The Brody Theater

[December 20th, 2006] Like a Christmas goose, Brody Theater director Tom Johnson knows what it feels to be stuffed, cooked or any other analogy that has to do with being screwed over.

For nearly a decade, Johnson's improvisational comedy company, the Brody Theater, has been housed in a sweet, small basement venue of the same name located at 1904 NW 27th Ave., in the far outreaches of Northwest Portland. It has long been a beacon for comedy—an improv institution that nurtured and molded some of Portland's finest jokesters, including the original Theatresports troupe and sketch comedians Renob Control. But now it's gone. With little notice, the Brody Theater's lease was terminated by US Bank on behalf of the trust that owns the building. Gone, too is Brody's upstairs neighbor, the Mexican-flavored Bull Ring Northwest.

Johnson suspects the company was pushed out to make room for new development. "If things go the way they usually do in that neighborhood when a small retail space closes," he wrote in a press release he issued late last month, "it won't be long before there's a hole in the ground, [and] then here come the condos."

But before any condos break ground, this groundbreaking group had a fitting final performance, Saturday night's balls-out improvisational jam, ... And Stay Out! It was a night of laughter mixed with just a few tears. The all-improv show featured 17 current and past Brody performers, including founding member Brian Kameoka, who now lives and works in Sacramento, Calif. Saturday night Johnson asked his audience—standing room only at 60 people—for a theme. When a girl shouted, "Bacon!" the army of improvs exploded into the set. Guided by Johnson's soliloquies, the performers riffed on everything from meatpacking plants to immigration raids to Match.com.

The hourlong performance ended with one of the group's fan favorites, "Rogan's World of Tomorrow," featuring Johnson, in a robot costume, answering audience questions about the future. The last question seemed to sting: "What's the future hold for condominiums?" Unfazed, the group jumped into a bit about futuristic condos. He then asked anyone who had performed on the stage to stand. When one-third of the teary-eyed audience stood, it was clear that the group, if not the building, still has a future.

The Brody Theater group is far from dead. New classes are scheduled in January and February, a trip to the Amsterdam International Comedy Festival is just weeks away, and the search for a new home is already in full swing. Condos or no, Brody's dead body just might return from its early grave.