Colin Mochrie & Brad Sherwood
Subscribe
X

Get the latest from Beat

Colin Mochrie & Brad Sherwood

colinmochrie.jpg

Following Whose Line Is It Anyway?’s cancellation in 2003 by the ABC, The CW revived the show this year for its summer lineup. “It’s going really well. We actually just got picked up for another 24 episodes,” shares Mochrie glowingly. “We were all a little nervous trying to recapture something that had gone so well ten years ago. As soon as we walked back onto the set, and just seeing Ryan (Stiles) and Wayne (Brady) again, it just fell back into what we had before. It’s been a lot of fun and the audiences have been great.”


For the past few years Mochrie and fellow Whose Line star Brad Sherwood have been joining forces and touring the world with their own brand of an interactive-audience driven comedy show. “I think we’re a lot more relaxed than when we first started because we didn’t really know what the beast was. It was the two of us, like a version of Whose Line without the tall guy or the black guy. There will be games that will be familiar to Whose Line fans, everything in the show starts with a suggestion from the audience. We have audience members onstage with us for about 80% of the games. We think that the show works best when we’re totally out of our comfort zone.

“We’re always thinking of new ways to get suggestions so that we get suggested things that we never have before. We’re always coming up with new kinds of games that we’re not quite sure about so that we can experiment in front of an audience. We do something called ‘The World’s Most Dangerous Improv Game’ where we are barefoot and blindfolded and there are 100s of live mouse traps on stage. It’s as stupid as it sounds.”

With every show going on different tangents and creating new experiences you would expect Mochrie to have more than a few highlights from over the years. “The beauty of improv is that nothing sticks with you,” he explains. “For two hours you’re basically just going from one scene to another. You’re thinking about the suggestions, you’re thinking about the audience, you’re thinking about the person you’re working with. Once the scene is done it’s just gone – you’re onto the next one. Unless someone dies on stage or pulls a gun on us I will never remember a scene. That hasn’t happened yet.”

Obviously Mochrie is the favourite of the duo, which can cause some tension. “It’s very hard for him. But I mean, it’s hard for me!” he exclaims. “I’m constantly having to build up his ego. There’s times when we’re doing a scene and I think ‘I have a killer line, but oh, if I do that then Brad won’t get a laugh’ so I have to wait for him to do something feeble. I’m really not just doing improvising. I’m doing childcare.”

Bringing their show to Australia for the first time this month, Mochrie has some hesitations in coming Down Under. “I just think of it as a large place with convicts,” he jests. “I’m sure that was probably a long time ago, but we’ve been a little slow in getting history books to Canada.”

BY TYSON WRAY