{"id":688267,"date":"2026-05-23T09:35:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T09:35:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/688267\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T09:35:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T09:35:11","slug":"improv-co-conspirators-reuniting-for-frenetic-weekend-comedy-blitz-winnipeg-free-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/688267\/","title":{"rendered":"Improv co-conspirators reuniting for frenetic weekend comedy blitz \u2013 Winnipeg Free Press"},"content":{"rendered":"

They were still green players developing their comedic compass when Riva Billows and Kristina Guevarra first plied their trade at Kelvin High School.<\/p>\n

In 2012, as members of Kelvin Red, the pair zipped into the Clipper tradition of competitive improv at a school whose comedic alumni include theatre performers Nicholas Rice, Caity Curtis and Mariam Bernstein, plus members of the longstanding troupe Outside Joke: Jane Testar, Chadd Henderson, Andrea del Campo and Tobias Hughes first acted together in Fiddler on the Roof.<\/p>\n

On Kelvin Red \u2014 coached by animator Lukas Conway <\/a>with teammates such as Toronto-based actor Stevey Hunter, who went on to become a founding member of Halifax improv company Hello City \u2014 Billows and Guevarra started out learning to crawl on the groundling floor.<\/p>\n

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Dan Robertson photo<\/p>\n

Monthly improv series Top Dog keeps the audience laughing in their seats at Sidestage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were so bad, and then we grew together,\u201d says Guevarra, who moved to Montreal in 2021, where she\u2019s the producer for the Sunday night program at Th\u00e9\u00e2tre Sainte-Catherine, the longest-running English-language improv show in the home of Les Habitants. <\/p>\n

In their early 20s, Billows and Guevarra tried their hand at independent producing, learning far-reaching lessons about audience and performer experience.<\/p>\n

At fringy venues like the anarchically driven Rudolf Rocker Cultural Centre on Albert Street and in the McDermot Avenue basement of the Dawson Richardson Building \u2014 the former site of Forth and the future site of Little Sister Coffee Maker\u2019s third Winnipeg caf\u00e9 \u2014 free shows didn\u2019t translate to value.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would pass a bucket around for donations, and of course, we\u2019d make like eight dollars in quarters,\u201d recalls Billows, who performs each summer in the DnD Improv Show at the Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival. \u201cAnd then of course, the pandemic happened, Kristina moved. And I\u2019d say in the last year I\u2019ve noticed there\u2019s a huge desire for improv again in the city.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn high school, I was told by some of the older folks in the city who did improv that improv is kind of on an eight-year cycle for some reason. There\u2019s tons of it for a long period of time, and then there\u2019s nothing for a long period of time, and the pendulum swings back and forth,\u201d adds Billows, an improv teacher who launched a monthly improv series called Top Dog in March at Sidestage (700 Osborne St.).<\/p>\n

Early competitors include Hughes, Alli Perlov, Mack Norberg, Christopher Dunn and Calla Abudofour-Poku. Alyssa Bird keeps the score.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in Quebec, Guevarra has become an associate producer of the Montreal Sketchfest, which wrapped up on May 9; as a booker, Guevarra brought in Billows to host.<\/p>\n

With Guevarra returning to Winnipeg this weekend for a visit, the duo have booked back-to-back programming at Sidestage. Vying for the Top Dog crown on Sunday night are Abudofour-Poku, Guevarra, Jesse Miki, CJ Schreimer and Outside Joke\u2019s Henderson and Testar.<\/p>\n

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Dan Robertson photo<\/p>\n

Fierce improv competitors will be going for laughs at Sidestage this Sunday and Monday.<\/p>\n

Joining those local performers on the bill are Montreal sketch artist Mason Persaud and National Theatre School grad Jeremy Lewis, two of Guevarra\u2019s colleagues at Th\u00e9\u00e2tre Sainte-Catherine.<\/p>\n

On Monday night at Sidestage, Guevarra, Lewis and Persaud \u2014 \u201cHe\u2019s like if you mixed Stavros (Halkias of Bugonia) and Elvis Presley together,\u201d says Guevarra \u2014 take the torch with their SEO-friendly travelling show, \u201cComedy Near Me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanted the Google juice,\u201d says Guevarra of the show, which reaches Vancouver on Thursday. \u201cWe call it the Montreal world tour, and I wanted to go back to the place I fell in love with comedy, which is home.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tickets for both Top Dog and Comedy Near Me are available at Sidestagewpg.com ($15). Top Dog returns to the South Osborne venue on June 29.<\/p>\n

winnipegfreepress.com\/benwaldman<\/p>\n

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Ben Waldman
Reporter
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Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University\u2019s (now Toronto Metropolitan University\u2019s) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print \u2014 part of the Free Press\u2018s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press\u2019s history and mandate<\/a>, and learn how our newsroom operates<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"They were still green players developing their comedic compass when Riva Billows and Kristina Guevarra first plied their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":688268,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-688267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=688267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/688268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=688267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=688267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=688267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}