Out of Bounds Interview Series: Coldtowne
The Out of Bounds Improv Festival and Miniature Golf Tournament ended on Monday after six days of blithe musings from some of the finest improv and sketch-comedy troupes in the country. In its sixth year, Out of Bounds reached new heights of comedic exuberance over the past week—and, more importantly, surely introduced a new universe of humor to an unimaginable quantity of newcomers.
But for some, Out of Bounds was more than a once-a-year opportunity to take to the stage and construct entire worlds of thought from nothing more than ephemeral impulses of wit and satire. For the improv troupe Coldtowne, Out of Bounds was an anniversary. Coldtowne relocated to Austin just over two years ago after being removed from New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina. Out of Bounds was their starting point in a new city; Out of Bounds was their Big Bang.
Since moving to Austin, Coldtowne has opened a theater, established an improv conservatory, and, just under three weeks ago, graduated a class of improv students. We spoke with Michael Jastroch, Tami Nelson, Chris Trew, and Justin York of Coldtowne about their perspective on Austin since their first Out of Bounds festival.
How do you guys see the improv community having evolved since the last Out of Bounds?
Tami Nelson: I see that we’ve opened up a theater since the last Out of Bounds.
Michael Jastroch: It has grown a lot, and there are tons of new troupes coming in. But more importantly, audiences are coming and starting to appreciate improv and comedy in Austin more and more every year. Just the fact that people here are actually willing to come and check out what we’re doing is awesome.
Justin York: The number of improvisers has increased by about four-fold. And a second theatre has opened up—ours. And two or three new teams have come onto the scene. So it’s very active.
Chris Trew: I think the biggest thing that has changed is the number of people learning and training to do improv. And with that comes new troupes and new types of shows, so the bar continues to be raised. These new guys are inspiring other new guys and keeping the old guys on their toes. It’s really impressive and fun to be a part of.
Michael Jastroch: I’m getting offended that there are people coming up that are funnier than me.
When you say there are more improvisers, is that sort of a chicken and the egg scenario? Because they’re not falling from the sky—people are becoming improvisers because they’re inspired by seeing improv. So what would you credit that to? Because there’s not a worldwide improve renaissance taking place right now.
Justin York: There actually is. If you go and you look at all of the festivals around the country, most of them are in their seven-to-ten year anniversaries at this point. But locally, as far as Austin, we’ve opened up a training center and we have been very consistent in our classes—every few weeks we have a new crop of people coming in. So we’re actively growing.
Michael Jastroch: We happened to open a training center, and I think it’s just natural that people will want to see shows and take classes.
Tami Nelson: There are five of us in Coldtowne that are working to promote the Coldtowne Conservatory. We’re also working with four other members of The Frank Mills. So what’s five plus four? If you can do that math, you can figure out how many people are working towards getting this message out and getting new students. That can be a lot of energy right now.
Michael Jastroch: And if you can do that math, you can probably improvise.
Tami Nelson: Don’t say what the number is!
Michael Jastroch: I’m not going to. Ever.
Chris Trew: When we opened up the training center, we put a lot of effort into making improv cool. We wanted people to see how cool it is in the same way we thought it was cool. We look at it as rock and roll—it’s rock and roll comedy. It’s not silly stuff all the time.
We hang out with our students all the time—our students are our best friends. There are so many fun relationships that are brewing up within the conservatory.
Justin York: The number was nine.
Do you think that makes a difference, though? A lot of people see Coldtowne as more than a theatre or a cluster of classes—they see it as their community.
Chris Trew: Absolutely. We’re Coldtowne the improv troupe, but anyone that’s taking classes or is performing in one of the troupes that formed out of here is, as far as we’re concerned, part of Coldtowne the family. And as long as we keep that mode of thinking going we’re going to keep growing.
Michael Jastroch: One of the reasons that we stayed here and didn’t go to New York or LA or back to New Orleans is that there was such a strong sense of community between the improvisers in town. The more we can build that sort of thing at the Coldtowne theater and then across the city with other improvisers—it’s all gravy. It’s such a fun, exciting group of people to get to hang out with.
Improvisers are genuine, awesome, kind people, but they’re also hilarious. What’s more fun than that?
Justin York: It should be noted that before we got here, there was a big community, the Austin Improv Collective, and we’re still a part of that—we’re very active in the AIC. But we saw that and wanted more. So it was very essential to make this a community and a community-minded project.
