WIT People

WIT welcomes people from all walks of life and improvisers at all levels of experience and skill. Made up of itinerant theatre professionals, bored public servants, confused stand-up comedians, desperate homemakers, cut-throat corporate sociopaths, nervous public speakers and relapsed improvoholics, we are altogether unique in New Zealand.

Guided by Creative Directors Derek Flores and Simon Smith, Coordinator Clare Kerrison, and the WIT Committee, WIT is a cooperative and inclusive family. WIT is the only improv troupe in the country that is accessible to members of the community and founded on the principle of community participation. We aim to provide pathways for all players.

WIT maintains a membership of about thirty adults with an even number of men and women. We pioneered the first all-female act (Improv Divas) and professional youth act (Joe Improv) in New Zealand. Check out some of the people who make WIT happen below.

WIT has a growing world-wide network of members and international branches in London, Melbourne and Singapore. Check out our representatives in a location near you. We can put you in touch with them if you contact us at info@wit.org.nz.

		Adam Williamson is a geek. He spends his days playing computer games and reading fantasy novels. Using his primary character trait (intelligence) he graduated from university with a degree majoring in Mathematics. Failing, however, to educate people on the importance of there being precisely six convex regular polytopes in four-dimensional space, Adam fell back on his secondary character traits of humour and charisma. After equipping his Ring of Sarcasm (+5 to Snappy Comebacks) and paying 30GP to join the Guild of WIT, Adam was given a rare T-Shirt of Improv (+10 to All Comedic Skills) and now participates in frequent 8-12 player high-level Venue Raids.
		Amanda MacLean ran away from the circus to join WIT in 2003. She is a professional clown and actor, and trained at the Clown School in California and the WIT Keith Johnstone masterclass in 2004. She can peel bananas with her feet. When life becomes dull and routine, she plays cards and represents Wellington at bridge. From Gisborne, Amanda rides a unicycle. Which is long way. Amanda starred in ‘Onion’ during the 2005 New Zealand International Fringe Festival, the success of which has propelled her around the country on a national tour.
		Anton van Helden /‘Un’tun van Helden’/ n. 1. A marine mammal scientist by day. 2. A magician, singer, mandolin player, cartoonist and improviser by night. An unforgettable, highly-realistic performance of an improvised song entitled "Sweaty Man" landed him the first of his many improv trophies in 2001, with other contestants literally throwing in their towels. From such humble beginnings, Anton starred in Micetro (Best Comedy Award, New Zealand International Fringe Festival 2003), trained in the WIT Keith Johnstone masterclass, and now leads WIT's beginners training programme at the Wellington Community Education Centre. Trying to emulate the musical stylings of a humpback whale, this big man loves to sing - he put the blues in Blue Whale.
		Barry Miskimmin is the oldest living member of WIT. Twice awarded the WIT annual prize for gravitas, Barry brings a serious flair for improvisation to the stage. Proud of his Celtic roots, Barry often gets Irish and Scottish accents confused. Barry trained in the WIT Keith Johnstone masterclass and is one of WIT's senior trainers and MCs. He is also perhaps the most stable improviser in the group, performing in all of WIT’s improv formats and starring in Micetro (Best Comedy Award, New Zealand International Fringe Festival 2003). Barry is so dry that he is a fire hazard. Weekdays, Barry is a sales weasel for a large corporation.
		Chrissy Ainsworth joined the group that became WIT in 2002, and began performing with the Improv Divas and in Battle of WITs in 2003. Originally from darkest Yorkshire, she used to eat puddings and dance professionally for indie bands throughout Great Britain. Sometimes she acted (up). She sought refugee status in New Zealand when the Performing Arts Establishment in the UK began to persecute her by typecasting her as an autistic gibbon. She now teaches ‘fusion funk’ dance classes. Chrissy is one of the funniest people in the world living without institutional support, and a great character improviser. She is black and proud.
		Christine Brooks joined WIT in 2005 and currently puts her sharp pen to work as WIT's Secretary. Christine has been improvising since she was old enough to know better and was recently teaching improv to younglings in schools throughout Canterbury. After many years performing in the obscurity and smog of Christchurch, she was spotted by a WIT talent scout concerned for her health. When she is not improvising, Christine likes to work from a script approved by the Prime Minister. She moves documents from folder to folder. Christine is a public servant. She is your servant. If you are dissatisfied with the level of public service you have received, she will be happy to respond to any enquiries in due course and as appropriate.
