Popularity growing for Phunbags improv

FAYETTEVILLE — The Phunbags Comedy Improv troupe members know what people want, and they’re constantly trying to find new ways to give it to them.

During a rehearsal last month, they brainstormed ideas for jokes, as they always do, by playing various games. As they paused between games, someone suggested that they might just begin one of their shows with all of the words people want to hear or expect them to say.

Vagina.
Penis.
Vibrator.
Boob.

Just blurt them all out and get it over with, like ripping off a bandage.

The pain or offense of the words is what makes them funny to people. Their vulgarity, shock or, even, disgust are key. That visceral response is what makes a joke succeed, causing the ideal reaction: laughter.

This group knows how to play games. Members include veterans of local theater — like husband and wife Mike Thomas and Julie Gabel. She was involved with the now-defunct Ozark StageWorks theater group; he teaches drama at Ramay Junior High School in Fayetteville. Mark Landon Smith is executive director of Arts Live Theatre, a group for local youth; Jules Taylor and Jason Suel also teach there. Kevin Kinder, a newspaper features writer, has written for and acted in the Northwest Arkansas Gridiron Show. Jocelyn Morelli studied improv with The Groundlings in Los Angeles; actress Cassie Self has a film credit; Patrick Kunnecke has local theater experience.

Phunbags started when Virginia and Justin Scheuer, also wife and husband actors, joined with Gabel and Smith, co-founders of Ceramic Cow Productions, with the improv troupe operated under DownRiver Actors. They saw a niche that wasn’t being filled by anyone in Fayetteville or the region.

“Not everybody wants to be emotionally challenged or deal with societal issues, or to be moved or to cry,” Smith said. “But everybody always wants to laugh.”

When the Scheuers got jobs in Bentonville, Ceramic Cow took over its production. That was about two years ago. The group has always performed at the UARK Bowl on Dickson Street.

They gradually added more team members, with a variety of looks and strengths. The group started with twice-nightly shows on Fridays and Saturdays, but it wore them out. They reigned it in to perform just once monthly, at the UARK Bowl on Dickson Street. The move heightened public anticipation.

“We went from having five people (in the audience) to having 150 people. It’s just exploded over the past seven months,” Smith said.

Intended as a hybrid of Whose Line Is It Anyway? and skits from Saturday Night Live, the Phunbags troupe uses a wide range of vehicles to get their creativity flowing and the audience laughter rolling. They practice three Sundays each month and perform on the Saturday of the remaining weekend.

Smith likens it to a game of hide and seek, where the person and the scenario are different every time. They practice regularly, so all members know the structure of each game, and so they are able to respond on the spot. Then, they wait for the audience input.

“We don’t know what the audience is going to give us that we’ll have to incorporate into the structure,” Smith said.

And they sometimes don’t know what they’re going to say until they’re saying it. At last month’s rehearsal, they played a game about things you never want to hear people say, like the Whose Line? actors did.

Take a taxi driver. “Put your seat belt on; I want to try something I saw in a cartoon once,” Thomas offered.

With each response, they stepped forward from their line. “The better the joke, the farther you walk out,” Thomas said. And sometimes, they started to step up, then realized their joke wasn’t going to work.

Then, they tried writing jingles for ridiculous products that haven’t been invented yet — like dog lipstick, scented doorknobs and edible watches. The structure for this: one person poses an issue or problem, and the other person solves it.

They discussed the structure, and what made the joke work better. Each line built on the next, which seemed to work well, and the format was concise.

Some members sat in chairs and watched how the jokes worked.

“It’s much easier doing this out there than it is up here,” Smith said, while on “stage” with Morelli and Gabel.

One of the games most popular with audiences is “boy band.” Because the troupe members know the basic premise works, they tried another variation: “girl band, country version.”

The setup was an unusual country ballad, sung by a female quartet and accompanied by Suel on guitar. They decided on the song structure, factoring in the verses, chorus and bridge.

At first, the tune was too much like the jingles they just did. So, Suel slowed the rhythm to a more mellow pace. Then, Thomas suggested that, rather than confine it to country, they leave it broader, as “The Ballad of [blank]” Mike says. “That gives you guys a completely open canvas,” Smith agreed.

They belt out the ballads with sincerity — “The Ballad of the Teenage Dropout” ended with the chorus: “crystal methamphetamine took me out of my life.” And, the chorus to “The Ballad of My Gay Husband” told the truth of the matter: “He’s a gay, homosexual, queer.”

Visually, this was still too much like boy band, with the women in a line across the stage. Suel suggested they huddle in the middle, like the gossip girls gathered around the washtub on Hee Haw.

They shaped the structure of this game, discovering what worked best. At first, each woman tried to one-up the last, as they offered an individual story with each verse. They decided they liked it better when their stories built on one another.

They practiced more ballads — about broken whiskey bottles, rusty plows and cow patties.

“It’s really good, guys,” Smith said.

They’ll practice all of these games more before putting them in the show, except girl band. They’d worked on it at past rehearsals, but in a different format. That day, it just clicked.

There are rules to what these guys and gals will say on stage. They refrain from profanity because that’s just too easy to get a laugh. They avoid bodily fluids and overt sexual situations. But they have no control over what the audience throws their way.

“And, a lot of times, the audience reads innuendo into something that we don’t set up as innuendo,” Smith said.

At a recent show, they made a big deal about Valentine’s Day, with lots of prizes from the Family Dollar store — a long-stemmed chocolate rose, bubble bath and a backscratcher autographed by the troupe.

They played a variety of fun games. They sang rhyming rap lyrics, facing elimination when their response faltered. With “The Dating Game,” the contestant (Suel) had to guess the professions of his potential dates (two women and one man) based on their clue-filled responses to his questions. In another game, using various props, they suggested uses other than the ones for which they were intended. And, Thomas gave an “Oscar-wining speech” in a skit with Kinder.

Some of the funniest moments were watching the actors figure out the answer to the puzzle they’d been given. In the “interrogation” game, one actor had to identify the crime, weapon and accomplice based on mimed clues. Jesus and an icicle were involved.

The funniest of the night, though, was the skit presented only using questions. Set in a cabin in the woods, various troupe members came in and out as they thought of lines. The skit grew funnier as they struggled to stay on track. And, then, Suel took on the role of a deer, using his fingers as antlers.

The next Phunbags next performance is March 17. Doors open at 7:15 p.m., with the show time at 8 p.m. You must be 18 or older to get in. Tickets are $5 and a cash bar is available.