BWW Reviews: Impro's TWLIGHT ZONE UNSCRIPTED on Odyssey Stage

Twilight Zone Unscripted/Impro Theatre/directed by Stephen Kearin and Jo McGinley/Odyssey Theatre/through November 4

Fans of improv and the ever popular The Twilight Zone series may exult in the opportunity to witness and contribute to an engaging theatre presentation by Impro called Twilight Zone Unscripted, playing in repertory with Chekhov Unscripted, at the Odyssey through November 4. Impro are a quite brilliant company of actors who take audience suggestions and turn them within seconds into original one-act plays of incredible insight and humor with the exact structure and flavor of...Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone.

Unscripted means that each evening is totally new. At the top, one of the actors steps forward and asks a question or puts forth a request such as "Suggest a place!" On the evening I attended, the setting chosen from audience suggestions for the first of five scenarios was a relish factory. How clever? What will they come up with in a relish factory? In true Twilight Zone style, an intro is played out and then an actor (actress) comes forward, as did host Rod Serling, to set the scene. It is amazing to watch actors do practically flawless improv in character, maintaining a steady dialogue flow, incorporating the audience contributed element throughout and producing an ending that vividly supports the moral of the story... and doing it straight out, with no phony baloney, for great comic results. Of course, the narrator concludes what was begun in true Serling style...in The Twilight Zone. The scene: a new factory employee (Kelly Holden-Bashar) is a lid tester for bottles of relish. She quickly learns that the relish has strange powers that endow ordinary human beings with super strength. This is a covert government operation, and when this lady breaks the rules and goes too far, she is dismissed. Other actors in the scene include Dan O'Connor as a stern boss, Stephen Kearin as an odd employee who is ferociously addicted to the relish, Nick Massouh as a delivery boy and Brian Lohmann as another trusted employee. Played with deadly serious intent, the playlet came off with drop-dead hilarity. Another terrific scene that involved a mode of transportation - audience suggestion was a scooter - presented a corporate exec (Massouh) and his new talking scooter (O 'Connor's offstage voice) that takes him on a whirlwind trip to Italy - it is an Italian scooter after all - where he meets the girl of his dreams (Lauren Rose Lewis) and learns that spontaneity can really perk up your lifestyle. Sheer joy!

The spontaneously astounding cast that evening besides the already mentioned Massouh, O'Connor, Bashar, Kearin, Lohmann and Lewis, included Jo McGinley. Bravo to one and all! With simple black curtains as a backdrop, it's the talent upfront that counts and Impro has it in spades. Don't expect rehashings of old series episodes; Twilight Zone Unscripted provides fresh ones with a spot.on enjoyable taste of the essence of what was The Twilight Zone.

http://improtheatre.com/