Meet Brett Hurley! Brett is a hilarious and hardworking human being who is one of the lead coordinators for Vikes Improv, UVic’s very own on-the-fly comedic acting troupe. His favorite food is pasta, and his favorite color is blue. Brett is a Social Sciences 3rd year studying Economics.
HC: How did you get interested in improv? Do you know when it started for you?
Yeah. I was living in residence in first year, and my friend was just like, “yo, let’s go to this improv thing.” We went to the first jam and it was a lot of fun.
HC: How did you get involved with Vikes Improv, or how did it start?
Well, Daniel Belkin and a couple other people started it the year before my first year, and then in first year I went out to one of the workshops that they were doing – it was more like a jam – and yeah, just went out and had a really good time, and kept going back, and the next year – my second year – it grew and became a bigger thing. We started doing the jams in the SUB upper lounge, and then, come second year, Dan put a troupe together, and then that troupe went to festivals and stuff. We really started to grow it. Then, in the summer, he approached me about taking more of a leadership role, and so I said yes, and we decided to move our shows to the David Lam auditorium and really started advertising them and trying to make them more of a “thing.” And that is the really short, thirty-second version of [it].
HC: So how many years has Vikes Improv been going, total?
The form that it is in now started in January of last year. So, a year, now. But it’s been a “thing” for three to four. More than that, even. You wouldn’t even call it Vikes; it was called ResProv, because it was from residence. It was UVic Improv. They didn’t do shows or anything.
HC: How would you suggest people get involved if they want to do Vikes Improv?
If they want to do Vikes, they should definitely either email us, or check out our Facebook page, where we put most of our info. Just get in touch with us. We do events – workshop/audition things.
HC: About how much time do you put in per week with Vikes Improv? Doing either improv or administrative work.
Improv would probably have one or two practices a week, each two hours – so maybe five-ish doing improv. And then doing other stuff, more than that. A lot more than that.
HC: Are there any upcoming events you would like to tell HerCampus readers about?
We have the Laughing Beard Festival coming up, on February 25th to the 27th – the Thursday to the Saturday, 7:30 PM; all three nights in the David Lam auditorium, same as always. We’re inviting five schools from across Canada and the United States to come preform. David Morris is also going to be preforming. All the shows are free, just by donation – same as always. We’re going to be selling t-shirts and stickers and stuff, to try to also bring in some extra revenue.
Say “hi” if you see Brett around campus!