		Clare Kerrison joined the group that became WIT in 2003. With a stage presence large enough to lift two Improv Divas off the ground while speaking gibberish, Clare has become one of WIT's leading ladies and a senior trainer. She trained at the NASDA in Christchurch, in the WIT Keith Johnstone masterclass, and at the Loose Moose International Improvisation School, Calgary. Clare is a mild mannered Business Manager for BATS Theatre by day and a seductive megalomaniac by night. She is sorry for any inconvenience and thanks you for the fish.
		Derek Flores just flew in from Canada, and boy are his arms tired. EH? Seriously though...He is a calico cat in smart waistcoat with ascot and a felt bowler tilted to a jaunty angle. With over 16 years of improvisational experience beginning at world renown Loose Moose Theatre under the eye of author and inventor of TheatreSports Keith Johnstone, progressing through almost a decade of global street performing into a five year stint with Second City Toronto, Derek is a little confused as to how he got here but he likes it all the same. He brings his formidable experience to WIT's aid as co-creative director, along with Simon Smith.
		Emma Thomson survived two interview rounds, a criminal conviction check and bribed her previous hair consultant to ensure an excellent reference before being recruited by WIT in late 2006. After a 4 month sabbatical this year, she has rejoined WIT, bigger, better and stronger than ever: bigger, having spent the entire break eating nothing but the national dish of Sweden, a simple but delicious triumvirate of chocolate, cream and blue cheese; better, having studied the ancient art of improvised comedy from the oldest living Master, nestled away in a secluded cave in Hataitai; and stronger due to 85 percent of her body (hair excluded) being rebuilt from improv robots following a near fatal accident while performing an interpretive creative dance.
		Janet Humphris joined WIT in 2003 and is one of WIT’s growing number of public servants. Disappointed initially by the lack of a strategic policy framework, Janet quickly adjusted to the world of improvisation and started performing in Battle of WITs. She won the inaugural WIT Award for Most Improved Player 2003, and is known for her winning way with words. Janet enjoys long meetings, cups of tea, Powerpoint presentations and the feeling that nothing she contributes as an individual matters. She applies her "Yes, (Let's!) Minister" attitude to work and WIT. Most recently it was discovered that Janet is in fact on the cutting edge of 'uncool'.
		Juliette Macdonald joined the group that became WIT in 2002, trained in the WIT Keith Johnstone masterclass, and was a founding member of the Improv Divas shortly thereafter. She has the great fortune to spend her days (and nights) in the delightful company of two of the world’s leading toddlers, Ari and Louis MacIver. Louis and Ari have been orbiting the sun with the rest of the human family since departing from Juliette’s womb in November 2001 and September 2004 respectively. Prior to Louis and Ari taking up residence, Juliette taught English as a second language and today specialises in a wide range of foreign accents for the stage. She has can rhyme under intense pressure and can be very silly indeed. To her great shame, she cannot play the violin.
		Jen Mason, an openly reformed Hutt girl, has performed in improv since she was 12 and has not yet gotten sick of it. Being a customer support representative for an underground auction site pays the bills in order to allow Jen to answer her true calling - being a wrestling valet for Kiwi Professional Wrestling. She is WIT's communications manager, and spends her spare time writing music and making the WIT website and myspace pretty.
		Julian ‘Poppa’ Wilson snatched power as one of WIT’s founding Co-Creative Directors in 2003 and was fired in 2005 amidst rumours of workplace bullying. An old-age improvising pensioner of some fourteen years and show-winning graduate of the Loose Moose International Improvisation School in Calgary, Jules was originally the President of the Dunedin Improv Company where he threw his status around. Known for his grumpy, dictatorial and uncompromising style, and his enthusiasm for seeing improvisers fail, Jules broke in new WITs one word at a time during his reign of terror. Jules devised “The Improv Factor” and won Micetro (Best Comedy Award, International Fringe Festival 2003). A professional actor, Jules graduated from Toi Whakaari New Zealand School of Drama in 2001 and won Best Supporting Actor at the Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards in 2006.
