by Riley Glover
In Downtown Pensacola, a form of comedy is practiced that sends shivers down the spine of the average onlooker and irrational laughter from those afflicted. A style practiced that even saying the words can cause looks of terror: Improvisation Comedy. Improv has become one of the most influential forms of humor over the past last half century, and while many can exist in a major city like Chicago or New York, we have one we can call our own: “Improvable Cause”
What’s interesting about Improvable Cause when compared to other groups of their kind is that they specialize mainly in short-form improv, a style more focused on short games based on using audience suggestions to fuel structured forms of play rather than long form improv’s need to create stories.
If you have any familiarity with the long running tv show Whose Line Is It Anyway? you would have a strong idea of what their shows are like. These can tell stories in some games, but they need less effort than a proper half-hour show. These games reinforce a genuine connection with a broad audience, allowing the audience more control of the objects used as a reference point in their shows.
The group takes deep pride in the way they construct their shows; they respect the audience as a part of the experience, as much as they like to reinforce the social connections the troop has together. Many of these games are exercises in social interactions in communication and understanding that everyone deals with on a day-to-day basis.
It’s arguably the key to the group’s success over the past 18 years. Starting in the early 2000’s as a group that would get together and act at what is now known as local establishment “End of the Line Café” for fun, long-term on and off member Nicole (or Cole for short) Dickson would transform the group from a private collective into a publicly playing performance group around 2003 to 2004 at an earlier version of local bar and performance venue “The Handlebar.” In 2005, they would finalize a recuring location in the former Sliver Screen as their main home of operation until that unexpectedly closed in 2013, leading the Pensacola Little Theatre to take them in what’s now their main performance place.
As expected, a lot of people have moved in and out over the years. Cole and other member Topher Warren have been in and out of the collective throughout history. The number of members has fluctuated anywhere between 7 to 15 different people being involved as some part of the collective, creating an imbalance that limits who gets to perform. The early 2020s were particularly rough on them, leading to massive changes in people leaving and entering the group, COVID experiments tried and thrown away in the wind, and the proper incorporation of the “Improvable Cause” by Laynie Gibson, Brooke Hardy and Becca Timmons. It’s been a particularly rough era for the group, which leads directly to one of their most interesting experiments of late.
Due to a December 2023 visit, they got to perform with legendary comedian Kevin McDonald (member of the legendary comedy troupe “The Kids in the Hall”and the voice of Pleakley in the “Lilo & Stitch” franchise) a long form show, an act that kicked them into high gear into taking long form improv seriously. Particularly member Michael Daw, who really pushed for the group to lean into this idea of doing long form performance.
They decided on naming it “Cheese for the Table,” an in-joke based on Becca’s habit of buying a cheese dish for the collective whenever they went together to eat before shows. As much as it was a tongue in cheek nickname, it works as a great symbol of sorts for the group, refining the individual attempts to connect with the collective and vice versa in the hope of a greater goal.
While word isn’t out yet on whether “Cheese on the Table” will become a long form project, it has already been successful enough to get a second show at the “Handlebar” with uproarious laughter at both shows, a long cry from their previous attempt back at the silver screen doing long form that failed miserably. Despite all the hardship, they’ve been able to successfully keep themselves as this weird, loose collective that stands as one of Pensacola’s most interesting entertainment institutions.
If you might have any interest in joining the group, it’s not really a thing you join through a rigid recruitment procedure, but something you prove with a good sense of creative play. Outside of the shows, Improvable Cause also has regular workshops for both team building exercises for businesses and for people who are interested in improv to learn from people who do it.
Many of the people you see today at Improvable Cause met through the workshops and synergized with the collective so well that they became official members. For Improvable Cause to do its magic, everyone must feel like they’re in the joke no matter what status or connection they have to improv. Of all the things that become admirable about Improbable Cause, it’s mainly how it’s been able to help teach people social skills and connect people together in a way that’s difficult these days in our world. All the people in Improvable Cause have full–time jobs outside of the group, so for many of them this is a way to not only build social connections, but to have a hobby outside of their work.
Improvable Cause, for these people, is a way to express their creativity. It also serves as a need for social connection in a constructive manner that gives back to the community in a creative way. Improv came from a unique creative place that gave birth to a distinct style of comedy that can encourage pro-social behavior in between teammates and the audience.
Improv comedy blurs the line in between the artist and the audience, thus shattering the line in between who’s in and who’s out. Instead of simply just being an escape from the normal day, improv directly encourages the audience to have a sense of play and courageousness of how they want to live their lives and take control of it.
