study<\/a> found that taking classes in something new, be it painting or iPad proficiency, can lead adults ages 58 to 88 to improve their cognition to levels on par with adults a full 30 years their junior.\u00a0<\/p>\nThere\u2019s reason to believe improv could have a similar effect. \u201cAs soon as you get up there, [Zareff] tells you what to do, and you have to act it out,\u201d Toni Della, 71, said. \u201cSo you have to be quick \u2026 because if you\u2019re not, you\u2019ll freeze up.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sheila Small, 86, was afraid that might happen to her a few sessions back when Zareff instructed participants to lip sync a song of their choice. Small, a shy former elementary school teacher, requested to sit the exercise out.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It\u2019s operated by Catholic Charities Brooklyn and Queens, which runs 20 Older Adults Centers across the two boroughs Emmy Park for NY Post<\/p>\n
But after some encouragement from the charming-but-firm Zareff \u2014 \u201cYou don\u2019t have to do it, but if you don\u2019t, I think you\u2019re going to be missing out,\u201d he said \u2014 Small took the stage to perform Ethel Merman\u2019s rendition of \u201cThere\u2019s No Business Like Show Business.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI couldn\u2019t believe it \u2014 I didn\u2019t have to do anything. All I had to do there was open up my mouth and have the words come out, and all of a sudden I was Ethel Merman,\u201d Small recalled. \u201cAfter that experience, anything that Stanley said, \u2018do,\u2019 I did, and I think all of us are like that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Indeed, Zareff finds his students can be more open-minded than their younger or professional counterparts. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re not proving anything to anyone,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd while they may be a little nervous, they\u2019re brave. And that\u2019s the bottom line: Be brave.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Actor-turned-communications consultant Stanley Zareff, 82, is the troupe\u2019s leader. Emmy Park for NY Post<\/p>\n
Elizabeth Valenti, 83, is just that. The former telephone company employee had a heart attack three years ago, and wasn\u2019t expected to survive. Then last year, she wound up in the hospital, and then nursing home, with pneumonia and the flu.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI wasn\u2019t supposed to make it, but I always said that God kept me here for a purpose and showed me that life is still worth living,\u201d Valenti said. Some of that purpose is realized through improv. \u201cI make people smile, make them laugh \u2014 that\u2019s why I\u2019m still here right now.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Taking senior center stage\u00a0<\/p>\n
Prior to Pamela\u2019s bachelorette party, Zareff\u2019s friend and former \u201cFunny Thing\u201d cast mate Mauricio Bustamante led the class in a relaxation exercise. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis saves money on plastic surgery,\u201d he said when directing participants to release tension in their foreheads.\u00a0<\/p>\n
An Earth, Wind & Fire-fueled dance party \u2014 populated by walkers and occasionally interrupted by Zareff\u2019s commands to \u201cfreeze!\u201d \u2014 followed. <\/p>\n
\u201cI can hardly walk,\u201d Valenti said, \u201cbut I can dance.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Later came the day\u2019s central exercise: The seniors, who\u2019d come prepared with song lyrics of their choice, paired off to create skits that somehow merged the two songs\u2019 storylines. \u201cInstead of singing the song, just say the words,\u201d Zareff said. \u201cAnd by the way, listen to each other. Support each other.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Zareff encourages participants to step outside of their comfort zones. Emmy Park for NY Post<\/p>\n
One mashup that ensued included two women sipping champagne at a Parisian cafe while bonding over their broken hearts. \u201cI will survive. As long as I know how to love, I know I\u2019ll stay alive,\u201d one said. Her friend was less optimistic. \u201cBye-bye love, bye-bye happiness, hello loneliness,\u201d she said. \u201cI think I\u2019m going to cry.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYay!\u201d the audience cheered after Zareff called, \u201cCurtain!\u201d \u201cYou spoke up, you stayed in character,\u201d he applauded. \u201cI think you both deserve some champagne.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
It\u2019s high but not rare praise from Zareff, who studied theater in college and graduate school, and joined the Colorado Shakespeare Festival before moving to New York. He toured nationally as a lead in \u201cA Funny Thing That Happened on the Way to the Forum,\u201d worked at the Roundabout Theater, and studied alongside then-emerging celebrities including Bernadette Peters and Richard Gere.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI think everybody feels like this is the clubhouse, and you\u2019re members of the club,\u201d said one regular. \u201cIt\u2019s a very good feeling.\u201d\u00a0 Emmy Park for NY Post<\/p>\n
While Zareff eventually built a successful career coaching executives in corporate America, he continued to teach acting workshops around the country and world \u2014 and has watched his students land roles in national productions of shows like \u201cWicked,\u201d \u201cChicago\u201d and \u201cBeauty and the Beast.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
In other words, he\u2019s beyond qualified to instruct a quirky collection of aging amateur thespians for free. But it\u2019s worth it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cEven though I\u2019m in a very high-end neighborhood, some of these people live alone in a studio; they don\u2019t have a family anymore; they rely on being able to come and have a lunch here, as well as play bingo or mahjong or attend an art class or do chair yoga or folk dancing,\u201d he said. \u201cThey have somewhere to go, and that means a lot to me.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
An ER doc and improv regular known as \u201cDr. Jon\u201d likens the senior center to the bar from \u201cCheers.\u201d \u201cI think everybody feels like this is the clubhouse, and you\u2019re members of the club,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s a very good feeling.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s a Tuesday afternoon in Brooklyn Heights, and Pamela has just arrived at her bachelorette party.\u00a0 It\u2019s a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":213838,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[5425,2574,68,2953,84382,232,13532,57,9,56,63,65,64,1881],"class_list":["post-213837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-aging","tag-comedy","tag-exclusive","tag-health","tag-improv","tag-lifestyle","tag-longevity","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-wellness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213837\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/213838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}