**/***** (two out of five stars)
If you’re the kind of person who finds Improv comedy unbearably cringey, try to imagine something that would add an audible eye roll to your uncomfortable squirming in your seat at an Improv show. Yes, that’s it: Hypnosis. Take Improv, a spontaneous comic styling that is generally hit or miss and involves quick-witted performers who are unafraid of looking idiotic in front of large crowds, and add to it the dubious art of “hypnosis” and you have the new, unfortunately named production at the Daryl Roth Theatre (through October 30) that is HYPROV.
There could be no better advertising for a well-written script and well rehearsed actors than Improv, but the discipline has wrought some of our great actors and comics (e.g. Amy Poehler and Kristin Wiig), most drawn from the ranks of LA’s Groundlings and New York’s Upright Citizen’s Brigade. And HYPROV features none other than Colin Mochrie, best known for his terrific work on both the UK and US version of “Whose Line Anyway?” which featured a cast of terrific, well-trained comics who excelled at the art. Unfortunately, in HYPROV Mochrie is the only performer with such credentials, and the imbalance between his talents and the audience volunteers’ is stark.
While Mochrie and his hypnotist co-host Asad Mecci seem to share a strong command of the stage and their act, director Stan Zimmerman allows the production to go quickly off the rail, when Mecci spends an excessive amount of time both explaining hypnotism and then choosing his subjects from the audience members asked to approach the stage. The whittling down of 20+ candidates (mostly young, 20-30 somethings who appear overly eager to be on a stage, any stage) seems to take around 20 minutes, during which time audience members are only vaguely entertained by the goings-on. That’s a lot of time to wait for entertainment, and the process should have taken place prior to curtain.
Once the final candidates are “hypnotized” some demonstrations take place: on the night I attended, those under hypnosis (“for entertainment purposes only” we were oddly, continually reminded) were told that when they awoke they would realize they were “missing their belly buttons” and that they should seek them in their immediate environs. While amusing, the exercise was preposterous, suggesting that not only were the subjects hypnotised, but that they had completely taken leave of their senses. Similar, though moderately less absurd scenarios ensued for the next hour or so.
Though the audience is continually reassured that there are no “plants” or “shills” in the audience (aside from a nightly “guest star,” who is also hit or miss) who come forward to be hypnotised, I had a lot of doubts and many questions. It was clear that even among the five selected—including one young woman who was sent back to her seat after she recoiled when the young man next to her flopped his “hypnotised” head onto her shoulder—most had extensive training as actors. One was clearly a trained ballet dancer, as made apparent by his near attempt at a backflip on the stage, which Mecci wisely stopped.
The Daryl Roth Theatre’s proximity to not only NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, but the Stella Adler acting school, mere yards from the door of the theater, made one suspicious that, at the very least, scores of theater students saw this production as an opportunity to get some stage time. The excessive “theatricality” of many of the first wave of volunteers suggested that this was not your average theater audience. One wonders if they are routinely invited or encouraged to attend these shows.
While Mochrie led the volunteers through a series of sketches, some dry, some quite clever (like a Sam Spade-esque “detective noir” episode), there were laughs and impressive moments, but they were few and far between, with Mochrie providing the bulk of the entertainment and clever banter. Had he been performing with a group of similar performers, it would’ve likely been an entertaining evening.
HYPROV stumbles in its concept before anything else can go wrong. The idea of asking audience members to pay between 60 and 100 dollars for an off-Broadway show that is primarily performed by amateurs is rather outrageous; especially when the dollar to laugh ratio ends up being about 20 to 1. Were it performed next door in Union Square Park for a pass-the-hat fee then it might have felt like solid entertainment. But professional theater can, and should, be better than this.
HYPROV: Improv Under Hypnosis. Through October 30 at the Daryl Roth Theatre (101 East 15th Street at Union Square East). Performances Wednesdays through Sundays, with an additional show on Saturdays at 10:00 pm. 100 minutes, no intermission. www.hyprov.com
Photos: Carol Rosegg
