Chemically Imbalanced Comedy's Blog

Part of the ongoing Origins of CIC series by Founder and Executive Producer Angie McMahon.

One of the first CIC Sponsored Troupes, and basically the founding fathers of the company, was a sketch group named “I, Miss High School.” Members through the years were:

Tom McMahon (2000-2004)
Angie Farruggia (McMahon) (2000-2004)
Melissa Freidman (Sept 2000- Oct2000)
Rodney Hood (Sept 2000-Nov 2000)
Catherine Pappas (Head of Casting at ABC’s Wife Swap) (2000-2002)
Bryan Heffron (http://www.carverskateboards.com) (2000-2002)
Gus Richter (brother of Andy Richter) (2000-2002)
Lilly Alison (Second City Tour Co, Annoyance Company Member) (2000-2001)
Sampson Croupen (The Southpaw Sam McClowski Show) (2000-2002)
Marz Timms (Pimprov) (2002-2003)
Matt Sabo (2002-2003)
Jin Kim (2002-2004)
Jo-Elle Muchnick (2002-2003)

Catherine, Bryan, Gus, Lilly, Tom, Sampson, and Myself went to the 3rd Annual Del Close Marathon at the UCB Theater in NYC as a sketch group. It was our first Comedy Festival and the first time a CIC sponsored troupe would go to a festival. It was also the last year UCB invited Sketch groups to perform as part of the Del Close Marathon. We were given two spots, 8:30pm on the Main Stage (at that time the only stage) on Saturday Night, right after The Annoyance show, and 9:30am Sunday Morning.

We prepared, over prepared and would fight over whose scenes were in and whose scenes where out. Made tables and charts to make sure everyone got equal stage time. And over all didn’t sleep much in the days leading up to the show.

Highlight sketches from the show included:

-A monologue Lilly wrote (Lilly at the time was 17 years old) about meeting Horatio Sanz in the Bathroom “…so maybe they could do a line of coke together or whatever.” (Horatio had only a month or so before been asked to join the cast of SNL from the Second City stage. So he wasn’t super famous yet, and he was in attendance at the show. He heard Lilly’s monologue, or at least heard about it, and we got to hang out with him, Chris Kattan, and a couple other future SNL cast members, like Amy Poehler and Rachel Dratch).

-A monologue I wrote called “My Name is Judy” that would later be turned into my one women show “Judy In Disguise with Glasses”

AND

-A sketch Sam wrote called “The Southpaw Sam McClowski Show” that would later be turned into CIC’s first Production, as well as our First show at Frankie J’s on Broadway.

Friends and family and everyone swear they didn’t post the following comment, but this is what an online user posted about our show:

“I Miss High School stole the show the night I was there. Southpaw Sam McClowski was a bit I would have liked to see all night long.”

And thus begins the saga of Southpaw.