In improvisation, there is no rehearsing, no script, and no plan; it’s a show that’s based off a suggestion by a random audience member.

This toughness means that there is a glut of mediocre performances. More often than not, the team labours on with a cheap innuendo for 20 minutes, occasionally beating embarrassed giggles from the audience. But the flip side that the difficulty of improvisation provides is that it sets a challenge for talented comics.

And when you get talented comics performing, it’s magic.

The Improv Conspiracy’s show, Bear Attack, fell into the latter group. They managed to be masterfully witty whilst simultaneously avoiding all the traps of tepid improvisation. It’s clear that these guys were the professionals – not a bunch of dudes who thought, “but I’m funny at parties, man.”

Bear Attack is a Chicago style improvised comedy show. This unique style focuses on building interesting characters in long form sketches. These sketches organically flow into each other, meshed together by a running theme.

Tonight’s show had the theme of “my heart is radio,” a suggestion from the neck-beard beside me. All the shows are different. This one began with a family scene, where the radio was warbling on about the Gestapo, child spies and Betty Bethoven’s new single, “boop de boop bop”.

From there, the show transitioned into sketches about sentient racoons, a post nuclear apocalypse state, and a cat-crushing landlord. The scene transitions were plentiful – they were either from verbal clues such as the mention of “grandma” which suddenly threw the scene into grandma’s house, while others were completely random, like the suggestion of a “western stand off”.

The show was a string of these loosely connected scenes, and just when you couldn’t see a resolution, we returned to the first scene, where the radio gave a plot that seamlessly linked all the separate sketches.

The show does not build to a climax, and the unifying plot was minimal. Instead, it was a loose collection of consistently funny scenes. This gave the night a permanent backdrop of laughter. The scenes were rich with excellent dialogue, heavy with surreal humour and memorable one-liners like “but I’m dancing, mother…”.

Indeed, the show had a plethora of original one-liners – “that’s a good question….do you mind if I answer with a marionette show?”

It would be impossible to rate the skill of the individual actors; these men were a seamless team. And in a group like this, there might be one wisecracking man with a slick one liner, but he’s nothing without the guy who sets up the scene. Their teamwork was the strength of the show, and stopped the night drowning in noise as quips are shouted over each other.

Overall, it was a fantastic show. The humour was bizarre, brilliant and intelligent; there wasn’t even one standard pop culture slur. The flow of constant chuckles peaked on diamond one liners, and the audience left feeling smart, sassy and so so entertained.

Click here for more information about the show and to purchase tickets. 

They are the city’s loved and loathed life-blood – the backbone of our funny stories, sarcastic tweets and witty repartee at parties. And Melbourne Fringe show, ‘Media Release,’ taps into this love affair with ‘luvvies’ beautifully.

In just a span of 50 minutes, this whip-smart show cracked through ambition, morality, feminism and even coffee art.  It is the story of April Fuller, played by the elastic boned Isabella Valette, who claws her way to tepid fame through selling out her family.

We open with her impersonating Kiera Knightley at a flop of an audition. We stay with her as she sings her way through her struggles, reaching the dizzying fame of triple digit twitter followers.

The strength of ‘Media Release’ is its dialogue; quick, snappy and slick with superb one-liners. The sobbed, “everyone needs a painted egg from time to time!” had the audience sputtering on their inhaled beer.

Quips, such as looking like over-sexualised 5 year olds, take a bow Ariana Grande, makes the show resonate with the early 20s crew. But ‘Media Release’ kept the older audience entertained too. It nailed middle class Melbournian mockery, with a sweetness that made the audience giggle instead of bristle.

Its satirical tone is apt, lively and constant. It carries the piece and audience through what is essentially a conventional plot. But even if the plot has a touch of Hollywood predictability, the dialogue, delivery and comic music makes the show so funny that you don’t care.

Isabella Valette captured her character’s glory lust perfectly. April reeked of raw ambition, and made a chillingly convincing narcissist. Valette  herself was in-fatigable. She pumped energy into the night, wiggling and kicking her way through dances, twirls and comic musical adaptions. Which, I should note, she sang with a power that was quite astonishing in such a small space.

Maddie Chaplain, playing girlfriend/friend, talent agent and various cameos, radiated hilarity. Her cameos were scene stealing and her voice work was particularly superb. She created the arch bitch agent, Sandy, almost wholly through tone shifts and a grating accent. Luke Chaplain, who also played the husband/brother, shone as an oozing, oily, outrageous media mogul. Strangely, it was more believable than his turn as the straight character, the voice of reason, George. In contrast, when Oliver Waters played his everyday character Jacob, a barista with a fondness for foam swans, with impressive accuracy. His morally scant reality TV star, Phil, had a killer east end accent and nicely improvised crucifix kissing. But his Phil felt like a parody, whereas the caffeinated Jacob felt like superbly satirical reality.

I came away from Media Smart laughing. And whilst I wasn’t blown away by the plot’s self-discovery theme, it was funny, sharp and sexy. Go. It’s pure entertainment.