		Kate Zabranski-Todd is a 'nice girl' and a new recruit to the Improv Divas, bringing the voice of reason to an otherwise often silly enterprise. She may have spent too long in the bush with her cats and has a more than reasonable aversion to men with no teeth. She is currently trying to avoid dressing in hessian and becoming the weird woman of the 'hood". Improv provides her with an outlet for the 'weird that lives within'. She has been improvising for about 3 years and loves the challenges that it brings, plus it gets her out of the house.
		Kirstin Price is the longest-running female improviser in Wellington, and a founding member of WIT and of New Zealand’s first all-female improvisation act, the Improv Divas. She is a senior trainer and has featured in all of WIT’s formats, starring most recently in WIT’s first long-form show, Lovepossibly. Kirstin has been involved in improvised comedy since forgetting her lines and cutting out her twin brother's big scene in a school play ten years ago. She trained in the Victoria University Theatresports troupe and performed in seedy bars when WIT was a just a twinkle in Keith Johnstone ’s eye. She compensates for her short stature by being quicker and smarter than other improvisers.
		Keith Johnstone joined WIT as an honorary member in 2004, directed the WIT masterclass and his first and only show in New Zealand (“The Secret Origin of Improv”). Keith is the world’s leading authority on improv, great chunks of which he invented (including Theatresports, Micetro, The Life Game). He currently tours the world teaching it. On discovering that WIT was largely unresponsive to outside help and unable to follow a trail to the end of a story, he concluded that WIT reminded him of ‘clinic clowns’, the gentle people who are entrusted to entertain very sick children - a badge we wear with pride. WIT continues to miss Keith and we hope to train with him again.
		Lorraine Ward is quiet and unassuming in public. Speculation exists as to her private life.
		Lyndon Hood likes to dress in green leathers and is a descendant of Robin. He has been improvising since late last century, stealing lines from the rich to give to the poor. Lyndon left Dunedin in 2004, when it became apparent that all the good improvisers had left (viz Alistair “Wish” Wishart, Julian Wilson and Nigel Chin). Lyndon brings intellectual rigour and a love for technological gadgetry to the stage in Battle of WITs and the Improv Factor. Generally creative, he is currently daylighting as the office lackey and in-house satirist for an independent internet news agency. He can be found sitting in cyber oak trees, thinking.
		Name Suppressed by the Broadcasting Standards Authority due to public indecency.This WIT Member loves women. A lot. Which is a shame, since he is a eunuch brought up by wolves at a Zen Buddhist temple in the Naki. It has taken him many years to suppress an innate urge to drop his trousers in front of a potential mate. After fifteen court appearances, the judge finally placed a restraining order on WIT member preventing him from coming within 50 metres of the opposite sex. WIT member can often be seen celebrating the end of another stint of community service (WIT producer). Discovered by Tom Cruise during the making of the Last Samurai, WIT member is an actor and made his film debut as a horse. He joined the group that became WIT in 2001.
		Paul “Poolie” Ross once aspired to be an actor.  He was told that the name didn't have Hollywood style.  He was also told that he didn't have dashing good looks (his wife disagrees).  The truth is that his memory is shot to pieces.  Remarkably, these are all assets in improv.  Fate can be cruel...
		Paul Sullivan is coming along nicely. He was handpicked by the Improv Divas to star in lovepossibly on account of his sweet nature, youthful good looks and prehensile tail. A graduate of the National Academy of Singing and Dramatic Art, Paul is a professional actor and drama teacher, but fortunately was liberated from scripted acting in 2004 by WIT. Paul practices yoga meditation and is so enlightened he glows on stage.
		Pete Hodgson joined the group that became WIT before anyone knew what he was like. He soon became a crowd favourite, driven by an obsessive compulsive desire to have fun on stage. Born the son of a rich Manchester industrialist for whom every sperm was sacred, Pete struggled to achieve recognition as an individual. Amongst sixteen brothers and sisters, Pete found that he could gain attention from his mother by dressing in bright orange and using lurid puns. These days we barely notice the attention deficit disorder gained from his traumatic past. ‘Pete Hodgson’ is a time zone recognised by Greenwich. Weekdays, Pete is the minister for information technology and manages this website. Pete has starred in Battle of WITs, Micetro and Gorilla - usually as a Mexican. He led the Jandal Slappers to triumphant failure in the Improv Factor 2004. He often protests at the unfairness of life by putting up billboards around town.
