This article was originally published in Boro Magazine in March 2018.
Normally, yelling ’I want to eat that baby!’ wouldn’t go over well, but in Astoria Women’s Improv class, Jen Jurek encourages participants to say anything and go with it.
“You have to say yes, you can’t say no,” Jurek said.
On a Tuesday night, Jurek enthusiastically watched as the several women in her class played “Emotional Uber,” acting out a carshare gone wrong, and “Machine,” stepping up one by one to become part of a human espresso-maker, complete with sounds and movement.
“We get to be silly and say whatever is on our minds,” said Rasna Defeis, who lives in Astoria and is taking Jurek’s class for the second time. “It let’s you unleash.”
That’s one of the reasons Jurek wanted to bring improv to women in her neighborhood, to help them escape the mundane — jobs, kids, relationships — , bond with each other and “show the funny” in a safe space.
Jurek, who had a career in musical theater and directing, has always incorporated improv into her work, whether in a warmup with fellow actors backstage or coaching adults for auditions, to pull out the “weirdness” and “humanity” in their performances.
Once she had her first child two and a half years ago, Jurek left her job at the time as the assistant to a cantor at a synagogue, and was getting to know more moms.
She started Hallet’s Cove Theater to pursue performance of all forms, and “spread the love” in her own way.
Her first local productions were full-scale, interactive puppet shows in local stores and children's’ spaces like Raising Astoria and Okabaloo. She provides the set and her hand-sewn “trash puppets” with original storylines and accompanying music.
“My rule was, I had to be fired,” she said. “They had to fire me, that’s the only way I’d stop."
The opposite happened, she gained a following, attracting full houses to her shows. Her characters continued to develop and become more “bizarre,” she said.
Eventually, Jurek thought the moms she was connecting with might be interested in creative performance themselves.
“I’m home, I’m meeting members of my community, … I wonder if people around here want access to improv,” she remembers thinking.
While there are plenty of great places to do improv in Manhattan, Jurek said it can not only be expensive, but feel intimidating.
She offered her first all female improv class last fall — 1.5 hour sessions once a week, wine included. The class concluded with a 45-minute performance for an audience at QED, where the women acted out some of the games they had practiced in class. The second class, which includes the seven original participants, and new people, started in early February.
“This is special. I just wanted to make it a safe place for women to lead and be led,” Jurek said of her improv class.
Defeis said she was intrigued when she saw information on an Astoria moms Facebook page, and hadn’t often see the opportunity to try improv in her own neighborhood.
She thought it would be a good creative outlet to change up the everyday routine. She said she also enjoyed meeting a group of new women in the neighborhood.
Jurek chose to only offer the class to women intentionally.
“It’s my form of political activism. Here we are, women, marching in the streets,” Jurek said. “How do we bring everyone together in a way that’s positive and powerful? Humor is power. You can command a room if you say the funny thing."
Jurek said while she is open to including men one day, restricting the class to only women allows them a sense of freedom that might be compromised if a man were there.
“You throw a man in the mix, suddenly the dynamic changes,” she said. “It’s just nature. What would happen if it was just us?”
Her role in class is a catalyst for “play” and creativity. She teaches new games and encourages participants to get out of their comfort zone and be bold, to say something and run with it. She makes sure people follow her basic rules: kindness, making their partner look good and supporting each other.
One of the warm-up games is “Got your back.” The women walk around and repeat the phrase and give each other an imaginary gift that has been hiding behind their backs. She also adapted the traditional improv phrase in her class from, “Yes, and,” to “Oh, I love that and.”
“You can’t say that without some kind of emotion attached to it,” Jurek said.
Defeis said Jurek has a kind, gentle way of giving criticism and communicating the lessons in classes. She said her positivity is refreshing.
“She’s very high-energy,” Defeis said. “I think she’s intentionally like that to raise the overall creativity and emotion. She promotes silliness fun and laughter and is accepting, no matter what the outcomes.”
The experience can build camaraderie, make people feel trusted, and build new connections in the brain by saying things that would normally not make sense, Jurek said. The enjoyment people get out of the experience can be transformational, she added.
“When you delight or surprise yourself, you’ve just changed,” Jurek said.”That’s powerful.”
Defeis said every time she has class, she feels nervous, but very excited to go.
“I”m really enjoying the hell out of improv, I wish it was everyday,” Defeis said.
When asked who else could benefit from improv, Jurek touched on nearly every industry: accounting, human resources, therapists and more.
“If you’re a banker, get in an improv class immediately. Everyone who’s a frustrated actor working around creative individuals should get into an improv class,” she said. “Introverts, writers, poets, improv is for you. Everyone with a job that’s not improv should do improv.”
In her own community, Jurek wants to expand offering improv to other neighborhoods like Sunnyside and Long Island City and to businesspeople for team-building.
“I want to reach people who are already talking in groups,” Jurek said. “[Improv] levels the playing field. You all act ridiculous, let’s do it together.”
She produced Hallet’s Cove Theater’s first full-length production, “A Feminine Ending” by Sarah Treem, with a first-time female director, which showed in Astoria First Presbyterian Church in late February, and is teaching three-hour improv workshop in Sugar Loaf, at the Seligmann Center in the Hudson Valley this spring.
Jurek said she wants to continue to bring theater of all kinds and fun into the lives of as many people as possible and make it accessible, showing them they can do it, too. She said people don’t need to be experts to enjoy their own, or other people’s creativity in performance.
“People want to do it,” Jurek said. “I want to pull people in. [It’s] the yes and movement.”