Meet Jill Lawler, a sophomore superstar in Boston College’s comedy group, CCE. Not only is Jill charismatic, smart, and enthusiastic, but she also never fails to keep the crowd laughing with her hilarious antics.
Name: Jillian Alice Lawler
Major: Nursing
Hometown: Boston, MA
What made you first want to join CCE?
“I had torn my ACL senior year of high school and I couldn’t join any sports teams, but I was still looking for the community aspect, so I went to improv tables at student activities fair. I went to check it out, and then I stayed, because it was fun and it was funny and the people were awesome.”
Tell me a little bit about the College Comedy Festival Beanpot Tournament that you recently participated in.
“The CCF takes schools from all over New England and they choose 9 to 11 people on each team. Then the teams come to Improv Boston to competed in different rounds. You earned points in each round, and the top three teams move on to the finals. The First Round was improvising stand up, where you have to make line jokes. It’s really nerve-wracking because they make you wait in a basement, and then just call you up two by two. When they would call up two more, we were all just sitting there like, ‘Who wants to be executed now?’ Then you get up there and they just point at you and yell, ‘Tell me a joke! Be funny right now!’ The Second Round is short form, which is like the games played on ‘Whose Line Is It Anyways.’ The third round is long form, which is 15 to 20 minutes, and you have to tell a story and improvise that whole time. The scenes have to have a common inspiration. The Fire Round is when you have Extreme Improve Challenge, and then after that is the Final Round.”
What was the best part of the tournament?
“For long form, the night before the tournament started, our group got together and we were trying to think of a way to make the long form funny and interesting to watch. It can be boring to just sit there and watch a bunch of scenes strung together, so I came up with the idea of getting a made-up word that sounds like something real and each scene, you make up a new definition. We would then have to improvise scenes based on that definition. For example, in the tournament, we got the word ‘Chiswick.’ The first definition was ‘a life changing operation,’ the next was ‘candle light dinner you bring you mistress to.’ The next was “stationary to write embarrassing confessions on,’ and lastly, ‘a new scent from Yankee Candle.’ The last scene, I came in with someone else, and we had to string them all together. The judges never saw that before, so they really liked it. We got really close to a perfect score on that one. We were shocked, we had no idea how it would work, and so it was really awesome to see their appreciation for it. “
How did it all end?
“We were ranked third going into the finals, and we did the final round and came out in third place, losing to Northeastern by a really small amount. It felt great because our team had never placed before, even though we always came really close. It was amazing to finally make this opportunity and do the final round. Then they announced the MVP at the end of the competition, and they said that they were giving it to me because of the new improv. It was incredible that they actually recognized it. There were so many amazing people there, and they recognized my new form. I was completely shocked though. It was all kind of a blur after that.”
When can we check out CCE?
“We have shows on April 26th-27th at 7PM and 9:30PM on both nights. Only $5 at door.”
Tell me something weird about you that most people don’t know
“I can do a multitude of voices, ranging from the lisp that I had when I was 4 years old, to the Deep South, to an Aussie bloke, to a middle school biddie. I do a lot of voices.”
Need a good laugh? Check out this video, “Baby Roommate,” an idea created by our favorite funny lady, Jillian herself!