		Peter Dorn wanted to be an exotic dancer in a night club when he grew up, but neither has happened. For years, nothing had happened for Peter. Then one night, in the audience of a WIT show, sudden waves of sensual excitement rippled through his body during an epic poem. Soon after, he changed his daily routine and started to care more about stage appearances. By 2004, he was sneaking out at night to attend the WIT Community Education Centre beginners course. When Peter is not improvising, he produces volumes of paper and WIT's business cards. He joined WIT in 2005. He is attentive and responds well.
		Simon Smith wants people to take him seriously, and gosh darn it, they will now that he's co-creative director along with Derek Flores. Simon is a professional improviser - he has trained at the Loose Moose International Improvisation School in Calgary, Canada, the Wellington School of Performing Arts, New Zealand, and Blockbuster Video, Kent Terrace. Notwithstanding his habit of dropping his trousers on stage, Simon is adored by the Wellington audience, as well as his fellow players. He is one of WIT’s senior trainers, MCs and producers, spearheading the internationally renowned show, Gorilla Theatre, and performing in all of WITs formats, blah, blah, blah. He plays himself, thus specialising in very wide range of unusual personalities.
		Steven Youngblood has been improvising for years (some might say his whole life). He was discovered by WIT living in the backstreets of the 1980s, performing with Palmerston North's FABULOUS local improv boy band, ‘Scared Scriptless’. In 2005, we successfully negotiated his release back into the mainstream improv community but still allow him to wear colourful knee-warmers and a towelling head-band at training. Steven’s hobbies include long walks on the beach and candlelit dinners. He claims to be in a committed relationship as a means of attracting women who like unavailable men who are unable to commit.
		Woody (Wiremu) Tuhiwai was born and raised in the golden fields of Hawkes Bay (only golden in summer and actually near the hills not in them). He first graced the stage with Theatre Hawkes Bay and was introduced to the world of Improv through Hawkes Bay Youth Theatre (HaBYT), joining the improv happenings of ‘Strange Habyts.’ A move to Wellington and Vic University in early 2007 led Woody to stumble across WIT. A generous player both on stage and off, Woody has been embraced with welcoming arms to the WIT family.
World Wide WITs
Auckland
		Danielle Hodgson is a force to be reckoned with. She joined the group that became WIT in 2002, began performing with the Improv Divas in 2004, and was WIT’s Coordinator for its first two glorious years and was its raison d'etre. Danielle is one Keith Johnstone masterclassy lady. Known for her supportiveness on stage and off, she is considered WIT’s leading lingerie model. Despite her outward façade of sweetness and calm, she is lit within by a ferocious desire to categorise, systemise and organise, the principal beneficiary of which is now Auckland.. She is also a finely-honed sales machine who could sell 1080 to a possum.
London
		Alistair "Wish" Wishart joined the group that became WIT in 2002. Wish came from a long tradition of Dunedin improvisers (all dead). He used to be funny until he became a lawyer. A man of letters, Wish prefers scenes involving minimal movement. And it is for this reason that Wish enjoys the challenge of dating women with lockjaw. He does not have a comb-over. Wish left the country in 2004 under suspicious circumstances. He is WIT’s plenipotentiary representive in the Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, based in London, and performing regularly with other improvisers who take him more seriously. Check out his roving reports here.
New York
		Tai Samaeli, a member of the Samoan mafia, infiltrated WIT in 2003 and became its Coordinator in 2005. Unlike the rest of the members of WIT, Richard is task-oriented. Having spent many years performing as an improviser and a passer-by in Christchurch, Richard brings a fresh approach and is widely credited with elevating style over substance in The Battle of WITs and The Improv Factor. Richard has, in the past, been a youth worker as a way of learning youth slang and to feel better about aging. He recently threw in his desk job to become a seventies action figure in New York and do Nicky's laundry.
