Last night I went to see the Whose Line is it Anyway? live show in Santa Rosa, followed by Colin Mochrie and Brad Sherwood's improv tour tonight in Sacramento. Besides the performers (the current Whose Line tour lineup is Ryan Stiles*, Greg Proops, Jeff Davis and Joel Murray), there are probably three major differences between the shows. Laura Hall provided live piano accompaniment for the Whose Line show, while Colin and Brad performed to tracks. I suppose improv purists might be bothered by having the same instrumental tracks for each show, but I'd counter that the live music tends to follow pretty standards forms when it's used, even on the show. Brad and Colin would do some longer games, and more of their games either weren't on the TV show, or weren't in heavy rotation on the show. Most of the time Colin and Brad got suggestions from the audience before saying what the game was, while the Whose Line gang usually called out the game first. *Ryan was not there in Santa Rosa (and he probably misses/missed their other shows this weekend), but they got Drew Carey to sub in. Understandably, he was a bit rusty and repetitive, to the point of using the same Dobie Gillis reference twice. (For those less charitable among us, you could note that Drew usually hosted the TV show, and rarely performed.)
The main drawback with these shows is the audience. You can expect a lot of (dumb, repetitive, boring, nonresponsive) suggestion shouting. If you had to choose between the two shows, I'd go with whichever one has more of your favorite performers. If that's not a factor, Brad and Colin's show will be different enough that you won't think it's just like a TV episode. Either way, it's a fine way to spend an evening. Best,David -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/358080149.2118329.1708241594703%40mail.yahoo.com.
