If we’re being excruciatingly honest, improv is not my idea of a good time. I’m still recovering from a 1995 incident with a campus comedy troupe (who shall remain nameless).
But the giddy, upbeat Freestyle Love Supreme—now on Broadway after a recent hit off-Broadway run—is enough to cure anyone’s improv-phobia. It’s also a welcome break from the exhausting 24/7 election-and-corruption news cycle that assaults us from every direction.
The company—Utkarsh Ambudkar (aka UTK the INC.), Aneesa Folds (Young Nees), Chris Sullivan (Shockwave), Anthony Veneziale (Two-Touch), and music supervisor Arthur Lewis (Arthur the Geniuses), plus keyboardist Ian Weinberger and special guest Christopher Jackson (C-Jack) at the performance I attended—solicits suggestions from the audience throughout the show. But no matter how many times they heard impeach, they didn’t bite. (Of course, they also passed on defenestrate. “I don’t want to throw it out, but we’ve used it before,” explained Two-Touch.) It’s words such as gyrate that the group pounced on, turning the evocative verb into an indescribably kicky opening number—something about a centrifuge and a gyroscope?—the likes of which will never be heard again. Literally.
[Read Steven Suskin’s ★★★★ review here.]
“I can only imagine what’s going through your mind right now—what the hell are they doing?” asked Two-Touch, who started FLS 15 years ago with director/producer Thomas Kail and producer (and sometime guest star) Lin-Manuel Miranda in the basement of the Drama Book Shop. Possibly. But judging by the number of Hamilton-savvy fans on hand—UTK’s line to C-Jack “That’s my president!” brought down the house—the audience pretty much knows what they’re in for.
Still, who would have thought C-Jack could extemporize such a soulful R&B-laced meditation on lactose intolerance? Or that raisins could be the basis for such a—pardon the pun—fruitful rap? Young Nees took on the divisive dried grape, spinning a tragic tale that involved Thanksgiving stuffing and a white girl named Karen. (Why are they always named Karen?) But that’s the magic of Freestyle Love Supreme: The performers find inspiration in the most unlikely places. Later, with Lewis providing silky smooth vocals, Young Nees, Two-Touch, and C-Jack turned out an old-school slow jam built around the word matcha, the trendy/possibly healthy green-tea-leaf powder.
What’s most impressive about FLS is the group’s versatility. When I saw the show off-Broadway, I was blown away by UTK. This time, though he rocked the speed-improv round, spitting insane rhymes while C-Jack threw word after word after word—one of which was coagulate—at him, he wasn’t quite as razor-sharp playing, say, audience member Katie from Tennessee who ran over her brother’s foot when they were teens. Meanwhile, C-Jack completely killed it during the matcha song—turning it into an ode to his grandmother and recalling his roots in activism (“Gonna be a marcher”)—and everywhere else. Saturday Night Live, if you need someone to play Cory Booker, he’s your man. And Two-Touch is the secret weapon. Not only is he the emcee, but he’s also the guy who has to decipher everything the theatergoers are shouting out. When a gaggle of drunk girls is yelling “Lexapro!” that’s no mean feat.
Freestyle Love Supreme opened Oct. 2, 2019, and runs through Jan. 12, 2020, at the Booth Theatre. Tickets and information: freestylelovesupreme.com
