Introducing 20Q(-ish). A new feature in which Sketchcenter, and it’s intrepid Staff, will be interviewing people in the sketch comedy community. I know there are only eleven questions this time but, hey, it's a new feature!

Our first interview is with Brian Posen, Executive Producer of the Chicago Sketch Comedy Festival and Director of the musical sketch comedy group The Cupid Players. Enjoy, and thanks to Brian for taking the time to speak with us!

Q1 John Boyle; Founder, Sketchcenter: What was the inspiration to start Chicago Sketchfest in 2001?

Brian Posen; Executive Producer, Chicago Sketch Comedy Festival: The Chicago Sketch Comedy Festival was started as a fluke. I was producing a lot of theater in the late 90's. We reserved a space for January -March 2001 for an original musical. The budget was way too high, and after 6 months of trying to work the budget, I threw in the towel. We still had the space to worry about. I contact the Theater and asked them to find another tenant. By October, they still did not find one, so I started thinking of ways to use the space. I had my own sketch group, The Cupid Players, but I knew that a sketch group could not sustain a 7 week run and cover the costs of a $2,000 a week rental. At that time, I just finished directing an all Asian sketch group, Stir-Friday Night!. I knew all the other prominent sketch groups in town, so I thought, "what if I had a showcase of all the sketch talent in town". I could give them all a performance space and keep the box and hopefully break even.
I made some calls and posted some e-mails and in 2 weeks, I had 33 sketch comedy groups on board. The first year ran 7 weeks. We gave each group a 4 week run. It was exhausting, exciting, fun and we made a few $. Plus, since it was in January, we learned that there isn't any theater in town, so we got a tremendous amount of coverage. A bad situation and a lousy time turned into a successful and exiting yearly event.

Q2 John: CIF has had a sketch stage for the past few years. Do you see them as competition?

Brian: No. CIF is primarily a showcase of improvisation. They only have maybe 6-7 sketch groups performing during their festival. It is a very small part of their festival and performed on one of the small stages away from the major theater where all the celebrities are performing. We solely focus on sketch. We are in a single 3-theater complex, rather then spread out all over town to maintain the feeling of community. Our performers are more cutting edge & grassroots. We stay with stages that perform to 150 patrons to keep the intimate feel of the art form. We focus on community, collaboration, networking and sharing, education and celebration. CIF has more emphasis on bigger names, where we are focused on more grassroots and we also give opportunities to up-and-coming groups that would not normally make a festival like CIF. The festivals have very different flavors, and both are awesome. I wish the 2 festivals would work more together. Two very successful festivals working together can produce such strength for Chicago theater and the sister art forms. Maybe in the future.

Q3 John: CSF is by far the largest sketch comedy festival in the country. What do you see as the biggest challenge in organizing the fest?

Brian: Because of our growth and popularity, and because we do not want to lose the intimacy of the festival, we are now in a position where we have to turn away quite a number of applicants. The teacher in me hates denying opportunities, but I guess that comes with the territory of success.We turned away over 70 groups this year. The producer side is happy to see such talent applying, but the teacher side hates it.
Also, $. When we expanded to 3 theaters, we had to invest a good chunk in equipment, increased advertising, etc. We are just starting to catch up from our deficit. Plus, the first 2 years, we gave away a lot of the houses just to make sure the groups had a substantial audience. So, the first 3 years, we had to work on building the reputation of the festival. Also, with our growth, production for the festival is now a year project, rather than 6 months. We want to make sure that our focus and mission are honored. We honor the artists and the patrons, and must maintain that integrity at all costs. Many of the festivals that I have been to have not been run too smoothly. They sometimes have trouble with starting times, have difficulty with traffic patterns with the patrons, they lose focus on the artists, they sometimes use their festival for self serving needs, they over charge, they sometimes treat their crew inappropriately, etc. To host 95 groups--800 artists---who have traveled from far away lands, or who have been rehearsing over their holidays, and want to share their gifts with us, I will make sure that I, and my crew, will make their experience exciting and worthwhile. By adding more opportunities, more workshops, performances, networking events, etc., we have to work harder. But those 2 weeks are bliss. They are the utopia I believe theater is all about.

Q4 John: Your musical sketch comedy group, The Cupid Players, have performed at Sketchfests in New York and Los Angeles among others. What have you learned from those fests and how have you applied them to Chicago?

Brian:After the first year of the festival, I decided to make it a yearly event. So I packed up our Cupid kids and hit the road to learn from other festivals. You watch and see what works and what doesn't and try it out. Seattle Sketchfest was a huge influence to us. We had 2 hour techs before going to Seattle and learning that 30 minutes is just fine. We learned that less is more. We had 50 minute shows, and learned 35-40 forces the group to play their 'A' game and the audience wanting more. Sitting and watching more than 40 minutes of sketch is sometimes hard unless the groups material is exceptional. The audience is fine with 45 minutes. We watched how Seattle moved their patrons with ease and adopted that. NY and Portland have the same mindset as us about honoring the talent and art form, and keeping the excitement for the talent and the patrons. I learned from other festivals to keep the times tight between acts, to make sure to treat your staff, talent and patrons with the highest respect, to clearly communicate to the talent, and to avoid any status between groups. Celebration, art form, collaboration, education, and more celebration.

