Black improv group is liberal with the laughs

Call it comedy with a conscience.

In House Freestyle, a Providence-based, all-black improv comedy troupe, offers a finely tuned blend of laughter and keen social commentary, mixed with parody and slapstick.

The group performs tomorrow at the Mixed Magic Theatre in Pawtucket as part of the Rhode Island Black Storytellers' Funda Fest.

At its last show, Dec. 16 at the Met School, the power of television was the theme.

Members played on commercials for breakfast cereal and Christmas compilation CD's. They gave a press conference to announce a book called Black Youth is Dying, then one to announce the nomination of a new Supreme Court justice, a one-armed man in a military uniform with thick glasses, false teeth and a Steve Urkel voice who dodged questions on Roe v. Wade and race relations.

In a mock commercial for "Microwave-It Cake," a schoolgirl arrived home to find her mother baking a cake, using the microwave. Here, a sampling of the biting lyrics to the accompanying song: "Microwave-It Cake is full of sugar and gamma rays. Microwave-It Cake is sure to make you constipate . . . Hey! Type II diabetes . . . Why is it black people will eat most anything?"

In House Freestyle's members are Ghislaine Jean, 23, an educator at the People's School, a nonprofit school in South Providence focusing on alternative forms of education; Jean's boyfriend, Jon Mahone, 28, a Pittsburgh native and Brown University graduate who teaches history at Hope High School; Yakim Parker, 23, a musician from Brooklyn who has lived in Providence for five years; and Trina Korlie, 16, a student at the Met School who joined the group after participating in an after-school theater program Jean was teaching.

The troupe, formed in September 2004, counts among its influences Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, Dave Chappelle, and Charlie Chaplin.

The four don't practice formally - they spend enough time together socially that life is practice. They do memorize song lyrics and rap sequences ahead of time. Other than that, Jean says, "A lot of the sequences we don't practice full-out. We like to feel the audience."

The troupe aims to arm its audience with knowledge. Mahone notes he used to work for the activist group Direct Action for Rights and Equality. "I've always been aware of the injustices that exist, and determined to fight them," he says.

Mahone says it's particularly important to counteract the thug-life themes that pervade rap lyrics. "There's so many people here who aren't about that, who are about doing something positive," he says.

Indeed, it's the sketches with political content that seem to have the most impact.

At last month's show, the one that drew the loudest applause was one in which the quartet sat on stage, chairs in a row, staring at imaginary TV screen where the audience was. Slowly, they started to speak in unison: "I want to be a black buffoon," first softly, then louder.

When the sense of discomfort in the room had reached a fever pitch, Mahone yelled, "Wake up! It's trying to program us!" Mass hysteria ensued, with the other troupe members yelling: "It's killing us! Turn it off!"

The troupe tries to run a family-oriented show, with no foul language or explicit content and plenty of physical comedy, singing and dancing for those too young to absorb political messages.

In House Freestyle serves a special purpose, its members say, in that it gives black people a chance to see people like them on stage. But they don't perform solely for a black audience.

"We're designing it for the world," Jean clarifies. "It's from the perspective of the black community."

"It's a human thing to laugh," adds Mahone. "Everybody does it."