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We are proud of the notable members who have come through our organization, past and present:
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| Andel Sudik was with One Group Mind from 2001-2004 with the team Teenage Carthrobs. Andel performed at The Playground, Frankie J..s (now known as the Spot) and IO. In the late summer of 2003 Andel auditioned into the ensemble of Imagination Theater, a touring social issues theater group. About a month later she got hired as an understudy at The Second City. She toured with the Second City for two years as well as performed in theatricals and understudied on the ETC and Mainstage Chicago. She lived on a cruise ship for 4 months performing with the Second City on the Norwegian Spirit and Pearl. In 2007, Andel joined Boom Chicago in Amsterdam, where she was also a writer and correspondent for Comedy Central Netherlands' news show CCN. From 2009 to 2010 Andel performed with Second City in their production The Second City Does Arizona, or Close, but No Saguaro. Andel has recently returned from Arizona and is currently working for Second City. |
| Anthony LeBlanc was with One Group Mind from 2001-2004 performing on the team Teenage Carthrobs. He got his start with his group Boxaganga while obtaining a degree in Computer Science and Physics at Loyola University New Orleans. He trained at iO Chicago, is a member of DSI: The Beatbox, and wrote two Second City Chicago Main Stage Reviews--America: All Better and the 50th anniversary Taming of the Flu. He has played on the team Sigourno Reaver and currently plays on the team Mike Helicopter at the iO theater. Anthony also acts and teaches at the Second City. |
| Originally from Heyworth, Illinois and a graduate of Northwestern University, Britt Lower now lives in Brooklyn. She has studied improv at ImprovOlympic, UCB, with Northwestern University's Titanic Players, and extensively under Armando Diaz at the Magnet Theater. Her Titanic improv team, Old Tom Jar, won the 2008 College Comedy Championships. Since moving to New York one year ago, she has performed in several new plays around the city and in the New York International Fringe Festival. In 2010, Britt was cast in Big Lake, a Comedy Central show directed by Will Ferrell starring Chris Gethard, Chris Parnell, and Horatio Sanz. |
| David Asher has a long and storied career. He was the youngest member to be on an ImprovOlympic House Team, Valhalla, at the age of 19. After teaching himself how to play piano for improvisation he became one of the premier improvisation piano players in the City of Chicago. After spending 2 years with Valhalla, he was hired by Boom!Chicago, performing with MADTV's Ike Barinholtz and SNL's Seth Meyers. David is currently the Musical Artistic Director of the iO Chicago. |
| Eric Lindberg was a founder and an original member of the Titanic Players. After playing on ImprovOlympic's Genealogy, Eric was on the cast of the Lindberg Babies, one of the longest running show at ImprovOlympic. Eric also performed on the Improv Olympic House Team, Prefontaine. He is currently a member of the ComedySportz cast and staff. |
| Heather Simms has been with ComedySportz since February of 2001. Since then, she has performed in Six Degrees, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, A Christmas Karl, Cinderella, Cinderella, and is an ensemble member of The Hot Karl. In addition to acting, she recently made her directing debut with The Phantom Tollbooth for the ComedySportz Family Matinee Series and has done stand-up comedy with The Elevated. She graduated from Northwestern University where she majored in theater and was a member of The Titanic Players. In addition to her education at NU, she has completed the training programs at both the Annoyance Theatre and ImprovOlympic, and was an ensemble member of Fashion Bug at ImprovOlympic. (Excerpts from her ComedySportz bio) |
| Jill Benjamin was with us briefly in the 1997-1998 cast. Since then, she found great success at Boom Chicago in Amsterdam. Benjamin was the co-star of the wildly successful Pick-ups & Hiccups with her partner Seth Meyers, head writer for Saturday Night Live on NBC. Pick-ups & Hiccups toured world-wide, with stops in Edinburgh, London, Singapore, Amsterdam, New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. The show completed a sold-out run at Donny's Skybox Studio Theatre in Piper's Alley. Whose Line Is It Anyway performer/writer and Second City alum Ron West also directed Jill's re-mount of Playing Dumb with Jill Benjamin at the Apollo Theater in Chicago. (excerpts from her Second City bio) |
