Growing up in New York, I never thought moving to Barcelona would be my chance to see some of the greatest minds of comedy. But now, they’re coming here to perform their improv special, Expats at Teatre Espai Texas on Jan. 14 at 21h.
Tim Meadows is a Saturday Night Live legend who had roles in comedy film favorites, such as Mean Girls and Grown Ups, just to name a couple.
Matt Walsh has been nominated for two Emmys for his work on Veep, and he quite literally wrote the book on comedy (the UCB Comedy Improvisation Manual).
In addition to hosting the Second City podcast, Joe Canale has been seen in The Mindy Project, among other projects.
And of course, Brad Morris, who visited the Comedy Clubhouse in the summer of 2023, is a seasoned improviser with credits in The Good Place, Good Girls, A.P. Bio, and more.
Even more impressive, however, is the fact that their decision to come to Barcelona is not a random one. I was lucky enough to speak with Brad Morris about what brings them to Barcelona after their run at London’s Soho Theater and he couldn’t speak more highly of our scene if he tried. I can’t lie — I was beaming through our entire discussion. I must have seemed like a giddy teenager talking to Justin Bieber. (Are my references too millennial?) But at the same time, Brad is so down-to-earth and generous that our conversation was just like speaking to another comic after a show.
“The energy of [Barcelona’s comedy scene] really reminds me of what it felt like when I started in Chicago,” Brad shared. “And probably even more accurately when Tim and Matt did because I jumped on after it was up and running pretty strong.” He pitched the idea of coming to Barcelona to Matt first and then later brought it up to Tim and Joe while thinking, “I don’t know if it’ll ever happen.” But it’s happening!
Their show, Expats, is an amalgamation of their improv expertise and experience up until this point. “The show is a version of things that the four of us in this group have been doing for a really long time, but we’ve never performed in this exact combination of people,” he explained. Brad and Joe came up together in Chicago, and when Tim moved back to Chicago, he started doing some improv sets with them. He eventually asked them to do other shows with him, an “exciting” venture for two up-and-comers. One thing led to another, and they were doing weekly shows together at the Improv Olympic, a theater where Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and almost all of the greats got their start. Brad then moved to Los Angeles, where he met Matt, who had a similar Chicago improv background. They started collaborating on Matt’s podcast, film scripts, and other projects. After the iO asked Tim, Brad, and Joe to come back for a reunion show 15 years later, this combo of four heavy hitters touring in Europe was on the horizon.
Brad’s trip to Barcelona last year was, in part, because of the writers strike—he had some free time and our favorite visitor, Nicolette Sweeney, encouraged him to come through. Now, Brad’s coming back with some friends and fellow improvisers to give us a once-in-a-lifetime show. “It’s extra special,” he says of coming to Barcelona. “So we’re really, really excited, and I’ve been just raving about the Clubhouse in particular because it really embodies so much of that scruffy family spirit we all came out of in Chicago that really is hard to replicate. A place has it or it doesn’t. So it’s really exciting to come see you guys at this moment.”
We agreed that Barcelona and Chicago share a similar sense of community and support that scenes like New York, Los Angeles, and London seem to lack. “When you’re a young performer coming up, you want to feel like you’ve got the freedom to take risks and find your voice and really hone it,” Brad says. “Being in a place like Chicago or Barcelona gives you the opportunity to do that around other people that have the same attitude. And so you’re helping each other out. You’re not in competition with each other. And I think that that is not a small difference.”
This applies to all forms of comedy, which includes standup and improv. When Brad was here over the summer, he invited one of our local favorite standup comedians, Kyla Cobbler, to come onstage. She did some storytelling based on audience suggestions inside of the improv show, showing how standup and improv can marry and blend as art forms. As part of Expats, the team will invite Kyla onstage once again to see what magic can be made with the interaction of the audience, the improvisers, and standup comedians.
“In improvisation, there’s a process early on where to get really good, you have to get really comfortable with the idea of vulnerability and flying totally without a net,” Brad explains. But this process can make standup comedians better at their craft too—it acts like a “confidence steroid that allows you to feel free to take chances.” He compares it to swimming teachers who “throw the kids in the pool before they know how to swim and somehow they learn how to swim because they’re forced to flap their arms or something.”
Barcelona is such a new comedy scene that we’re all still flapping our arms in some ways, but that’s what creates the community that makes it special … at least we’re flapping our arms together! And now, we get to see and interact with the Olympic swimmers of comedy, so Expats is not one to miss.
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By Jamie Lerner. 9/1/24