The Second City at the Kennedy Center

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I had seen The Second City perform at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue several years ago. The first time I really liked them, and the second time I was a bit apathetic. But I decided to get tickets to see the group at the Kennedy Center since I had never seen them in a venue like that before.

The introduction was very strange, with strobe lights flickering and the actors stumbling about as if they were caught in a tornado. This continued throughout the show for their transitions, and it was off-putting from the start. 

The first actress wasn't there, so her understudy replaced her. Images from here.

You can see that there were a mix of men and women in the group, and yet several times the women played male roles. My first reaction was, "If there are men on stage, why can't the men play the male roles." But then on second thought, I wondered, "Ok, if the women have to play male roles, why don't the men ever play female roles?" It was like they were trying to be half-progessive.

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I wish there were actually more improv incorporated into the skits. It's not that the skits aren't funny: most of them are. I especially liked their bits on Germans proclaiming they're not the assholes of the world anymore, or their spin-off on Marie Kondo. The Magic Mike bar mitzvah skit and an HR lady having to deal with nudity at the international space station were also hilarious. But those were clearly scripted and practiced.

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Some of the skits were clearly created (or at least adapted) to fit Washington, D.C., like a brawl between a Capitals and a Penguins fan or a bus tour visiting the Washington Monument. But even those weren't improvisational. There were only a few times that the group even asked the audience for ideas, and sometimes the actors claimed to have heard a suggestion from the crowd that they clearly already had in mind to act! So that was a scam. They also had an audience member come up to speak some Spanish (that's not funny, and his Spanish wasn't even that good), and then another audience member just had to read out a script that, again, had already been written out beforehand.

I was entertained, and I laughed some. But honestly, I've seen better ad-libbed material in stand-up routines than from this group that's supposed to be about improv comedy.

*Here's a more favorable review from the DC Theatre Scene.