| Joe Kendall began doing improvisation at Northwestern University where he graduated with a BA in English Literature. In 1998, he was a cast member of The Titanic Players class that began doing long form on campus. His coach, Mike Abdelsayed, was a member of Valhalla, one of the oldest and longest running house team at Chicago’s ImprovOlympic theatre. Joe studied at the iO, taking classes with Charna Halpern, T.J Jagadowski, Bob Dassie, Craig Cackowski, Miles Stroth, Noah Gregoropoulos and Susan Messing. In addition, he also performed on the Harold team Kids Around the World. Joe also performed with ImprovBoston as well as Micetro, Theatresports, Mainstage, Secret Society and BlueScreen. He acted as the Expansion Team Manager and an ImprovBoston University Instructor. (Excerpts from his ImprovBoston bio) |
| Titanic owes a great debt to Justin Koh for literally keeping the group alive. Bridging the gap from the group's founders to what would later be the largest improvisation group in the country, Justin's 6 years with Titanic are the group's most profound. Justin is the only member of Titanic who performed for 6 years and directed for 4 years. Justin is the member of Titanic credited with its expansion from one team to 4 on campus. He was the first "unofficial" assistant director of Titanic. While still in school, Justin performed with the ImprovOlympic team Kids Around the World. You can see his latest online project, Bull and Bunny. |
| Kate Duffy performed with One Group Mind team Sleauburn from 2001-2003. She has studied, performed and coached improvisation for the last 10 years at The Annoyance Theater, iO Chicago and The Second City. You may have seen Kate performing with Atticus Finch, Otis, The Baritones, Corporation Incorporated, KNC: Fight Lamps, and Strawberry Quick. Kate has also performed with Children of a Lesser God, LadyTown, Schnuffy Lindberg Babies 2.0, and The Signatures. Kate was also a member of Second City Tourco, and performed on the Norwegian Cruise Line ship: Gem. Apart from teaching improvisation at iO and The Second City and for companies around the country, Kate currently performs with the teams Deep Schwa, The Armando Diaz Experience and FELT, the critically acclaimed puppet show, at iO Chicago. |
| Laura Grey recently relocated to New York from Chicago where she wrote and performed two original revues at The Second City Etc., improvised at places like iO, The Annoyance, Second City, and Comedy Sportz, and acted in a bunch of plays. She performed and co-devised the all silent revue Reverie directed by Dexter Bullard for the Montreal Just for Laughs Festival, and before that she traveled with the ferocious three-woman sketch troupe Triplette to San Francisco Sketchfest, Sketchfest NYC, and The Chicago Improv Festival. In NY she is performing with Baby Wants Candy, the Story Pirates, the magnet house team Chet Watkins, and the sketch duo Klepper and Grey at the ucb.
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| Lauren Ashley Bishop is originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, and now resides in Los Angeles, California. She has performed stand-up all over the country, including venues such as The Chicago Improv, Zanies, The Ice House, The Lakeshore Theatre, and Gotham Comedy Club in New York. You may have seen her on the stage in Second City's Romeo & Juliet Musical @ Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues @ The Apollo Theatre, Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up @ Theatre at the Center, or in the National Broadway Tour of Scrooge, The Musical with Richard Chamberlain. Lauren has appeared in national commercials and voiced countless radio and TV ads, including her favorite, Popeye's Mama Slap Chicken. The micro-site for KFC she was cast in, chooseyoursauce.com, won a 2007 Webby Award. She is also a graduate of Northwestern University, and a proud SAG, AFTRA, and AEA member. |
| Liz Cackowski was a member of our 1995-1997 Titanic cast. Liz was our first Titanic Player to be hired by Saturday Night Live (hopefully not the last). She has performed at ImprovOlympic, ComedySportz, and Boom! Chicago and was one of the youngest performers cast in the Second City Main Stage after spending 2 years with the Second City Touring Company. She was on the Second City Mainstage for one revue, when she was hired by Saturday Night Live. Liz now lives in LA and is a writer and actress on the popular NBC show, Community. |
