22 Years of LOL
Mark Twain has described humour as a fragrance. If his description is accurate, then nothing is more aromatic than the atmosphere at 11:07. Even after 22 years, the Trinity Western-born comedy improv show manages to flood Freedom Hall with the fragrance of uproarious laughter every second Friday night.
While most 11:07 pioneers credit Dirk Van Stralen (’89) as being the show’s founding-father, Dirk insists that it “was the good idea and the work of many bodies and brains.”
Though the concept may have been collective, the name was allegedly Dirk’s idea. Co-founder, Greg Charyna (’89) recalls how he, Dirk, and a few other theatre students “stumbled upon the idea of a late-night comedy show, but it was Dirk who thought that the name and the time should be the same thing for some bizarre reason.”
Largely unchanged since its first year, 11:07 still consists of team-based impromptu comedy sketches in which suggestions from audience members shape the scenes that play out onstage. Though no stranger to experimentation, the show has remained faithful to its roots.
Perhaps overlooked among 11:07’s integral qualities is community. After all, relying on one’s fellow entertainers is an 11:07 performer’s only defense against an intimidating audience of hundreds of expectant peers.
As such, the friendships forged under the hot lights of Freedom Hall are likely to last. Karen Elgersma (Jonasson, ’88), a performer during the first two years of 11:07, echoes this sentiment when she recollects that, “Being part of something like that really bonded us.” Karen, who today is a lead reporter for Shaw tv’s The Daily, remarks that 11:07 “was probably one of the best times of my life–not just the shows, but spending time with the cast before and after shows.”
Undoubtedly, it was this sense of camaraderie that drew together the first funny few, in the fall of 1986, to assemble a bimonthly variety show featuring a soap opera satire, musical performances, and sketches of improv comedy, all under the umbrella of a developmental theatre/education course. But it wasn’t long before the peripheral aspects of 11:07 were whittled away and the improv alone prevailed.
Even at its inception, 11:07 was wildly popular. “There was always a lineup out the door,” reminsces Elgersma. According to her, the show immediately became a pivotal part of campus life. “We used a lot of inside jokes; the ones that got the biggest laughs were when we made fun of things that were happening on campus.”
But far beyond mere mockery, the show relied, as it does today, on sharp wit and jocular dexterity to draw a crowd. “Some of the creativity you would witness up there was spectacular,” says Charyna. “Some [performers] you wouldn’t expect to be into this sort of thing would get out there and really shine.”
Now the adopted child of the TWU Theatre Department with two paid student coordinator positions, 11:07 still consistently floods Freedom Hall with patrons and the aroma of comedy.
Upon hearing that the format and popularity of this TWU staple has hardly changed or diminished since its infancy, Charyna does not seem surprised. “Why mess with a good thing?” he asks. “It’s kind of humbling, actually. I get a kick out of the fact that something we started as a lark is still being enjoyed today and has created an outlet that is drawing together the campus community.”
by Jay Jameson '08
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