Awkward Silence creates 4 improvised musicals

The John Waldron Arts Center auditorium rang with laughter last Thursday, Friday and Saturday as Awkward Silence Comedy created four brand-new, on-the-spot musicals for crowds of 60 to 100 people.\n“This is kicking Awkward Silence to a whole new level,” said senior Dani Trynoski of the Union Board Comedy Committee, which helped organize the series. “They’re diversifying a lot more.” \nEach night’s show started off energetically with a performance by dance group Hip Hop ConnXion: the Sequel. The dancers performed an eight-minute set before the main event.\nSenior Brian M. Frange, Awkward Silence leader, then took the stage, asking the audience for a title for that night’s musical. \nPianist Mike Raunick, an IU alumnus, took his seat, wearing a tuxedo complete with cummerbund, bow tie and tennis shoes.\nAfter that, the performances varied quite a bit. \nThursday night’s performance, kicked off by the prompt “Flamingos Gone Wild,” became an epic tale of a suburban neighborhood lawn contest gone horribly awry. \nAudience members never knew what would happen next because generally, neither did performers. Plot twists included a decapitated topiary bear shrub, s’mores made of margarine and saltine crackers and a soul-stealing demon.\nDuring “Perfect Neighborhood,” a duet between freshman Sean Liston and junior Georgia Perry, Liston informed the crowd that “We feel right at home here, even though there’s a sexual predator right down the street!” To be fair, their characters were Neighborhood Watch members and owned a rifle named Bruce. \n“I was a little skeptical coming in, but I was really impressed,” said senior Tom Stoffel.\nFriday night brought “Alligator Planet,” in which two third-graders with ADD went up against two sixth-grade bullies in a science fair battle. The third-graders invented a fountain of youth pill for their feeble, 70-year-old teacher, who was then able to stand up to the other teachers who always made fun of him. In the end, the pill wore off, the sixth-graders turned out to be lovers and the fair was declared a tie.\nSaturday’s matinee featured “Trojan Horse Babes,” which turned into a play about spring break in Florida, where two elderly women plotted to trap college men as love slaves and shuffleboard partners in the basement of their retirement home. \n“I like the Waterslide to the Pit of Doom,” said graduate student Mike Lee. “It made it a little bit more absurd.”\nIn the Pit of Doom, also known as the Trojan Horse Retirement Home basement, senior Alex Young told her cast mates that “nothing can harm me – I’m a Florida beach dude.”\nFreshman Grace Friedman, as the Florida beach dude’s “lumpy” sidekick, was considerably less positive.\n“I’ve been rejected on average 47 times each spring break,” she informed the audience, later adding, “I’ve never really been alone before ... except on dates.”\nNot everything went perfectly for the Florida beach dude, however.\n“I can’t even count my muscles, I’m so upset,” Young said at one point. \nThe group’s final performance was “Hard Core Petino,” in which the main character Hard Core Petino falls in love with insecure freshman Melissa. \nHer overprotective parents, the school principal and vice principal won’t let her attend the upcoming dance. Ethel and Bradley, organizers of the dance, are dating. Ethel is a typical spotlight-hogging diva who insults Bradley regularly. Petino gets expelled, but Bradley stands up to Ethel and sneaks Petino into the dance, which Melissa is allowed to attend, now that Petino can’t. Petino uses a finger mustache as a disguise and Bradley pretends he’s God, who teaches everyone a lesson. Melissa and Petino reveal their love and everyone celebrates.\nChoreography from the shows included pantomimed cow-milking, an impromptu Macarena and a good deal of finger-snapping and pseudo-ballet moves.\nAudience members enjoyed the spontaneity of the shows. \n“I think they should do this more often,” Stoffel said.