Last year’s Coachella Valley Improv/Comedy Festival was a mouthful, but it was also a great time for a first festival. (Also, it happens to be geographically directly between where Bill and Nick live.) They’re gearing up for their second year and taking submissions. I got to interview Jeanette and hear more about this year’s festival. They’re growing, but not losing touch with made them good to begin with.
Last year’s festival had more positive feedback that just about any other festival out there, but it was also a very small festival so many people may not have heard about it. Tell us a little bit about what the Indio Festival is all about and what it hopes to do?
White Women with Hal Williams
The Coachella Valley Improv/Comedy Festival was created to give improv and comedy a platform, more exposure as well as opportunities to commune with like-minded individuals. We view improv as an under-valued art form and want to help give it the respect it deserves as well as help create a wider audience for improv (and stand up comedy.)
We just wound up our “Weekend of Comedy” at the Indio Performing Arts Center. This show featured the winners of the inaugural festival (the improv group “White Women” from Los Angeles) along with two stand up comics that also performed at the festival and fared well with audience votes. Many of our audience members had never seen anything resembling long-form improvisation like “White Women” did, but they ate it up. The “Weekend of Comedy” was really the culmination of last year’s festival. This makes the festival a year-round project, as we now approach the deadline for submissions for this year’s festival.
Indio isn’t a major city, but it brings a very informed and educated audience. Tell us about the community out there and the kinds of shows you’re hoping to attract to show them
Indio is booming. Our county, Riverside, is one of the fastest growing in the nation, and you can tell by just looking around. What used to be a highly seasonal area is becoming more and more a year round destination. The festival just happens to be riding that wave at just the right time.
The local community of Indio is perhaps a little more economically challenged and diverse than the other cities in the Coachella Valley. And yes, there is an informed and educated audience who also happens to be older and maybe a little more conservative than the average improv audience. So, while we don’t want improvisers and/or comics to censor themselves, we do encourage everyone to play to their highest intelligence.
What are some of the things people can do when visiting when the festival isn’t going on?
Some of the major attractions here are the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, which transports you from the desert floor to the top of Mt. San Jacinto in ten minutes, tons of golf courses, world-class restaurants and spas which often have off season discounts, the “magic healing mineral waters” of Desert Hot Springs, Wet n Wild Water Park, Indian Canyons and Tahquitz Canyon, Whitewater Preserve (where I personally have spotted Bighorn sheep meandering), The Living Desert, Palm Springs Art Museum, a new aquatic complex in Palm Desert, the College of the Desert Street fair (weekends), the Thursday night street fair in Palm Springs, Hard Rock Hotel, Painted Canyon, and at least 3 casinos which bring in top-name entertainment. A fun activity that costs nothing is to drive around the area and see the homes where icons like Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, Liberace, Elvis and others had vacation homes or part-time residences.
Bill and Harpo
Last year you had a very swank banquet for performers. What treats do you have in store this year for people coming to visit?
We are planning to once again have an informal buffet-style meal on Friday night while we mix and mingle and pay homage to Harpo Marx. Perhaps even screen one of the Marx Bros. films together. Harpo’s son, Bill Marx, lives here in the desert. He is an accomplished pianist and has agreed to play and accept an award for his dad’s contributions to comedy. Bill has also written a book about life with his famous father, so we might have a book signing as well–still planning.
On May 16, as a teaser for the fest, we have a special event planned. Drama Desk Nominee and Joseph Campbell Foundation Fellow David Gonzalez will teach a storytelling workshop which will be open to the public. That same evening, he will perform his award-winning one man show, “Mytholojazz.” This is made possible by a partnership with the McCallum Theatre’s “Crisalida” project.
How has the improv and the public perception of it grown in the last year?
It just keeps growing, which I think is healthy. There are at least 5 individuals I know of who teach locally, all or most of whom will be involved in the festival in some way. There is an improv presence at the Idyllwild Arts Academy in the mountains above Palm Springs where I teach 2 improv classes, but also at Coachella Valley High School, College of the Desert, and at Coachella Valley Repertory Theatre–all local institutions. What I love most is what you talked about in your “Miles to Go Before I Sleep” retrospective of last year’s fest. I saw it happen again after “White Women” performed as part of “A Weekend of Comedy:” an older generation with the look of a new found love in their eyes.
What are the things you learned from your freshman festival? What are some things you hope to change or grow this year?
Passionate volunteers are an absolute necessity to pull off a successful festival. It is truly a year-round endeavor. And don’t try to do too much too fast. We hope the festival will grow, but also realize the importance of not growing it too quickly. We’d rather have a high quality small intimate festival than to try to grow it too quickly and have it become impersonal.
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Submissions are open until the end of April. Submit now.
Currently Bill is an instructor at The Torch Theatre and producer for the Phoenix Improv Festival. He tours teaching and performing across North America.