| Mac Antigua was part of the Titanic hiatus to ImprovOlympic in 1997 and found himself playing with the Harold Team, Genealogy, and alongside MADTV star, Ike Barinholtz. Mac also performed on the iO House Team, Space Mountain. Mac is The Big Daddy of Titanic whose leadership helped Titanic through its first initial lean years. In 2006, he brought the Harold to Houston, Texas by founding Massive Improv. During its three year run, he sent teams to the Del Close Marathon, Austin Out of Bounds Improv Festival, San Francisco Improv Festival, and the Dallas Comedy Festival. Mac was also named to the 2010 American Express/Independent Sector NGen Fellows class. He is one of 12 "under-40" leaders expected to improve the quality of leadership in the nonprofit sector. |
| Marla Caceres was with One Group Mind from 2001-2004 with the team Teenage Carthrobs. Marla Caceres started improvising at the University of Florida. She has also performed on Big Friendly Giant, a two-person improv ensemble, and Padraic in Smark and Vixen, a vaudevillian sketch show. In 2009, Marla was in two short films, “Happy Birthday Pele” and “Tech Support”. Since 2007, she has been performing with Whirled News Tonight and also plays on the team Henrietta Pussycat at the iO theater. |
| Matt Sax is best known for his critically acclaimed one man, hip-hop musical called "Clay" that opened the door for his full production hip-hop musical called "Venice". Opening the second theater space for the LookingGlass Theater in Chicago, Matt sold out Clay for over a year. His new hip hop musical, Venice, is currently running in New York to critical acclaim from the New York Times. You can see Matt discussing his new show on the Carson Daly show here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEi6QaJ6qj8 |
| A double major in Economics and Theater from Northwestern University, Mike Abdelsayed was one of the founders of The Titanic Players in 1994 and the parent organization that supports us, One Group Mind. Mike was placed on Valhalla, the oldest house team at ImprovOlympic, at the age of 20. In addition to performing, Mike was also an ImprovOlympic coach and teacher. Mike was an understudy for The Second City touring companies and the Second City ETC stage, performing in their highly successful review "Yellow Cab of Courage". He was also a member of the Second City's Outreach and Diversity Program. Mike is most known for his teaching, having defined the Improv Theory called the Expansion Tree through the experience he had coaching over 30 teams, each no less than 2 years. His students have continued successful careers at CBS, NBC, The Office, Saturday Night Live, Community, Reno 911!, Arrested Development, Big Lake, and the Unit, as well as national and international improv theatres, including The Annoyance Theater, Boom! Chicago, ComedySportz, ImprovBoston, ImprovOlympic, The Magnet Theater, The Second City, Theater Sports, and Upright Citizen's Brigade Theater. |
| Peter McNerney grew up in Chicago and Minneapolis. He began his study of improvisation at Northwestern University where he majored in Theater. He has since studied improv in New York at the Magnet Theater and the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre under instructors Armando Diaz, Kevin Dorff, Dave Pasquesi, TJ Jagadowski, Susan Messing, Matt Besser, Mike Abdelsayed and many others. Peter is currently a performer, teacher, and Artistic Director ath the Magnet Theater in New York. |
| Piero Procaccini was an original member of the first improv group that helped start One Group Mind in 2001, Under Oath. He also became the first assistant director of One Group Mind coaching the team Teenage Carthrobs. He has taught classes at IO and Second City and offered workshops at theatres around the country. He was Assistant to the Director for “From Fear to Eternity” in the Second City ETC Theatre and has directed many improvisors who have gone on to perform in the touring company and on resident stages in Chicago. While in Chicago, he spent several years performing with Johnny Roast Beef and American Dream and coaching Otis and Carl and the Passions. Most recently, he has been cruising the high seas performing for Second City aboard Norwegian Cruise Lines. (as of march 29th 2010) |
| Zoe Jarman hails from Nashville, Tennessee and is a graduate of Northwestern University where she studied theatre. She began learning and performing longform improv at NU with The Titanic Players' team Panda Panda. After moving to Los Angeles she began studying improv at UCB and The Groundlings. Since then she has performed at UCB in shows such as Sketch Cram, Maude Night, Let's Do This! and various Spank shows. Zoe has recurred on the ABC Family Channel show Greek and appears in He's Just Not That Into You as Sorority Girl #1. She also plays the violin and is a member of the Mortified show's Mortified After School Orchestra. Zoe is a proud member of the Harold team Arts&Athletics. She has also recently appeared as Carla on The Office. |
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