Riff Raff Theater

Riff Raff Theater’s writing process can best be summed up as “Crowdsourced Comedy”. Stealing a few ideas from the internet at large (and to be more specific, the section of the net that identifies itself as “2.0″), we’ve honed our creative workflow into a well-oiled gag machine that involves everyone that wishes to be a part of the show. So, how does it work, you ask? (Please ask, or this page is going to be short.) Great! Let’s proceed.

• Choosing a title
  Sometimes we put up a vote, sometimes we have grand plans for a title and announce it up front. In any case, we have a large selection of movies ranging from the awful, to the dated, to the pretentious dreck that infects our cineplexes every year. Our titles are announced here on the website, and we send out our writers into the Netflix queues and Blockbuster videos of the world, forced to rent movies they usually wouldn’t admit to ever having watched.
• The Writers Go Nuts
  At this point, our lives our in the hands of the writers, whoever should choose to be a part of that process. Using our script template (download), writers get their friends together (if they have any) and write out all the material they can think of. We encourage quality over quantity, but we’re no stranger to receiving submissions with over 400 jokes included in the script.
• The Editing Begins
  Once the deadline has passed and all the scripts are in our hands, our technical wizard and lead editor James Whistler compiles all of our material into one file, where the work on our part begins. We look for quality material and include it in our “Gold Sheet”, keeping everything else on hand in case a second look is needed at a particular moment in the film. This process usually takes a few days, at which point it’s given to the performers.
• Final Grinding
  Along with some of the local writers, the three performers get together over the final few weeks before the live show and recording sessions, writing additional material and assigning reading duties to each. The performers’ writing sessions are usually more focused on filling gaps in the script rather than replacing submissions, though we’ve been known to bust a gut at a sudden outburst or two that demands inclusion.