Guerilla Theatre with Ripley Improv at the Old LA Zoo

It was another sunny day at the Old LA Zoo. No event was scheduled. No permission needed. No script was written. Ripley Improv performed Dystopia for the first time in three years; for the last time for Sara Mountjoy-Pepka.

Dystopia in a derelict zoo is guerilla theatre at its finest. And the Ripleys know how to use their surroundings.

Who is Ripley?

Taken straight from their website, Ripley Improv is

“An all-female improv collective that creates stories about real [ not parodied or stereotyped ] women who save the day, save the world, and save each other. [ their mission is ] To awaken bravery, embrace weird, and cultivate play.”

“We embrace our inner weirdness, we’re fearless,
we’re constantly evolving, and we’re pretty badass!” Amanda Troop, Director of Dystopia

She’s not lying!
Learn more at ripleyimprov.com

What about Dystopia?

Dystopia is a female-protagonist-driven narrative improv show in the style of Young Adult novels like “The Hunger Games”, or “Divergent”. It has all of the awesome action/romance moments, and all of the gorgeous messages about being true to yourself that YA novels are known for. It also embraces the idiosyncratic cringy aspects of YA in a way that celebrate, rather than ridicule the genre.

Ripley will put on an hour-long show that could be a first draft of a YA novel, complete with world building and epic sci-fi/fantasy elements. There’s even a Hot Guy who the protagonist meets. Not always, but often enough that I’ve come to love it when it happens. Every show is unplanned and completely different, even the Ripleys don’t know what they’re going to make.

My friend Kevin at the Book Shop would LOVE this show.
Kevin! Why don’t you know about this?!

Back to the Zoo

I don’t know what large animals were once caged in the enclosure Ripley selected, perhaps bears, or tigers - something wild and dangerous was forced to live within these tiny confines. Incongruous stone picnic tables have been installed inside the enclosure by the park authorities who maintain the old zoo. It was an emotionally resonant choice for a collective coming together to perform after spending so much time in lock-down.

The Ripleys formed years earlier from friends who took improv classes together. And they were immediately adept in using the concrete stone facades, park benches, enclosure holes, and even found objects such as leaves, or a discarded coat hanger to tell their story. The power of improv is that you can use everything, weaving the found and the unexpected into the story. Viewpoints training helps with this as well.

The acoustics were fantastic, and the afternoon sun behind the enclosure made a natural shade, so it suited an improvised performance very well. After all, an animal enclosure in a zoo takes into consideration many of the same concerns a playhouse would.

The tech setup could be deliciously minimal because of that. Only a laptop and two bluetooth speakers were needed.

A side-rant about copyright music

Many improv groups will use carefully selected music they don’t have the rights to during their performances. And one of the chief ways improv groups are kept from sharing art online is due to their reliance on copyright music.

Hollywood does the same thing. When creating a new movie or TV show, directors often use copyright “temp music” as placeholders to get a sense of how the edit will work once they put in their original music (which unfortunately ends up sounding very much like the temp more times than not).

Street performers and independent bands also make the majority of their money on cover music, speaking to the copyright-saturated zeitgeist. Tragically, because this music is both everywhere and copyright protected, small art is effectively prohibited on online platforms like Youtube.

Back to Ripley

Ripley indeed does have art on Youtube, and you should check it out! During lockdown they recorded in an amazingly innovative way where each member has their own isolated recording studio. All those feeds get cut together live in a medical drama like “Heartbeats”.

But for this occasion, there was no need to be so formal. There was no recording equipment present. This revolution won’t be televised.

Nevertheless, it was an emotional gathering - partly for being the first time performing together in-person, and partly because one of their number is leaving for Chicago.

“Besides my home with my family, Ripley is one of the first places I ever felt home as well. … So I know how special this is, because I’ve been without it. So thank you to Ripley for seven years of home and love. And thank you to you all because you’re all each part of communities for me as well which have been home, like I’ve never had until I came to LA. … I’m excited to shift away from Hollywood, because after eight years of being here, I realized I didn’t care about Hollywood I just cared about what this is and what we do."Sara Mountjoy-Pepka, Ripley Member

Sara will continue to be part of Ripley. And with the power of the distributed theatre this “home” has innovated together, she can be a part of it even at a distance.

My (terrible) re-telling of the Improv

Suggestion: “Water Bottle”

Part 1:

When Hydra cannot perform the prescribed emotional response by crying at her father’s funeral, a funeral where her father’s body is committed to the sky by a bunch of ravens coming down and carrying him off, she is cast out by the Shaman, Grape (Jade Law) for being a bad influence. Hydra’s friend Melon (Madi Goff) tries to help but can do nothing.

Part 2:
Hydra wanders into the west where she discovers a strange old mentor-figure (Aliza Pearl) who knows the secret of water. The mentor turns out to be the leader of a community of Leaf-worshipers who all have a fascination with leaves, and bizarre responses to any situation, even one who just “ribbits” a lot (Amanda Troop). Among the villagers is a Hot Guy named Duvel (Kelly Lohman), who rarely responds at all.

Duvel, the hot guy is not convinced. In private, he criticizes Hydra for not expressing genuine feelings instead of prescribed socially approved responses from a book. It also turns out the Book of Prescribed Emotional Responses is a book Hydra’s father wrote to encourage the Sand-bathers to express their feelings.

The Leaf-worshiper Leader reveals privately to her second in command (Teri Gamble) that Hydra is the chosen one according to the prophecy, a prophecy that demands that Hydra lead the Leaf-worshipers to bring water to the Sand-bathers.

Part 3:

Back in the west, Hydra is practicing the bow and arrow (she’s uncannily good at it) when Duvel notices. I can’t remember the exchange any more, but they talk for a while flirting, in that disdainful way teenagers flirt with each other. There may be an important plot point I missed, but I was focused on getting good camera shots (sorry). I do remember Duvel reaches out to wipe away a genuine tear Hydra shed for her father after describing his golden-green eyes.

Part 4:
They all go to bring water to the Sand-bathers. Melon (Madi Goff again) says they sure hope their grandma is safe. Just then some ravens drop Melon’s dead grandma into the water right where they are standing. Everyone screams, but Melon’s grandma begins to glow and comes back to life. It turns out that when the ravens carry the dead away from the Sand-bathers, they drop the bodies into the water and the bodies come back to life and live on in the west.

Just then, Hydra’s father shows up (Kelly Lohman), and he’s very proud of all Hydra has accomplished, especially about being sincere with her emotions.

Then the Shaman arrives to ruin the party. But the Leaf-worshiper Leader turns out to be the sister of the Shaman. They are about to be reconciled when ominous music starts playing and the Shaman turns into a gigantic raven. The raven terrorizes all, but Hydra pierces it with an arrow and the shaman returns to their original form, falls into the water, comes back to life, reconciles with their sister, and all is well.

Epilogue:

The end.