Comedy troupe fancies the unpredictable

Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2001 | 9 a.m.

Billionaire Ross Perot as a vampire?

Zesty nipples?

A duck named Bob that break dances?

An audience watching Las Vegas' Mutiny Improv Comedy Troupe perform can never predict what they are going to see or hear next and neither can the cast members, who use a bare stage as a canvas to paint scenes that are abstract to the extreme.

Improv is not for actors with faint hearts, limited knowledge or severe inhibitions. Their talent and intellect are always on the line, ready to soar to great heights or crash and burn. They are like a high-wire act working without a net while the audience (shouting out scene ideas) constantly shakes the wire.

During the course of a performance, cast members must instantly be able to reach deep into their psyches and their brains and pull out something that is both entertaining and fresh, and rely on their partners onstage not to screw it up.

That is a difficult task to sustain for a normal 90-minute show.

The Mutiny has been doing it for six years.

"I basically torture myself," Lee Scott, co-founder of the Mutiny, said. "In my life, everything is set, coordinated. I know what's going to happen next. But getting up there to do improv, it's almost like giving myself a barium enema or throwing myself out the window to see what I can do to catch myself. It creates a chaotic situation that I have to fight to retain control."

"Theres a lot of value in upsetting the apple cart, sometimes," Markus Kublin, another co-founder, said. "It's agonizing and torturous, and at the same time rewarding."

Strangely, the most difficult thing the Mutiny must do might not be related to performing.

"Because the show is different every time," Kublin said, "one of hardest things is to explain to people what we do."

Whatever they do, they must do it well, having performed an estimated 300 times at venues such as Boulder Station, as well as at coffee houses and bars all over town.

The Mutiny recently began appearing monthly at Sunset Station's Club Madrid (the next performance is Feb. 26) and every other Sunday at the Nevada Theatre Company in northwest Las Vegas (the next performance is Sunday).

The cast has evolved through the years.

"Some stay longer than others. Lee and I just won't quit," Kublin said. "One of our cast members recently got a job with the new Universal Studios in Osaka (Japan) for a year. When he comes back, he will be back onstage with us."

Meanwhile the Mutiny has an opening for two more players, and cast members are interested in looking at potential improvisors. (An audition for those who would like to join the cast will be held Monday. Call 248-1585 for information.)

Improvisation has gained national attention recently because of Drew Carey's weekly ABC program, "Whose Line is it Anyway?"

"Every actor can do (improv), but not every actor can excel at it. They can't work off four other people to improvise a scene," Scott said. "We've been together so long we can see when a player needs help and needs to be bailed out. That's why it's hard to replace a cast member."

Members of the troupe, in addition to Kublin and Scott, include Michael Hartnett, Vaughn Pyne and Zander Schaus. A former member, Ron Mohl, recently rejoined the cast for a single performance at Sunset Station. He quit the troupe 18 months ago (after four years with the group) to pursue an acting career in Los Angeles.

The Mutiny charges $5 for admission, which isn't enough to live off of, but performers say their improv experience has made it possible for them to land day jobs in the entertainment field.

Kublin plays King Arthur in the "Tournament of Kings" show at the Excalibur; Hartnett is in "Star Trek: The Experience" at the Las Vegas Hilton; Scott is the Wizard at Caesars Magical Empire; and Pyne and Schaus alternate playing Maximus, also at the Magical Empire.

"The skills we have acquired (doing improv) allowed us to get jobs," Kublin said. "It stretches our muscles, gives our acting skills a workout. We take whatever knowledge we have gained and take it with us to auditions."

Aside from the experience, both Kublin and Lee say improv is "a labor of love."

"It's the most dangerous kind of comedy there is," Kublin said. "Another thing I like about it is that the audience is involved. They don't have to be funny (with their suggestions), we have to be funny."

Deanna Duplechain, artistic director of the Nevada Theatre Company, invited the Mutiny to be artists in residence at the theater she founded three years ago.

"They are the longest-running improv group in town, so obviously they have stamina," Duplechain said. "They are so much fun. The audience has a great time. I did improv for a number of years myself, though most of my work has been in legitimate theater, so I appreciate what they do. I am a fan."

The Nevada Theatre Company began with a Books Alive Program (performing stories from books for young students) and has expanded to include a full range of productions, from classic drama to, now, improv.

Kublin said the Mutiny will hold improv classes at the company's theater in the near future, taking after the grandfather of American improvisational theater, the Second City of Chicago.

More than 1,000 improv students are enrolled at the Second City, which culls the best talent from the lot and turns them loose onstage in front of an audience.

Since its founding in 1959, the Second City has produced such major stars as Alan Arkin, Dan Akroyd, Bill Murray, John Belushi, Peter Boyle, John Candy, Joan Rivers, Mike Myers, Martin Short and Fred Willard.

A branch of the Second City is scheduled to take up residence at the Flamingo Las Vegas in March. Its arrival is eagerly awaited by the Mutiny, whose members have tried for years to convince venues on the Strip to give them a chance.

"It's going to be good for us," Scott said. "We may actually finally get one of those casinos to listen to us."

He said entertainment directors at the major casinos on Las Vegas Boulevard have never fully understood what the Mutiny does.

"Now we can say, 'It's like Second City.' "