In the back theater of Bryant Lake Bowl & Theater, the cast of all female, femme-presenting and nonbinary performers celebrate the famous Austenian novels like “Pride and Prejudice” or “Sense and Sensibility” through a 75-minute long-form improv show.
For the past 10 years, the evolving cast of Manners and Misconduct: Improvised Jane Austen has celebrated the stories of Jane Austen through their unique and ever-changing improv shows. Every performance features different characters and themes that all pay homage to the famous romance author.
Meghan Wolff, a performer in the cast, said the shows are purely based on the cast’s intuition and the three suggestions they take at the top of the show — two family names and an old-fashioned adage, like Friday’s suggestion of “Don’t beat around the bush.”
“You’re not going to see any of the characters from ‘Emma’ or ‘Sense and Sensibility.’ It’s a completely new world, but it’s just inspired from the works of Jane Austen,” Wolff said. “We use those suggestions to craft our own little cast of characters who make their way through their own stories.”
Wolff began in improvisation 20 years ago, becoming involved in their college improv group at University of Texas at Austin after participating in theater growing up. When she came to the Twin Cities, Wolff created Manners and Misconduct with her friend Maggie Soros based on their shared love of Austen’s work.
“There’s so much in it that’s just about the challenges of navigating the world despite balancing the pressures of society and your family,” Wolff said.
The show was created with the intention of involving female and female-presenting performers, a goal important to cast member Sarah Busch.
Busch began performing in improv shows in middle school and continued on the improv team in high school before pursuing it further at St. Olaf College. She also worked in a group called Fair Play MN, which moved to make improv more accessible and welcoming to women, trans and non-binary performers.
“We operated for a couple years and helped create some guidelines and boundaries,” Busch said. “It was a pretty scrappy group, and we truly didn’t know what we were doing. We just knew there was a problem, and we were trying to solve it.”
The hour-long performance allows for the cast to develop storylines with characters following complete arcs and even developing romantic relationships.
Joining in 2017, Sarah Turner Litz found a sense of community in the cast, as well as the opportunity to grow important life skills.
“You never know what is going to happen on any given day. I think it’s given me the ability to think on my feet more, which is really helpful,” Turner Litz said.
Turner Litz filled the classic Austenian role of the “doting mother” in Friday’s performance, weaving together the quickly established family unit made up of her fellow performers through improvised dialogue.
“I love the cast, and I love performing with them, and I look forward to it every single year,” Turner Litz said.
Turner Litz enjoys the magic of improv, since, unlike traditional theater, actors don’t have to memorize their lines or blocking for scenes. Instead, everything happens for the first time, in real time.
The closing performance of Manners and Misconduct is 7:00 p.m. this Friday and Saturday at Bryant Lake Bowl & Theater.
