*Cue the seductive sounds of a solitary saxophone echoing along a misty, dark alleyway* The cool September rain, now abated, has puddled and pooled in the potholes, dancing and sparkling murkily in the light of headlamps of cars passing down the cobbled Newport streets, just off Broadway. A solitary figure is illuminated briefly as he enters the overlarge doors of the Firehouse. His pale face is accentuated by his shaven head. But it’s not his appearance that exposes him as a foreigner. No. Only when he speaks… His name, you ask? Vlad …. Vlad Tenenbaum. And on this dark, stormy, September night, he has a mission; a mission to make you laugh.
With Vlad as the Host on Friday, he was joined by fellow Bit Players, Frank Fusaro, Dylan Eberle, Neal Leaheey, Stephanie Conrad and his first time on the stage as a player, and not behind the keyboard, was Chuck Malone.
In “Slideshow” Frank took us all on a trip to Greenland. As the rest of the players created poses captured on the slides, Frank not only had to offer an explanation of the poses, but weave them cohesively into his story.
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| Dylan, Stephanie, and Frank in "Good Cop / Bad Cop" |
In all the Firehouses, in all the world, the vixen, Stephanie, strode into this one. And as the perpetrator of a crime (supplied by the audience), Stephanie was subjected to the questionable interrogation methods of the Firehouse’s version of law enforcement played by Dylan and Frank. In “Good Cop /Bad Cop” Stephanie had to confess to her crimes of killing Bob Barker, with a wishbone, in Never-Land.
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| Frank,Neal, and Stephanie perform "Doo Run Song" |
Frank, Neal, and Stephanie surprised audience member, Lynn, celebrating her birthday with her family at the Firehouse Theater with a “Doo Run Song”. Hubby, Joe, daughter Amanda, and son Jason, who described his mom as amazingly wonderful, gave up Lynn, a retired teacher of 7th and 8th graders to be the spotlighted by the Bit Players, who created an improvised song all about her.
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| Bill Crossen is "Serenaded" by The Bit Players |
Lynn wasn’t the only person to be singled out by her friends and family. Up next, Bill Crossen, was not only highlighted for his 55th birthday, he also called to the stage to be “Serenaded” by the Bits. As an added bonus, his friends provided some pictures beforehand to the Firehouse’s graphics team who created a very special movie played on the BIG screen in honor of Bill.
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| Frank and Stephanie in "Stunt Doubles" |
In keeping with the mysteriousness of the murky night, a lost dog was the suggestion for “Stunt Doubles”. In this bit Frank and Stephanie as pretentious actors call for their doubles, Dylan and Neal, to perform even the most miniscule of tasks. Neal and Dylan were tasked with hanging posters to find the lost dog Fluffy, as well as thinking and searching as a dog. With Neal (acting for Stephanie) doing his business on Dylan’s leg, and Dylan “picking up” after this wayward little doggie, Frank scolded Stephanie for being “way too into this”.
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| Stephanie provides advice to Frank in "Bartender" |
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| Chuck, Neal and Stephanie in "Bartender" |
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| Dylan laments to his "Bartenders" Neal and Stephanie |
The audience too was feeling a little hazy as the suggestions for the night became even more seedy. In “Bartender” with Stephanie and Neal acting as the proprietors, their job, in addition to satiating their patrons thirst, is to provide advice in the way of song to their patron’s unique problems. Dylan, endowed with diarrhea, and Frank provided with herpes as their problems by the gentleman(?)Sean, in the front row, turned the tables with their songs. Frank took the suggestion and sang an entire song about his girlfriend who couldn’t say her P’s. Stephanie (who is actually trained in speech therapy) provided Frank with a clinical approach to his problem. Stephanie offered the technical description of forming the “P” sound. Evidently this was factually correct information to the speech pathologist sitting in the back of the theater, who hollered out “Bilabial”! Before we get to Dylan’s dilemma, Chuck was up next with his issue of wanting to play baseball but having asthma. Neal offered Chuck the response that he could still play, and puff-puff on his inhaler if he just ask his coach to be the designated hitter, as he wouldn’t have to do much else, except hit the ball, and puff-puff-puff away. Finally Dylan got his retaliation on Sean by singing about somebody pooped their pants tonight with a refrain of “Sean’s got diarrhea to-niiiiii-iiight!” Diarrhea-cha-cha-cha!!!
In the second set, “Actor’s Nightmare” connected in the target’s bulls eye with the audience. Dylan, who could only read lines out of a script selected by the audience, had to be justified by Frank’s dialog and continuation of complete story. As welders, Frank created a cage for Dylan to keep him safe from the world, until Frank realized that the cage would not help. The two would have to confront and take down all of the characters that were out to get them (Susan, Anya, Hellen, Mrs Bahoynkin (who was doping) and Sir Lawrence). Watch to see what happens in this hilarious scene . Click the video here -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lFT4fOQ6Ts&feature=youtu.be
Sitting in the darkness of the theater, Ben was found and singled out for also celebrating his birthday. His secret desire to be a sailor Ben’s wish was brought to life before his very eyes, and performed as an “Irish Drinking Song” by Stephanie, Frank, Dylan, and Neal. In the Bit Player version of Ben’s sailing days, Ben fought a giant squid and ended up after taking a hit from his bong of having visions of Captain Hook and Smee.
