More Apes Press!

Jason Heidemann of the Chicago Tribune included Impress These Apes in his column this week about the loss of Robin Williams. 

Excerpt here:

Standup Scene: Take a risk in honor of Robin Williams

By Jason Heidemann, Special to the Tribune

AUGUST 20, 2014, 1:10 PM

I was on my way to see a comedy show last week when I learned of the death of Robin Williams. You can say many things about the standup of Williams. His style was manic, intelligent, at times deeply personal and almost always highly physical. He was a comic bull in a china shop. He was political, a great impressionist

and a master ad libber. But what I'll miss most are the risks he took onstage. "You're only given a little spark of madness," he once said. "You mustn't lose it."

Williams was fearless. I think about this going into tonight's "Impress These Apes" challenge.

"Apes" is an eight-week show in the form of a talent competition judged by a panel of hyper-intelligent apes from the future (played by comedians). The annual two-month event happens Mondays at ComedySportz in Lakeview and is the brainchild of Blewt! Productions, the folks behind the Chicago-based game show competition "Don't Spit the Water."

Each week, the contestants are tasked with a challenge they must perform in front of a live audience and tonight their task is to perform a five-minute standup routine with a twist -- each has been assigned their own heckler whose job it is to derail their set. Talk about needing to be fearless. Comedian Shannon Noll is a comic who I last saw at the Laugh Factory's queer-themed "Chigayco" show. When comedian Tiffany Puterbaugh starts lobbing slurs her way, Noll handles them admirably. "I hate cross dressing children," shouts Puterbaugh in attempt to mangle a joke about a food truck with the words 'children crossing' written on the side of it.

Without missing a beat, a whip-smart Noll acidly replies, "Oh my God, you would've hated me as a kid."

The highlight is a ferocious Amy Sumpter who admirably beats back heckler Ramona Mourir by totally engaging her while still making direct eye contact with her audience. "I was scared out of my mind," Sumpter says later. "I found out about Robin Williams right before I left for the show [and] was super sad. But then I had a moment where I thought, 'what would Robin do? He would kick ass.' So that is how I decided I would handle my heckler."