Chip and Monica of Good Morning Apocalypse, the perky morning show trucking along following the end of the world, try to stay upbeat. But it's pretty hard when your camera is a Tide bottle and a Capri Sun box, and one of your co-hosts is dead.
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Dallas Comedy House's brand new (and quite timely) comedy sketch show, Good Morning Apocalypse, opened this past Friday to a full house. Playing off the Mayans' alleged end-of-the-world predictions, the show follows a cast of characters throughout the apocalypse while flashing to one-off scenes with secondary characters for the duration of the show. All five actors play multiple roles, switching outfits and accents backstage.
The show is directed by Greg Hernandez and stars DCH's Atlantic Pacific Billy troupe: Nick Scott, Noa Gavin, Terry Catlett, Clifton Hall and Alicia Sherrod. Scott and Gavin play Chip and Monica, Scott providing the straight man to Gavin's Katie-Couric-on-cocaine character. The two work well together, and Chip's downward spiral into anger and depression is fun to watch.
Catlett plays Ted, the Mayan responsible for mapping out time in stone, who just wants the gratitude of his fellow comrades but is left empty handed each time. In the opening scene (above), he shows the chiseled calendar to his fellow Mayans, who nitpick his creation, demanding changes and updates. It's not like it's set in stone, right?
The one-off scenes feature a menagerie of characters: everything from a pregnant couple creating a designer baby to a young group of friends consoling a recently dumped member of the gang with karaoke to a couple pushed to the brink by the wife's excessive hoarding.
The troupe has been rehearsing for three months to prepare for their three-show run, but according to Gavin and Catlett, the writing started much earlier. Some of the bits grew from improv class runs and fell perfectly into place in the sketch show.
The side stories that break up the main plot are actually the best part of the show. Characters play off the comment sections following online articles, recreate a famous movie scene, and even have surprise endings. Oh, and Jesus makes an appearance.
But the storyline in the forefront is what provides for the message of the show. I won't give away the ending, but for a comedy show about the end of the world, the take-away lesson is actually, dare we say, profound.
Good Morning Apocalypse will run again December 15 and 22 at 9 p.m. at the Dallas Comedy House. That is, if we're still here December 22.
