes at CIF 2002.
(We're on the Second City stage in Chicago - Woo Hoo!)

I have now started up a new Web site to showcase the improv community in Utah called UtahImprov.com. It is a brainchild of my friend Ryan and I inspired by the growing improv community in Utah. Hopefully, it will be a success.