Cedar City’s Off the Cuff Comedy improvisation group celebrated their 15th anniversary with a special two-part Birthday Show on January 18th and wrapping up on the 19th. Members of the club have reunited to celebrate the significant anniversary including the hosts of the night, Wendy and TJ Penrod. The show has grown enough in its 15 years that the two shows will be able to boasts completely separate lineups of cast with 27 members for each show.
The show opened up with a game called “Slideshow” that featured recreations of pictures taken on a vacation to the planet, Venus. The crew acted out a Venusian ceremony of three presentations in three different phases: cleansing, presentation, and inversion. Each position was visibly uncomfortable for the performers but the game continued longer in spite of their pain. This routine became a running joke throughout the rest of the night.
Other games for the night included: “Late for Work” where an employee had to explain her tardiness because, based on the audience’s suggestions and a team member’s pantomiming skills, she accidentally kicked her cat, then was run over by a tarantula and a unicorn simultaneously. To wrap up the game, she had to explain her escape from velociraptors that took her to the edge of the flat Earth.
The game “Understudy,” which featured a ‘Dinner at Costco’ performance, “Spelling Bee,” in which a three-headed speller had to cooperate to create new words, and “Cell Phone,” where audience members’ text messages wrote out the script for the scene, were all big hits and garnered a warm reception from the crowd.
The three-hour show kept audience members engaged and laughing throughout the entirety of the event. Adam John Daly, a former OTC crew member in attendance for the show on Friday, dubbed this performance “one of the best things you can do in Cedar City on a Friday night.”
The 15-year birthday celebration was a hit for all in attendance and OTC has more to offer in their shows every week. For more information on shows and the team, visit otccomedy.com or follow them on Instagram and Twitter @otccomedy.
Story by: Tomas D’Anella
tdanella73@gmail.com
Photo by: Tomas D’Anella
