But Seriously, Folks

All those hours doing Don’t Throw Shoes improv prepared us for something in the real world – not cubicle comedy, though.

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Shoes Katie Hammond ’03, an actor in Chicago, declares that Shoes "showed me the door to realizing my destiny. Without Shoes I might have wandered around thinking that teaching German to Chinese in Bulgaria should be my career." Cory Becker ’04, who’s off to start an M.A. in critical theory at the University of Chicago, proclaims, "I don’t think there’s anything more useful going on at Wooster than Shoes." (Of course, he’s studying critical theory, so useful is as useful does.)

Even the old-school types, who ought to be all jaded and misanthropic, practically gush. Who knew? I mean, Shoes was valuable to me, but then I’m a playwright. Writing plays is like doing improv in your head, at a computer. It’s like being crazy, only without the glamour.

But take Cathy Taylor ’92, who’s the publicity and communications director at Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago, where she rubs elbows with the likes of John Malkovich and Gary Sinise. "Whenever I tell someone I used to be in a comedy troupe, they’ll always say, ‘No you weren’t,’" Cathy recalls. "I remember one friend actually told me, ‘That’s impossible. You’re not funny.’ For the next three days I’d ask people, ‘Am I funny?’ They’d say, ‘Well, not right now.’"

Even if Cathy can’t wring some credibility out of her Shoes experience, she thinks it was appropriate preparation for what she’s doing now. "Here I am working at Steppenwolf, which I think is one of the greatest theater companies in the world, and – like Don’t Throw Shoes – it is an ensemble company. I remember a sketch we did in Shoes on Ted Kennedy. It was a joke that Andy Cobb wrote, but he gave me the punchline. The crowd absolutely loved that skit, which gave me such a high. Love that ensemble ethic! I don’t think I would have found that level of camaraderie elsewhere."

Cathy was a theater major. In keeping with liberal-arts eclecticism, most of us in the Shoes’ early years weren’t. We concentrated in disciplines as far-flung as psychology (hence the neurological game show skit "What’s My Lesion?"), philosophy (hence "Star Trek: The Wrath of Kant," featuring Captain Kierkegaard), and music history (here I have no "hence").

Thinking about his psychology major, Clarke McFarlane ’92 says, "It would seem that my life took a sharp turn off the rails that my Wooster education set me on. But from the point of view of a Shoe, I kept right in line." With his wife, Silvia, Clarke has created a wildly successful international traveling comedy juggling show called Planet Banana. Though their home base is in New York, Clarke does most of his touring and performing in Europe, "where circus and the variety arts rank with opera, theater, and music in the cultural diet." (Sketch comedy, of course, ranks with boardwalk caricatures, dirty limericks, and double-jointed tricks.) "We use circus skills to tell a love story, often with live music. We juggle, dance tango, perform aerial fixed trapeze, involve members of the audience and we dress funny." They do it for crowds at venues ranging from a Phish concert to a medieval fortress in Israel. Check out planetbanana.com – one of the strangest Web sites you’ll ever visit without shameful prurience.

"It wasn’t until I entered the collaborative process of Planet Banana that I got back on the track that started in those 10 o’clock rehearsals in Lean Lecture Hall," Clarke said. "There was never time for ego-driven political dispute. Our goal orientation was manic. We had the confidence from successful shows to draw upon, and we all suspected the others of genius. It was the most consistently creative period of my performing career."

Clarke still has a tape of a Shoes show in a box somewhere, but the idea of ever actually watching it again fills him with fear and loathing. "I can easily remember why it was the most hilarious sketch in the world when a man asks his date ‘What’s your favorite animal?’ and, when she says, ‘I like tigers,’ he gives a self-conscious attempt at imitating a tiger. This was gold. But to the uninitiated it could seem, I don’t know, sophomoric? Still, the audience liked it. And just like back then, Planet Banana leaves the executive decision on any matter to the audience."

The man who asked his date about her favorite animal was played by Christian Ruch ’92, among Shoes’ most consistently amusing performers. Now he’s among Shoes’ most surprising alumni stories: he’s pastor of the Church of the Cross in Minneapolis, a job which involves starting up a whole new church. Like, from scratch. They call it "planting" a church. It’s like gardening, only with Godliness. Surely if nothing else from Shoes prepared Christian for this, his role playing Schwarzenegger as The Germinator did.

Actually, the first thing that comes to mind when he thinks about applying his Shoes training is parenting – Christian enjoys making his three kids laugh. Seeing as they’re all under six, he says they’re not a very demanding or rigorous audience – they laugh easily and at the cheapest, broadest stuff. So it’s like performing for drunk undergraduates at the Under-ground all over again. He also has to be careful with the slapstick, because they don’t know better than to try and imitate him. (Again, see drunk undergrads, above.)

But Shoes has shaped Christian’s vocational choices as well. "There was a Shoes philosophy of entertaining people that I have adapted for use in ministry," he says. "In Shoes, we did a fair share of unfunny skits, but at least when they bombed they were short. We were prepared for short attention spans. And this has translated into my preaching: I make sure there is a momentum to the message. It also plays into how I run a church meeting – I am really terrified of boring people. Overall I place a high value on humor. Too many pastors – too many Christians, really, for that matter – take themselves too seriously, and so humor can be an effective tool at building trust."

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