Brian's Hat - ITUSL

When Brian, a fish out of water, is at court his secrets comes to light in the worst possible way.

SKETCH ANALYSIS

2 min read

HOW I FELT:

I was laughing through most of this sketch. I felt embarrassed for Brian as his personal ‘laundry’ was being aired in such a public setting. I loved the tension I felt as they kept revealing more and more about Brian and he tried to get rid of the dice.

WHAT WORKS:

I think part of the brilliance of this sketch is that it’s placed in a courtroom which ups the stakes and the embarrassment factor of anything that’s revealed about Brian all of his embarrassments and quirks are all about to become a matter of public record. The flashbacks also worked for me as a way to keep the sketch interesting and active. Many improvisers have heard the advice of don’t talk about the past, show it and this sketch takes that advice to heart. Also fun easter egg is when Brian drops the dice he rolls double sixes then when the camera cuts back to them they’ve changed into ‘snake eyes’ or double ones at 1:59! I also love how Brian tries to roll the dice closer to the elderly gentleman as if to frame him for owning dice. I also love Brian’s asides and comments which really show his emotional state during the whole ordeal.

STRUCTURE/ EXPOSITION

  • Pov: If you try too hard to be cool you’ll end up appearing like an idiot.

  • Who: Co-workers

  • What: Insider Trading Trial

  • Where: Courtroom

  • Game: Revealing embarrassing things about Brain during trial.

  • Premise based improv scene initiation:

‘I’m going to read off the transcript of the embarrassing things texted about you by your co-workers to the court.’

GAME BEATS:

  1. Did you see Brian’s hat? Cut to: we see Brian in the crowd wearing the same hat and mutter “What the hell.”

  2. I saw two cubes in his pocket, I think he has dice.

  3. Brian tries to subtly drop the dice from his pocket

  4. Brian got in big trouble in a meeting over his hat.

  5. No one stood up for Brain

  6. Brain covered his eyes to cry

  7. Boss called him out on what he was muttering. He denied saying anything.

  8. Brian tries to defend the hat and reveals it’s just the salesman who believes in it.

  9. He reveals that he’s never taken a stand for anything in life but he’ll do it for this hat.

  10. He slams the water bottle all over his laptop.

  11. He tries to do a Fred Astaire hat roll

  12. He complains about wheelchair grease that got on his hat

  13. Brain realized he said the wrong thing and tries to cover it with a lame joke.

  14. “Relevance” - ‘FINALLY!’

  15. Elderly gentleman kicks the dice back, ‘don’t fuck with them!’

ENDING:

The ending used a callback to the earlier beat of trying to shift the dice towards someone else on the floor with his feet.

PITCHES:

I was a little bit confused as to if Brian was on the jury or not. I would assume that he was not as he was related by work to those in the trial. The seating arrangement was a little bit strange to me. But that may have just stemmed from the type of room they were able to get for shooting.

The judge could have called Brian out at some point for being disruptive.

Brain could have tried to blame the elderly gentleman sitting next to him for the dice.

The bailiff could have confiscated the dice or hat for being distracting.

#ITUSL #Ithinkyoushouldleave #FishOutOfWater