Q5 John: Producing festivals is a lot of work. What do you find most rewarding?

Brian: Happy artists.
Happy patrons.
Lotsa funny.
2 weeks of 124 shows of funny to watch, share and learn from.
No competition.
Lifting a glass with friends and colleagues from all over the World.
The crew. I love our crew. I love the chance to spend 2 weeks together with them in this perfect world.
One patron came up to me after a night of shows and said "I wish my church felt like this". Bingo. That is it.

Q6 John: Let's go back in time to the young, doe-eyed Brian Posen. What happened or what did you see that made you think: I want to do sketch?

Brian: It was a natural evolution.
When I got out of undergrad, I was debating whether to go to Law School, or get my MBA. While working that summer, someone turned me on to classes at Second City. After a few months there, I fell in love with the art form and the theory behind it. There was absolutely no judgment, everyone's initiations were embraced, and the power comes from a group mindset, rather than the individual. I had no choice but to explore the art form more, which led me to grad school where I got my MBA in acting. Upon returning to Chicago, I knew that I wanted to give back because of the incredible influence improv and sketch had on my life.
I got hired at Second City 12 years ago. Over those 12 years, I was paid to be able to have the opportunity to dive into the work. How cool is that!?!
Now, I have learned that sketch, as grass roots as it is, is an art form which is so sophisticate, difficult, and such an incredible gift. You not only have the opportunity for performance, but you, as an artist, create what is important to you. You get to share your own voice, rather than someone else's words. It is a personal art form where the artist creates the material and performs it. How awesome is that!

Q7 John: Underground sketch comedy is growing all over the country. I've heard comparisons between the current sketch scene and the improv movement right before it became mainstream. What are your thoughts on this?

Brian: There seems to be a natural evolution of what is hot in popular culture.
In the 80's, stand up was it. The 90's had a boom with Improv.
The natural evolution is sketch...and we see it now.
We opened our doors one year after Seattle Sketchfest started.
San Fran started the same year we did.
LA & Portland opened their sketchfests, follwed by NYC and Toronto this year.
Philly is talking about 2006.
Sketch has been featured at improv and comedy festivals, but only in the shadows until recently.
Sketch will be on top for a while, until stand up comes around again.

Q8 John: You and the staff see a lot of demos from TONS of sketch comedy groups. Do you see any trends?

Brian: This year, the quality of production of videos have greatly increased.This is due to technology &computers being easier to use, etc.
Also, both with demos and performances, the bar has been lifted so much higher. There are now a billion sketch groups and they are forced to be smarter, more satirical, and find their own voice as a group. The trend is spreading worldwide. We have groups applying from Montana, Iowa, remote towns in remote places. It is everywhere. The demos are so important. We have seen groups have awful demos and not get in the fest. Then, when we see them live, we are blown away. Plus, the opposite is also true.

Q9 John: One of the biggest questions I get is what goes in a successful submission packet. Can you offer some advice on what you like to see from groups? And what you don't like to see!

Brian: No brainer here.
Good quality.
Spend a few $ to get someone with good equipment.
So many videos we have such a difficult time hearing the artists. Recording in a live venue is not easy. Have good picture and sound quality. Filming in a studio loses the excitement of an audience, so there is a trade off.
Also, if you record in front of an audience, make sure they are a friendly one. Have them clap after a scene. Put a plant in the house to teach their house to clap and laugh out load. Nothing kills a demo tape with an audience that does not respond. I cannot tell you how many submissions we get where the scene ends, and only a few people clap. If you are not pleasing your audience, it would be hard to justify having them come out here and us putting in over 20K in advertising to get people to see them.
So....a successful submission...a submission represents the group. If your writing is unreadable, the quality of the taping poor, the papers are all crumbled up with coffee stains, and the submission comes in a week late after a 2 month submission period, I take that as a reflection of the group and their level of commitment to us. Some groups include food, a lunch bucket, stickers, gifts to us...I like that.

Q10 John: Sketch groups tend to have very odd props. What's the oddest, most cumbersome prop an out of town group brought to Chicago?

Brian: A coffin. A washing machine.
When we are striking the festival, you would not imagine the stuff left behind. I have a basement full of swords, wigs, sexual devices, umbrellas, clothing....plus the items artist's left behind. I was being funny there.

Q11 John: Let's talk about the Chicago Sketchfest Documentary. Does it accurately portray the madness that is putting on a festival of this magnitude?

Brian: Absolutely. And absolutely not.
We work about 6 months on that beast for a one hour showing for our fundraiser. We watched over 150 hours of footage for a 50 minute product. Each group averaged about 5 seconds of coverage. The video captured every element of that festival, from load in, performances, workshops, events, to strike. But it cannot come close to the year's planning, the meetings, the staff meetings, the love shared in that place. So yes and no.

Q12 John: OK, your bio mentions Renaissance Fairs. Spill it!

Brian: We do things in our past that help teach us what we are in our present. Actually, the Ren Faire is an awesome place for training in our art form. I did 2 years of commedia work, and what better training is there for working an audience, senarios, sketch and improv, etc. I was lucky to work with Ron Scot Fry, the artistic manager of the Ren Faire who is probably the most knowledgeable person on Commedia in the Universe.