Is that what draws people in? I think most people have an idea of what improv is, and so they’ll go and see a show—but what do you think attracts them to joining that movement? Do you think it’s wanting to be funny on stage, or do you think it’s wanting to build real relationships and friendships with people? Is it the appeal of joining a community?
Michael Jastroch: I think it’s both. Like anything: Why do you join your softball team? Why did I join the softball team that I started? I love softball, but I also love the people I play softball with. So the two are completely tied together.
Tami Nelson: It is fun. When people come to our theater or go to the Hideout, everybody is hanging out—the audience members and the performers. And most of the time everybody knows each other and parties with each other and hangs out with each other.
But more than that, everybody is able to work on their respective projects with each other. We’ve got this really sweet, diverse group of people: There are filmmakers, there are writers, there are actors. You can draw from this community and everyone is welcome. Everyone is valuable.
Justin York: It’s also a specific type of community that’s not your softball league. In a softball league, you’re like-minded only in that you enjoy running around. But this one’s fairly specific: You get to be smart and funny on a stage. That’s not really offered in a lot of communities.
Michael Jastroch: But my softball league plays every Wednesday night at Zilker park.
Do you think some people are intimidated by that? They may come and see an improv show and think that they won’t be able to rise to the occasion on stage and say smart and funny things. Do you think that’s a barrier to entry?
We’re not doing this with the end-goal in mind of getting on Saturday Night Live.
Chris Trew: If anyone takes twenty minutes—fuck it, five minutes of our level one improv class, they’ll realize that improv is not about trying to be funny. It’s not about what most people think it’s about at first glance. It’s about being smart and honest on stage and finding the truth in comedy, which most of us subscribe to.
It looks intimidating, but once you break through that first barrier—which is what improv is all about, breaking through barriers—then they’re part of this community and they have 50 new friends instantly.
Justin York: And I don’t think a barrier to entry is a bad thing. It’s not bad at all when you’ve got people coming here and realizing that there is something special going on on-stage that isn’t for everybody.
Anyone can go ahead and try it, but it takes a lot of time to get good at improv and get comfortable on stage. But it’s a fun journey on the way. It’s like Jastroch’s softball team: You’ve got to get good before you make the A-team.
Michael Jastroch: Tryouts are Saturday the 10th at Zilker Park. Come in uniform. You have to bring your own uniform.
Do you judge a candidate’s ability based on the uniform they put together?
Michael Jastroch: Yes. They actually get their position based on their outfit.
Justin York: Which is the same way you get placed on a team in the Coldtowne Conservatory.
What would you say to someone that has just graduated from college and wants to pursue improv and is in a place in their life where they can move to go do that? If they were considering the bigger improv epicentres in the United States, what would you say to them about Austin?
Tami Nelson: I would say, “Stick around, kid!” Because there are a lot of opportunities in Austin to have immediate access to your instructors. And in larger cities like in Chicago or New York, you might be able to take a class from Big Wig So-and-So Improviser, but you won’t be able to hang out with them and pick their brains.
Chris Trew: It’s also a great place to be right now for comedy because there are tons and tons of opportunities to get stage time, and that’s the bottom line. You can perform more often here and get just as good of an education in improv.
The stand-up scene, as well. The stand-up scene here is just as funny and aggressive as other places.
Justin York: If someone did ask me where to go, though, I would ask them what they wanted. Because I’m not going to downplay New York or Chicago.
It depends on them. We can offer more stage time, but we’re not going to offer as many opportunities to go down the street and audition for a movie like in LA.
Michael Jastroch: People that want to be on Saturday Night Live think they have to go to Chicago to those training centers because they think that’s what they have to do, and to some extent that’s true.
What we’re trying to build here—we’re doing this to do it. We’re not doing this with the end-goal in mind of getting on Saturday Night Live. We’re doing this to do our own thing, and Austin’s a great place for that.
If you want to have creative control and your goal is to make art and have it seen by a lot of people, you can do that in Austin and probably a lot easier than in Chicago or LA or New York because it’s easier to get stage time.
The Coldtowne Conservatory is currently accepting students for its next session of Level 1 improv classes.
Photos, from Coldtowne's Saturday performance in Out of Bounds, courtesy of Leah Moss.
