Why was it so funny?

Question 4 in our ongoing Q&A series is… This is by far our favourite question! Every one of our shows is adapted from a pre-existing story — whether it be a fairytale, a novel or a play. And although we love the original versions, we like to make our adaptations as wacky, silly and hilarious as humanly possible. So we of course read up on the original versions before launching into creating our own. But then we look for every opportunity to find new ways to make ourselves and you all laugh. And once we have that base, we introduce our audience actors into it, and they, of course, bring their own humour and we play around with that too. In addition, a lot of a DuffleBag performance requires improvisation — which means we go with our instincts and make stuff up as we go when we need to. When you open yourself up to those surprise moments, and improvise with them you can discover totally unexpected funny moments you had no idea were there. And that means we get more chances to laugh — which is the best part of our jobs!

How long does it take to create a show?

Creating a new show is a very exciting part of what we do at DuffleBag. So we put a lot of thought and time into getting it just right. To get the ball rolling we spend about two weeks in a rehearsal space from morning to evening playing around with different parts of the story and characters until we shape it into a performance. During this time we figure out which roles we want our audience actors to play and which we want DuffleBag performers to play. We also get to do lots of improvising as we play around with different jokes to find the ones that are the funniest and help tell the story the best. Once we have shaped it into a 50-ish minute show we think you will love we start performing it. But even then we aren’t done! We keep playing around and improvising with each performance we do. If one joke isn’t working we might take it out and replace it with another. Or if something really funny happens out of the blue and it works, then we might throw it in permanently. So our DuffleBag shows are constantly evolving — and our fabulous audiences are a major part of that!

Where do you get all your costumes?

Luckily for us, we have incredible costume designers that create most of our wardrobe. They are brilliant at creating colourful, creative pieces that are easy to put on and take off — which is crucial with the amount of costume changes we often have in our shows. We also have a lot of fun shopping at used clothing stores like Value Village and Goodwill to find fun pieces to add to the mix. But most importantly, we have something other than the actual costumes on our sides… your imaginations! An actor onstage might simply be wearing a silly wig and a cloak — but it’s your imagination that recognizes the character he’s playing and goes along with it. So thanks for making our jobs easier!

How do you get changed so fast?

We are very fortunate to have fabulous costume designers that create the majority of the costumes we use in the shows. When creating a new costume we look for every opportunity to make a piece as easy as possible to put on and take off. That means no complicated buttons, clasps or zippers. Instead, many of our costumes can simply be slipped over our heads and held in place with some velcro or a belt. Then, to top it off, wigs, glasses and other accessories that are easy to throw on are added to complete the look. We then try to make the costume changes while the Narrator is talking about something else on stage. That way the audience is concentrating on that while we change quickly behind the backdrop. Most importantly, we practice! Rehearsing and doing so many shows helps keep us familiar with our quick changes so we can continue to do them quickly and efficiently.

How do you make all the sounds?

At DuffleBag we do a lot of physical comedy — and physical comedy is made extra funny with noticeable, amplified sounds. And with the minimal technology we use — that means we have to get pretty creative. Sometimes we rely on the narrator who has the microphone to make sound effects such as a “boom” sound when somebody falls down. Other times the individual actors make the sounds for themselves — for example, the “cling-clang” sounds in a sword fight. And other times we use props such as the trunk for a galloping horse, or a container in the back to make big booming footsteps. A whole lot of creativity and experimentation goes into creating the basic sounds — and then of course our audiences’ imaginations help by taking what the narrator describes and enhancing those minimal effects we create. So it’s a team effort!

What’s up with the chicken?

The fifth question we’ll be answering is one of the ones we get surprisingly often… Oh, you noticed him did you? We’re glad! That flying chicken goes by the name of Reginald (a.k.a. Reggie) and he actually appears in every single DuffleBag show. Interestingly enough, there’s no flying chicken in any one of the original stories on which DuffleBag shows are based but we manage to find a place for Reggie in every adaptation we do. And why, you might ask? Well, because we think he’s hilarious. We hope you do too!