Impro Theatre Elects New Artistic Directors

Impro Theatre's Main Company ensemble embarks on a reimagined vision for the future with the announcement of three new leaders that will share the position of Artistic Director. Based in Los Angeles, Impro Theatre has garnered national attention with their unique acclaimed brand of improvised theatre and loyal following.

Company members Lisa Fredrickson, Jen Reiter, and Tatiana Godfrey were elected to the co-leadership roles by an internal election held by the performance ensemble. Fredrickson is a longtime member of the ensemble and veteran improviser; Reiter is an actor and theatre maker who came up through the Impro Theatre School; Godfrey is a dramaturg, educator and performer who comes to the company through longtime company member Mike Rock.

The company has been focused on transformation this past year. In April, Impro Theatre's longtime Producing Artistic Director, Dan O'Connor, stepped down from his position to encourage a new artistic direction focusing more on inclusivity. In July, 21 new members were added to their acclaimed performance ensemble, helping to fulfill Impro Theatre's goal of expanding the artistic voices within the company to better represent the global population and share more stories from different perspectives. Inspired by the We See You White American Theater call to action and the BLKLST Collective's LA Anti-Racist Theatre Standards, this new leadership team will continue to double down on this transformation, rebuilding systems to ensure the space is inclusive and creating policies for harm prevention and for addressing harm when it occurs.

The new artistic directors have started taking administrative meetings ahead of their January 1st start date. In the spirit of the joyful improvisation that the company has become known for, they playfully refer to themselves internally as "Janice."

Lisa Fredrickson has been an ensemble member of many improv companies including Seattle's Unexpected Productions, SAK Comedy Lab in Orlando, and also (since 1999) LA's Impro Theatre. She is proud to bring her sense of fun to her teaching at the Impro School. Lisa is a commercial actress who is also the resident improv teacher at California Lutheran University as well as an adjunct at The Harvard Westlake School. She believes in Improv Faeries - really.

In her leadership pitch to the ensemble, Fredrickson said she wants "to help us find our common mission. I want to help us facilitate our discovery of a mission for Impro Theatre that the ensemble is excited about so that we can go warp speed into the future!"

Jen Reiter is from Berkeley, CA and is a graduate of the University of Southern California School of Theatre where she earned her BFA in acting. She has performed internationally at the Pierre Cardin Theatre in Paris as well as at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and is a long time contributor to the Los Angeles theatre scene. Favorite LA theatre credits include Kokol in Marat/Sade at Sacred Fools (LA Weekly Best Production 2006), Georgia in Mac Wellman's Crowtet, and Diva in Starmites. Other credits include The Office, Married, Mulaney, The Exes and a yogurt commercial she booked by licking John Stamos' face. If you have small children you may recognize her as the voice of Mother on Nick Jr's Olivia. Recently her improvised film The Living Worst received Best Ensemble at the Downtown LA Film Festival, and she can soon be seen in the upcoming feature film Doula.

Of the vision she shares with her co-Artistic Directors Reiter said, "I find safety in these structures. When we are all clear about how things get done in this company, we can all plug ourselves in to the places that we best fit. When we understand how we fit, we can start to feel belonging. And when we all know we belong, then the bigger the leap we can take together."

Tatiana Godfrey is a graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in drama. She has had a varied career in theater before discovering a passion for arts education. She served as the assistant director of the Off-Broadway premier of No Dogs Allowed, by Sonia Manzano; she is a founding member of New York's Pipeline Theatre Company and Atlanta's Fabrefaction Theatre Company; she was featured in HBO's David Mamet film Phil Spector. She recently graduated with an MFA in dramaturgy from the University of Massachusetts and is the company dramaturg for WAM Theatre in the Berkshires and teaches and performs with Improv Cincinnati and Impro Theatre.

Of the new leadership position, Godfrey said, "I understand that, in theater, the final product is just as important as how it was made. I'm excited to focus on building a culture that prioritizes humans and relationships over products."

The triumvirate of Artistic Directors begin their tenure on January 1st and will set up an infrastructure for a rotating leadership team to take over the positions in six months' time. Plans for their six months in leadership include announcing a season, clarifying the mission, and building systems and protocols that put people first.

More information can be found at www.ImproTheatre.com.

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