Read-Through -- Wednesday, April 5

Beefy thugs, a dim-witted blonde, a screaming Chinese man, a dash of song and dance, and at the center of it all, a wise-cracking little imp named Choppy. That was the menu for this morning's table read.

We gathered around 9am for our own read-through before the big guns showed up. This was a good idea because The Choppy Show is unlike any other show. It's loud, it's visual, it's got music, it's got dancing. The upcoming table-read for the brass needed a once-over to make sure we got the kinks out. And kink-outing we did. Cues were established, stage directions were eliminated, entrances and blocking were smoothed over. We were ready for the suits.

The read-through of the pilot clicked most when actors were on their feet, especially our creator, writer, and hero of the piece, John Crane, aka Choppy. The scenes were mostly lifted almost intact from the stage of the Groundlings Theater, where this character was born and developed. When I saw John do The Choppy Show back then, there was a loose plot running through each of the Choppy scenes, attempting to tie them all together. The beauty of this creation is that there is no effort to tie the stories together. In fact, they aren't even expected to last a full 30 minutes. Each episode of The Choppy Show would, in fact, be two episodes, each lasting only 15 minutes. As in this case, the two halves are unrelated except by Choppy and the object of his affection, Heidi. The sense, as described by both John and the casting director, Donna Ekholdt, is that Choppy is a modern day Stooge. He is Moe, Curly, and Larry all rolled into one and he goes off on these little adventures, two per week. Part of the fun should be seeing him in new settings every time you tune in. "Well I wonder what kind of mess Choppy is in this week!"

You can almost hear America saying it already.

The Choppy Show | Ducey on TV | Resume