Trust Us... This Is All Made Up

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The very talented up-and-coming actor/director, Alex Karpovsky, screened his new feature documentary Trust Us... This Is All Made Up at this year's SXSW. It was the last film I saw during the festival, and was happy to have ended on such a high note.

Trust Us... This Is All Made Up documents and explores the improvisational genius of legendary Second City veterans, David Pasquesi and T.J. Jagodowski.

 The first 10 or 15 minutes of the film introduces us to the two performers, tracing the development of their individual careers in comedy and improv, then emphasizing their professional collaboration and special friendship cultivated throughout the years. Karpovsky artfully frames these early sequences through a split-panel screen that follows each performer independently as they discuss their partnership and views on the demands and joys of improvisational comedy. We observe them as they wander through the streets, people-watch from a park bench, bantering and gleaning inspiration from each other and mundane, daily occurrences. Karpovsky's approach is particularly effective in demonstrating the differences in their personalities while highlighting  the unique, empathetic bond between the two that informs such brilliant spontaneous performances.

The remainder of Trust Us is a simple but well-shot screening of one of Pasquesi and Jagodowski's live New York improv shows. After introductions, they stare intensely into each other's eyes, finding that eerie psychic link which sparks the initial interactions as, along with the audience, they discover their characters and situational humor. The momentum builds as they hilariously create a scenario of the absurd, but true-to-life tensions of office politiking, often seamlessly switching between five or six characters. Their method is elegant and entirely elusive to me.

Karpovsky had seen (and filmed? I can't remember) five such performances by Pasquesi and Jagodowski, and obviously found this one to be the most powerful for the film. I understand that to preserve the integrity of an improv experience, the narrative flow would be difficult to interrupt. Nonetheless, I would have preferred to see a broader sampling of their work, and perhaps further interviews with the two at the end.

However, Trust Us... This Is All Made Up is extremely enjoyable and creatively filmed. I must confess, that I, myself, took improv classes at Improv Olympics in Chicago... and flopped humiliatingly, giving me an immense appreciation for what it takes to succeed as an improv artist. I urge anyone curious about the genre to please check out this film. I also heartily encourage everyone to follow the past and future projects of Alex Karpovsky, an impressively intelligent and insightful filmmaker.
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