Bad Dog Learns New Tricks

When you just say “yes” to moving forward, you will be amazed at the path that unfolds before you.

My passion is improvised comedy. It’s given me skills and confidence in both work and life but most of all, it’s given me joy even when life isn’t joyful. If you love the comedy of the likes of Tina Fey, Eugene Levy and Alan Arkin, chances are that you are someone who loves improv, too.

My story

I took my first class at the Second City Training Centre in Toronto in the early 2000s. I was working a stressful job at that time and didn’t have much time for homework or anything else. It was something I could do every week, feeling like a had a creative outlet but I also had to feel like I was getting a creative release, too!

There’s something about collaborating with another performer, creating a story on the spot that lives in the moment, shared with the people in the room with you, that can’t be replicated anywhere else. It’s a great way of learning to tell a story, collaborate with other creative people and to fundamentally push away the mental blocks that sometimes stop us from taking risks.

I moved over to Bad Dog Theatre after completing my Second City studies. They simply had more learning and performing opportunities for anyone wanting to get more practice. It helped refine my skills and gave me the opportunity to learn more about myself. There’s no better way to become self-aware than to stand before an audience and learn how that react to you - your body language, your voice and what you think is funny.

I support my passion now as a board member of the Bad Dog Theatre here in Toronto. Since 1983, the theatre has proven its resilience and appeal, moving and morphing through a long line of leaders and performers and in different venues across the city.

Why it’s great

Bad Dog Theatre is not a “run-of-the-mill” comedy factory. Our mission is to “transform the culture and perception of improvised theatre, elevating the art form to unprecedented standards of success and professionalism.”

That includes making room for everyone in our community. We have a diverse blend of performers and programming while trying to expand our audience through a commitment to accessibility, inclusion and diversity.

That has been especially important as most of us faced isolation and anxiety in the face of COVID-19.

Where we are now

When the pandemic came, we had to make the difficult choice to move out of our physical space and offer all of our classes and programs online. Thank goodness for Youtube because it gave Bad Dog Comedy TV a chance to be born and to thrive.

We are blessed with a canny and forward-thinking artistic director, a capable staff and a committed community of performers, teachers, technicians and, most of all, patrons who have support our academy, shows and festivals throughout a most difficult time in world history.

To me, that’s why we have the best improv theatre company in the world and I want more of the world to see it and take part.

Our current membership comes from classes and viewers. We make money from an ongoing rotation of online classes and are starting to make headway with our YouTube subscriptions.

Our greatest untapped resource is the 35 years of past performers, teachers and students who could rally behind the theatre. One of my goals as a board member is to create an alumni association to keep all of our past participants in the loop about the great things happening at our theatre. We need a place or platform that bring them together from wherever we might be sitting, all around the world.

A partner like Memberful could help us to take the next step in expanding our global community and sharing our vision with the world. A membership platform could help us with that while expanding our audience further and wider than any of us imagined. We could take care of the past and the future all at once.

To see what we have to offer and learn more, please visit us at our web site and our YouTube channel. We would love to have you join us.