How do you decide you’re ready to direct? How do you handle pushback from a defensive writer? What’s the difference between teaching and directing? All this and more in this marvelous conversation with Matt Gehring and Niccolo Aeed! Thanks for reading Unusual Things: A Guide to Sketch Comedy! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Bios:Matt Gehring:Matt Gehring is a New York–based director specializing in comedy and performance whose work has been featured at The Signature Theater, Joe’s Pub, the Edinburgh Fringe, Comedy Central, Netflix, and Just For Laughs: Montreal. For five years, he ran the comedy residency at the Obie Award–winning Ars Nova, developing 25 original shows, and co-created the long-running musical comedy show SHIZ at UCB with two-time Tony winner Shaina Taub. A Shubert Scholar with an MFA from Brooklyn College, he has directed projects in collaboration with artists such as Bowen Yang, Chrissy Shackelford, Chloe Troast, Alexis Gay, and Matt Rogers, creating and shaping original work for stages worldwide.Niccolo Aeed:Niccolo Aeed is an award winning screenwriter, director and comedian. His first feature film, co-wrote and directed with Marina Tempelsman, This Will Never Work, won Best Screenplay at Brooklyn Film Festival, and Best Narrative Feature at the Dumbo Film Festival and SF Indie Film Festival. He’s half the comedy duo Marina and Nicco, whose sketches have been featured in The New Yorker, Funny or Die, the UCB, PIT and College Humor and more. Plays include If You Do This Right You'll Probably Break Their Chest (Ars Nova) and To All My Supporters (Ars Nova), Room 4 (The PIT) and Unpacking: A Ghost Story In the Dark (HERE Arts). Nicco's other plays include One Morning Soon and The 5th Epic of Cheri which were both featured at The Fire This Time Festival. He teaches sketch with the UCB, and has directed the Maude teams The Foundation, Pretty Boys, House of Birds, Find My Friends, and Golden Hour. He hosts the podcast Copaganda where he watches cop films to learn about policing in America. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit marinatempelsman.substack.com
