In recent years, Berlin’s transformation into the cultural capital of Europe has also brought about an explosion of English-language comedy.
While most open mics and showcases feature stand-up comedy in bar venues, ETB | IPAC’s monthly International Comedy Showcase combines international headliners with multiple forms of comedy by local artists, including stand-up, short-form and long-form improv as well as musical comedy in our gorgeous 120-seat auditorium.
Featuring headliner Isak Jansson (Sweden), musical guest A Spoonful of Deutschland (USA/Ireland/Germany) and improv comedy by ComedySportz Berlin, hosted by Chris Davis (Scotland) and curated by Paul Salamone (USA)
What do you get when you combine three very nerdy tour guides, one hairy Scottish musician, far too many beers and a smoky basement bar in Berlin’s red light district? A Spoonful of Deutschland is the musical comedy project which explains the ins and outs of German history (sorry Poland), through the medium of song. Songs designed to subliminally impose Western capitalist ideals upon children the world over. But we digress… Summer Banks, Matti Geyer and Barry McKeon have been pulling at this unlikely thread for quite some time now, perform regularly around Berlin and even made a trip to Leipzig, much like Napoleon. The songs might sound familiar – if this is the case, it is pure coincidence. No really – don’t tell the mouse.
In “Emission,” a hapless drug dealer in Princeton is humiliated when a cruel co-ed exposes him exposing himself on a blog gone viral. “McDonald’s” tells of a frustrated pharmaceutical copywriter whose imaginative flights fail to bring solace because of a certain word he cannot put down on paper. In “The College Borough” a father visiting NYU with his daughter remembers a former writing teacher, a New Yorker exiled to the Midwest who refuses to read his students’ stories, asking them instead to build a replica of the Flatiron Building. “Sent” begins mythically in the woods of Russia, but in a few virtuosic pages plunges into the present, where an aspiring journalist finds himself in a village that shelters all the women who’ve starred in all the internet porn he’s ever enjoyed.
Jamie Collier’s writing style stems from country and blues, with influences from Tom Waits to Gillian Welch. A sensitive acoustic guitar technique, strong melody and a powerful singing voice form the backbone to a captivating performance of storytelling in song. From New Zealand, his musical journey of 9 entirely DIY albums has led him to hold a respectable stance in the craft of songwriting.
The Clockwork Faerie is the project of Berlin-based Johanna Blackstone. It is Clockpunk & Opera Strange. “To tell a story… That is the meaning of my song. The story of forever… Ticking on and on and on…” The Inventor! (Johanna Blackstone), sings with a pure tone voice that seems like a siren over water, playing a resonator ukulele that couldn’t be more fitting. Occasionally accompanied by The Engineer! (Gerrit Haasler), her songs weave together to tell a story of the Assemblage of The Clockwork Faerie.
Will Trent is a brilliant agent with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Newly in love, he is beginning to put a difficult past behind him. Then a local college student goes missing, and Will is inexplicably kept off the case by his supervisor and mentor, deputy director Amanda Wagner. Will cannot fathom Amanda’s motivation until the two of them literally collide in an abandoned orphanage they have both been drawn to for different reasons. Decades before, when his father was imprisoned for murder, this was Will’s home. It appears that the case that launched Amanda’s career forty years ago has suddenly come back to life—and it involves the long-held mystery of Will’s birth and parentage. Now these two dauntless investigators will each need to face down demons from the past if they are to prevent an even greater terror from being unleashed.
Charles Mee has written Big Love and True Love and First Love, bobrauschenbergamerica and Hotel Cassiopeia, Orestes 2.0 and Trojan Women A Love Story, and Summertime and Wintertime among other plays–all of them available on the internet at