Modified On November 30, 2011
Since we moved here, nearly ten months ago, we have confirmed one notion: EVERYbody wants to play Vegas. At least it sure seems that way. When we tell people that we’ve moved there, they freeze for a moment, the wheels inside their heads spin briefly and then they ask a variation on the same question: “How can I work Vegas?”
Well… here’s one way, maybe: Enter the Improv’s “Up Yours” contest. That’s a link to the rules for the latest edition of Budd Friedman’s and Mark Lonow’s online clip battle that ends up with six finalists peforming in front of a panel of judges at the Improv comedy club at Harrah’s on the world famous Las Vegas Strip.
The winner gets paid gigs at The Improvs in Las Vegas and in Lake Tahoe, which are, according to the website, “valued at $25,000.” No word on just how many gigs at the two clubs which are necessary to add up to that magical figure. Also, the winner gets “a meeting in Vegas at the time of the finale with an agent from the talent agency APA.”
Hop on, check out the competition and dive in. And, as always, check out the rules before you enter. Know before you go. Poke before you joke. Enter with your head, not over it. Blah, blah, blah.
As with any contest of this sort, the organizers would be remiss if they didn’t include the Universal Release (look for it at the “Terms of Use” link) that pretty much says that anything you submit becomes their property and that they can use it any way they please. Our favorite part of Universal Releases these days is the part where you grant the contest folks the “license to use… all CONTENT… in any form, media, or technology now known or later developed. So if, in the year 2525 (with apologies to Zager and Evans), if somebody invents a way to inject your material into somebody’s brain in such a way that it’s re-written as a playlet and re-enacted by a microscopic troupe of actors composed entirely of tiny carbon nanotubes… you can’t kick. Of course, it’ll probably just end up as a ringtone. BORRRRing!