		Nicky Hill joined WIT by accident but found a way of life. Her meteoric rise to stardom was complete when she began performing with The Improv Divas in 2002. She was WIT's founding Communications Manager and keeps coming to Committee meetings for the company. Nicky has since performed in all of WIT’s formats, most recently spearheading WIT’s first long-form improv show, Lovepossibly. She produced the WIT Keith Johnstone masterclass as a means of ensuring she won the end-of-class show. Underneath it all, Nicky is a shy and retiring person with deep-seated psychological problems and a sense of personal worthlessness. She narrowly escaped the culturally stunting effects of an upbringing in the Hutt Valley before moving into town. Though improv provided her with an outlet for risk-taking behaviour, it also so alarmed her colleagues in the New Zealand foreign service, that they eventually sent her off to the UN in New York for reprogramming.
Singapore
		Carmen ‘Kah Mun’ Mak is joined the group that became WIT in 2002 and was WIT’s founding Secretary in its first two glorious years. A one-woman Asian-invasion, Carmen had a tenacious grasp of all of the agreed action steps that eluded other players on stage, and was a much-loved institution in The Improv Factor, micetro and Battle of WITs. For fun, she organizes the Asia Pacific region at the APEC Secretariat. When there is nothing better to do, Carmen rearranges her sock drawer using feng shui. Carmen has emigrated to Singapore in 2005 because her partner wanted her to dedicate more time to him than improv.
		Nigel Chin hails from Dunedin, New Zealand, where he was a regular on the improv scene. On arrival in Wellington in 2002, Nigel quickly made a name for himself as a cutting WIT and has featured in all of WIT’s improv formats. He also starred in many musicals throughout New Zealand, including appearances as a chinese frenchman in Les Miserables, a puerto-rican chinaman in West Side Story and a chinese american in 42nd Street. He channels barely suppressed rage at racial stereotyping into corporate law. Nigel was born in the year of the snake, is 5ft 7" in heels and his favourite colour is red. He emigrated to Singapore in 2005 to find a wife and is setting up WIT’s South East Asian branch operation.
Melbourne
		Naomi Stephen-Smith joined the group that became WIT in 2002 in the wake of national television success as a shrewsbury in the Hudson biscuit commercial at the age of ten. Naomi is a practising saint and helped WIT in numerous ways. She fiddled WITs books, produced WIT shows, and took ticket stubs, always with a smile and an unspoken demand for efficient progress. Short but tough, Naomi's feisty enthusiasm propelled players more than twice her size off stage in Battle of WITs and the Improv Factor. She is now a member of Melbourne Impro and looks sideways at WIT.
Roving
		Chris Werren had resigned himself to a life of red tape and bureaucracy in the far reaches of the public service (Wellington City Council) until he discovered WIT in 2004 while on his way to another nightclass ("Handicrafts for Busy People"). He performed in The Improv Factor in 2005. For Chris, finding WIT was like an epiphany, but without the harps, angels and roman sandals. In the future Chris hopes to find God, or at least, a girlfriend. Likes: Lamb shanks, the Pixies and K-Bars. Dislikes: Agapanthas, ironing and damp socks. Chris left the country in 2005 and now serves as WIT’s roving foreign correspondent. He has a failed career as a musician.
		Pien Hoeben and Bas Van Eldonk decided to go Dutch and jointly joined WIT in 2005. Before that, they lived together in old Zeeland, and were active members of the well-known Netherlands theatre sensation "Scheveningsche Gezelligheidsvereniging Kracht door Eenvoud" (Zeeland Improv Troupe). These days, they spend their time wondering why houses aren't insulated, why people go barefoot, why the sun is in the North at noon, what "Hoki poki" is, and why it takes fifteen minutes to make a latte. They enjoying conforming to national stereotypes, like the Dutch shop in Petone, and are hugely reproductive members of WIT.
		Ryan Hartigan (WIT’s inaugural Creative Director, winner of Best New Director at the New Zealand Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards 2004, former President of Victoria University Theatresports, NZ Universities Improv titleholder and fourteen year improv veteran) has been improvising since he was even smaller. Ryan is an athlete of the linguistic marathon, and winner of many of the country's ‘Ryanman’ competitions. A professional director and founder of the Theatre Pataphysical, he is engaged in endless experimental work with nubile drama students at a university somewhere in the US of A. In moments of psychic disorientation, Ryan quietly sweeps.