Out of Bounds Pick: VAROOM

One of the unfortunate things about improv is that even its biggest, most influential names illicit a “Who?” from the general public. Even Del Close, the father of modern improv, is recognizable to most people only as a minor character in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (he’s the teacher in the scene where Ferris gets Sloan out of class with the fake-dead-grandmother excuse).

So it’s understandable if the names David Razowsky, Dan O'Connor and Floyd Van Buskirk don’t mean anything to you. But know this: these guys are improv. Their resumes are long, and include time spent in Chicago, Amsterdam, Seattle and Los Angeles, the latter of which is their current base of operations. Apart, their achievements are staggering—Razowsky was the artistic director of Second City L.A. for ten years, O’Connor represented the U.S. in the Improv World Cup Tournament in Germany, Van Buskirk makes an appearance in A Mighty Wind, and that's just the beginning. Nonetheless, improv’s not about individual achievement. It’s about collaboration, and VAROOM is one hell of a collaboration.

VAROOM plays Saturday night, 8pm, at Salvage Vanguard Theatre. Austin's Parallelogramophonograph opens the show.