Sitting in the darkness of the theater, Ben was found and singled out for also celebrating his birthday. His secret desire to be a sailor Ben’s wish was brought to life before his very eyes, and performed as an “Irish Drinking Song” by Stephanie, Frank, Dylan, and Neal. In the Bit Player version of Ben’s sailing days, Ben fought a giant squid and ended up after taking a hit from his bong of having visions of Captain Hook and Smee.
In “Half-Life”, a bit where the entire story of a fairytale is told in a scene performed by the players in increasingly smaller amounts of time, 1 minute, then 30 seconds, then 15 seconds and finally 5 seconds. The audience took pleasure in the painfully frenetic pace of the fairy tale (Hansel and Gretel) as bodies flew and were thrown across the stage.
In Saturday night’s performance it was like the Tale of Two Cities – “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity…” But mostly it was - foolishness and incredulity.
Originally scheduled to be at another Bit Player performance, Neal Leaheey, Stephanie Conrad, Lobo Linhares, and Jim Foley, through a fortuitous turn of events (for us), the affair was cancelled. So they joined, the rest of the cast of players, Frank Fusaro, Dylan Eberle, Matt Lindman, and Clayon McFarlane on this epic night.
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| Frank, Clayon, Dylan, and Matt in "Irish Drinking Song" |
Audience member, Jessica, working in facilities management sales, and celebrating her birthday was surprised to be the focus of an “Irish Drinking Song” performed by Frank, Clayon, Dylan, and Matt. Although the players were not initially inspired by Jessica’s current job, Jessica offered her secret desire of owning a hot dog truck, which the players eagerly accepted as a suggestion and provided Jessica a taste of living out her dream in this Bit Player version of her life in hot dog sales.
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| Jim and Matt in Shakespeare Alphabet" |
If that wasn’t zany enough, next up was “Shakespeare Alphabet”, a scene game where the actors tell a Shakespearian style story, but can only speak their dialog beginning with the next consecutive letter of the alphabet. There is no way to capture in words, the shocking events that happened in this scene about “Love and Madness” performed by Jim and Matt… Watch it for yourselves! Click the video here -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDfN3PeuiSA&feature=youtu.be
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| Frank and Matt in "Bartender" |
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| Dylan, Frank and Clayon in "Bartender" |
All the bits were called to the stage to perform “Doo Wop Song . An audience suggestion of an inanimate object becomes the inspiration for this improvised song. The Bit Players will profess their love for it in the style of a 60’s doo-wop. The inspiration for tonight’s song was the “blankie”.
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| Matt and Clayon perform in "Sportscasters" |
“Sportscasters” was next on the docket. In this bit, the suggestion from the audience was cleaning the bathroom. The two players performing this bit, Clayon and Matt acted out the suggestion as if it were being broadcast by our sports reporters Dylan and Frank (aka Chet and Chip Ripplebeck). The scene gets more bizarre as Matt (aka Mark Goldberg) takes a plunger to Clayon (aka Derek Johnson) and proceeds to plunger him in the face and then pees on Derek. Derek however gets the last laugh as he kills Mark with a monkey wrench and win Toilet Bowl Bowl 2012.
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| Liz has some fun with Matt as she is "Serenaded" by The Bit Players |
In the second set, long-time Bit Players fan, Liz, was honored for her birthday and called to the stage to be “Serenaded”. Not happy with her daughter Bailey for setting this up behind her back, Liz was spotlighted on her special day in Bit Players fashion with not only a song improvised for her, but also with a movie clip shown on the Big screen. The clip was created for Liz from pictures provided by her daughter, Bailey to the Firehouse’s crack graphics team. We also learned that Liz a massage therapist by trade, had a little fun with helping Matt work out some tightness in his thigh?? Pictures don’t lie, Liz!
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| Megan and Mike are the puppet masters for Matt and Clayon in "Puppets" |
More audience members, Mike and Megan, were invited up to the stage to help with the bit “Puppets” In this bit about putting together IKEA furniture, Matt and Clayon are at the mercy of Mike and Megan who can bend and move them in any direction they want. These two players must then make the scene make sense based on their physical position. The audience loved the zaniness with Mike and Megan as the puppetmasters.
The foolishness of the night ended with a Blues Song where the entire cast helped out to sing a song about “Zombies”
Before we lose the attention span of our A.D.D. fans out there, the Bit Players want to once again remind you about the special Halloween Show on Wednesday, October, 31st from 8-9 pm. Those fans coming to the show dressed in costume will pay only $5 at the door for their admission. There will be lots of hilarious hijinx, candy, and a costume judging contest with prizes too. Make your reservations early. You don’t want to miss out!
The Bit Players perform improv comedy every Friday and Saturday night at 8:00pm at the Firehouse Theatre, 4 Equality Park Place (off Broadway), Newport, RI 02840. Please call the box office for reservations and information about all of the shows 401-849-FIRE (3473) And it is always BYOB!
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