Getting a Group Reaction as an Comedy Host

Video Transcript

Hi there, it’s Les McGehee again, at ExpertVillage.com. I’m the author of Plays Well With Others, and what we are talking about is improvisation, and especially improvised comedy shows. In particular now we’re talking about hosting and starting up those shows. Hopefully you’ve seen the previous clips on this, talking about pre-show and your first moments on stage saying hi to everybody. But now you have a few things to do, to professionally get that audience ready for that show. Until you have very specific ideas, about your show and how you want to get the audience to your show, here’s some basic rules that will almost always work for you in some fashion or another. First of all, after you’ve said hi to everybody it’s great to have a reason to have everybody to applaud at once. They kind of want to in a way, so it’s not as though you’re asking for very much. Very often, after I’ve said hi, I say, we have a great cast together for you and a great show, we’re all really excited, we’re so happy to be here today, we’re at the Hide Out Theatre, so I might say, “we’re so happy to be here at the Hide Out Theatre, how about a nice round of applause for all the people here, your waiters and waitresses making you comfortable. Everyone is looking for a reason to applaud, they’re very happy to be at the show and it helps to build their expectations. There you have a group reaction, don’t spend any time on it, but it is one of the first steps you want to do, is have a group reaction, where you can get a nice round positive group round of applause out of everybody.

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