Pop! Sketch Comedy for the Gifted

Executive Director of PhillyGayCalendar

Lady Gaga and Cyndia Lauper do a makeover on a shocked fan. A harried receptionist at the American Sperm Professionals of America accidently drinks some of her company’s product. And then there’s the latest installment of  the outrageously popular Gaga Vlog hosted by Lady Bling Bling and her associate, Focus.

And, to cap it off, a testicle pops out of a costume during a parody of RuPaul’s Drag Race.

‘Cause in live comedy, anything can happen. And at Pop! Sketch Comedy for the Gifted, one thing that can happen is accidental nudity, including the infamous testicle reveal.

"It’s good it happened on the first night, too," says Pop! cast member Liam Daley, "because people kept coming back to see if it would happen again."

A smattering of the buoyant cast are assembled tonight to rehearse and I’m treated to a sneak peek of the upcoming performance. Daley is running through the opening monologue. He’s coached by Pop! director and Barrymore-nominated actor Keith Conallen.

"This shit just writes itself," Conallen remarks as the cast moves quickly to rehearse the next scene: "Little OB-GYN, Big World."

After they finish rehearsing, I sit down with some of the cast and pummel them with questions.

http://phillygaycalendar.com/images/columns/402a.jpgTimaree: So, since I’m writing for the PhillyGayCalendar, how gay are you?

Conallen: We have one straight male member. So, like 99%. All the girls are gay, they like dudes.

Frances Calter: We’re not afraid to go with a good gay joke… or a good autism joke

Madonna Refugia: Or rape. I love rape.

Timaree: Ok, so how Philly are you?

Daley: Straight up for real like a motherfucker.

Conallen: About 80% of our cast is from around the South Philly area

Refugia: I live in Center City with all the beautiful people.

Calter: We have highly Philly content.

Timaree: How do you classify your brand of comedy/entertainment?

Daley: (with food in his mouth) Wee vulgar

Conallen: A wee vulgar?

Daley: I meant witty vulgar. I have food in my mouth.

Conallen: Witty vulgarity, yeah. It’s clever, it’s smart.

Calter: It’s uncensored. It’s relevant, it’s pop culture- we make fun of a lot of celebrities and stuff that’s going on in politics.

Timaree: What are favorite recurring characters?

Carl Boccuti: Wade’s weiner.

Conallen: That was nice when that popped in. We’ve had some other repeat stories. We have a sketch called Tough Questions with a father and his six year old daughter. The daughter has lots of tough questions she needs to ask like, "what are baby wigs? How do gay people make babies?" And "could the power of holding your pee generate the electricity for an entire city?"

Timaree: What’s the grossest or weirdest thing you’ve ever had to do for a sketch?

Refugia: On stage bukkake.

Mark Dahl: Amanda would say crapping on Hitler.

Calter: And as Hitler, I would say that was pretty gross too. But I had on a surgical mask, so you know…

Daley: But not in a demeaning way. Like in a kinky, they were both into it…. What was the line? "I’m ‘omnisexual’?"

Conallen: No, "unisexual. You can do it anywhere in the UNI-verse."

http://phillygaycalendar.com/images/columns/402b.jpgTimaree: What is the goal of Pop!?

Calter: To make you laugh. It’s just fun. To get people drunk and have a fun Monday night. What else are you going to do on a Monday?

Boccuti: There’s a great atmosphere to the whole scene. There’s a bar, you can get up, watch it as much as you feel like it. There’s not a tight line between the stage and the audience.

Calter: It has a very vaudeville-esque feel.

Daley: It has a fly-by-the-ass charm, I think. If vaudeville was happening now in Philadelphia and was kind of gay, I think that’s what this would be.

Conallen: "Pop!: Kind of Gay Vaudeville." I like it actually. We’re changing our postcards!

Refugia: And it’s in a Mexican restaurant.

Boccuti: And our tech angle is quite good.

Conallen: Yes! A lot does go into the tech- it really adds to the show and makes it pop.

Daley: It helps pull the whole thing together as a coherent unit. They’re all unified by the sharp audio-visual elements.

Dahl: I think everybody’s seen sketch comedy around town. You expect you’ll go in a room and see people on stage in the same thing in every scene. We pumped it up a level where it can be filmed for television. It’s like you’re in a TV audience, which is the difference.

Refugia: Wade’s balls.

Conallen: Is that like the third or fourth time we’ve mentioned Wade’s balls?

Dahl: When you think Pop!, you think Wade’s balls.

Calter: No, that’s going on the postcard.

So, if you like testicles, the Gaga, or supporting live theater and if you’re not occupied the third Monday of the month, check out Pop! Sketch Comedy for the Gifted, part of the Traverse Arts Project.  Next show is April 19th.

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