We’re excited to finally have the opportunity to put this show up – Hankin is a living legend in these parts.  Larry Hankin’s Street Stories formed the basis of Hankin’s Oscar nominated short Solly’s Diner and was last performed in San Francisco in the 1990′s. Street Stories at The Marsh is a limited engagement. Buy now!

Larry Hankin’s Street Stories
Friday and Saturday, June 1 and 2 at 8pm
at The Marsh Studio Theater
1062 Valencia at 22nd
San Francisco
Tickets: $20-35 BUY!

The San Francisco Improv Festival serves up unique opportunities for learning the art in 2012, and now we are partnering with SF Rec & Parks Department to offer an intro to improv at exceptionally affordable pricing!

A 9-week Intro to Improv class with master improvisor & SFIF board member Chris Libby is on offer for just $90 – that’s (wait for the math…) $10 a class!!

WHEN: Fridays March 23rd – May 18th: 6:30pm – 8pm

WHERE: Upper Noe Rec Center @ Day & Sanchez, SF

COST: $90 for the nine classes. Sign up here!

Continuing our 2012 season, the San Francisco Improv Festival is bringing The Committee’s Julie Payne to SF for a unique two-day weekend intensive for female improvisors, March 24th and 25th at the Alcove Theater.

In an art form that has often been deemed by many a “boys’ club,” Julie Payne brings her feminist approach and decades of comedy experience back to her roots in the San Francisco improv scene. She will encourage you to take more time, dig deeper, play from the heart, mine your own and others’ experience in improv and as women.

Get more info here or go straight to get your tix. Tickets are on sale now atBrownPaperTickets.com!

The San Francisco Improv Festival’s work in bringing Improv Everywhere’s MP3 Experiment to Union Square has been noticed by one of the premiere local lifestyle mags, San Francisco.

In a 2-page spread featuring a photo byGrecco Balatbat, San Francisco magazine captured some of what made this Summer’s festival both ridiculous and amazing [read the caption here].

Thanks to Charlie Todd, Improv Everywhere, the city of San Francisco, SF Rec & Parks, MJM Management and the thousands of people who showed up to Union Square to rock the fest!

Check out the video highlight of the event here.

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Wow. Fantastic festival, San Francisco – thank you!!

The San Francisco Improv Festival is all about community and introducing audiences to improv, and we got that and more from the Bay Area and those who came from all around to make it happen. From the OCIC award for Jim Cranna, to the amazing volunteers who showed up and covered our producorial butts and represented the festival with aplomb – to our sponsors who stepped up this year, to the big bump in attendance for all shows and the incredibly talented acts from around the bay and around the nation – the 2011 fest rocked.

There is more to come in 2011 and 2012 from a planned college tournament to more great workshops produced for the improv community and shows for San Francisco in general. Keep checking back here or keep up with us on Facebook & Twitter, or sign up to our email list. We’re looking forward to bringing you more amazing events…!

The San Francisco Improv Festival is excited to announce the addition of Emily Candini to the already deep bench of talent on Saturday night. Emily will be ‘Messed with’ by the ridiculous and ridiculously skilled Susan Messing in the 8:30 PM show on the Saturday double bill with Uncle’s Brother.

Tickets are selling really fast for this show, so get ‘em now!!

MORE ON EMILY:

Emily Candini is a California native who has been performing for over 20 years.

Obsessively in love with comedy since the age of two, she has always known her path. After years of modern and classical theater she moved to Mecca (Chicago) to study improvisation, writing and sketch with The Second City, iO Chicago and Annoyance theaters.

After six years of writing and acting in exactly one million original shows and improvising in just over a fafillion more shows, she moved to Los Angeles. Emily has won many useless awards including a Ducky (Annoyance Theater) and Del Close Awards (iO Chicago). In the past she has traveled the country and abroad performing in improv and comedy festivals in Los Angeles, Toronto, Chicago and The Del Close Marathon.

In 2010 Emily played Karen in the film All My Friends Are Funeral Singers which went to the Sundance and SXSW Film Festivals. Since arriving in Los Angeles Emily can be seen performing at The Second City, iO West and the UCB Theaters.

You can also find her online in vids like these:

http://bobodenkirk.com/?p=105#more-105

http://vimeo.com/groups/28626/videos/15852686

2011 OCIC Award designatee (is that even a word?) Jim Cranna has just been added to the panel on comedy legend Del Close. Jim will appear with fellow Committee members Chris Pray and Ed Greenberg, along with Del’s co-founder of Improv Olympic (now iO) Charna Halpern and Del Close biographer, Kim “Howard” Johnson. Charna and Howard also co-authored the improvisation classic “Truth in Comedy” with Del.

This is one rare hour of comedy talent and knowledge you don’t want to miss!!

Thanks to all of you who showed up to play on Tuesday!!

The MP3 Experiment was a huge success, with an estimated 2500 people improvising in Union Square to the dulcet tones of Steve, Improv Everywhere’s omnipotent voice on the MP3 track. Check out the video highlight from the event by clicking on the pic above, and take a loook at some other angles from NBC Bay Area and Laughing Squid!

Special thanks to SF Rec and Parks and MJM Management for rolling with an event much larger than anticipated…!

Charlie Todd’s talk and Q&A on Improv Everywhere  (Improv Everywhere Live!) was also excellent and told us how it all got started. Really, Charlie – you look nothing like Ben Folds… It was an hour of behind-the-scenes stories, clips, commentary and your questions answered with the man who started it all – thanks to all who came!

Special thanks to the SF School of Digital Filmmaking for hosting the event in their space at the SF Chronicle building (@ 5th & Mission)!

Our festival retrospective on Del Close, focusing on his early years performing and directing here in San Francisco with The Committee, has just added two new members to the panel – Committee members Chris Pray and Ed Greenberg. These fantastically talented improvisors talk (with Del’s co-authors of the improvisor’s handbook “Truth in Comedy” Charna Halpern, and Kim “Howard” Johnson) about their experiences with Del as an actor, director and not-yet-improv-guru.

Del Close, the man who trained improvisors from John Belushi to Tina Fey, and who served as the House Metaphysician for SNL’s opening season, spent his time in San Francisco forming the ideas and forms he would take with him to Chicago, including The Harold. This man is a legend in comedy and his influence is everywhere in modern comedy. Come hear how San Francisco helped shape his work.

The San Francisco Improv Festival is proud to announce that Jim Cranna is the 2011 recipient of their annual OCIC Award! The festival will be honoring Jim Sunday, August 21st at 5:30pm at the Eureka Theater, located on Jackson at Battery in SF. This is a free event, so please come celebrate with us…!

Jim Cranna is one of the guiding lights for improvisation in San Francisco. Improv legend Del Close discovered him in 1967 and brought him into The Committee, where he performed until they closed up shop in the 70’s. Jim performed with other seminal Bay Area improv troupes through the years, but possibly the greatest contribution he made was his drop-in workshop on Saturday mornings at Ft. Mason which continued nearly uninterrupted for over 25 years, training and mentoring thousands of Bay Area improvisors & keeping the spirit of The Committee alive in San Francisco.

The event will feature an abbreviated version of the documentary about Jim Cranna’s Fort Mason workshop, “Hug Everyone, Tell Them Your Name” by Ian Hadley, as well as short stories and remarks by members of The Committee and others who have worked with Jim through the years.