On this day (April 25) in 2006, a random conversation between Elianna and Jess on the campus of Case Western Reserve University founded what would become The Confused Greenies of Players' Patchwork Theatre Company.

Now... 460 performances later of 260 different semi-improvisational scenarios from traditional Italian commedia dell'arte and Japanese kyōgen to parodies of science-fiction, anime, and steampunk, staged in nearly 50 cities across 7 states by 200 Players of the Patchwork... 20 years... and still running!

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #Birthday #Anniversary #20Years

Tomorrow (Saturday, April 25) is our troupe's 20th birthday! Know what would make a good present? Helping the Italian Cultural Garden with spring clean-up! One of the most beautiful places in Cleveland and one of our favorite venues to perform.

Starting at 10:00am in the Cleveland Cultural Gardens. Meet at 990 East Blvd, Cleveland, OH 44108.

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #ClevelandCulturalGardens #ItalianGarden #ItalianCulturalGarden #SpringCleaning

This Saturday, April 25 we celebrate our troupe's big 20th birthday so we're doing a retrospective countdown!

Year 16 (2021 - 2022) was when we could stage in-person commedia dell'arte again though we now had two different sets of masks such as the premiere of "The Horrible and Terrifying Deeds and Words of Niphleseth, Queen of the Wild Island of Chitterlingonian Sausages" for Ohio State University Center on Medieval & Renaissance Studies inspired by the 16th Century satirical novels by François Rabelais!

Year 17 (2022 - 2023) saw the world fully reopen and when faced what was expected to be the final Marcon (our premiere science-fiction convention) we decided to go out with a bang and stage our second adaptation of a play briefly scene in the pages of the "Girl Genius" gaslamp fantasy graphic novel series, the infamous and incredibly ribald "Heterodyne Boys & the Socket Wench of Prague"!

Year 18 (2023 - 2024) we staged more innuendo jokes in a 60 minute performance block than possibly the prior 18 years combined with "The Beavers of Venice", a last minute "Plan B" commedia dell'arte play for our biggest show at Pennsic!

Year 19 (2024 - 2025) finally completed plans begun in 2019 for our first D20 Project Play in 2019 when we staged "A Mockery of Mimicry" multiple times as a commedia dell'arte parody celebrating the 50th anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons where audience rolls of a giant die determined the course of our farce!

Year 20 (2025 - 2026) we continued our look into the more fantasy side of commedia dell'arte with several performances in historical pastorale style on our way to going down, down, down into a goblin town where we'll end on the madness of laughter!

So... where will the next 20 years take us?!

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #ClevelandConCoction #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #Birthday #Anniversary #20Years

Choices, choices... What commedia dell'arte shall we bring to Pennsic 53 this July and August?

Today is Earth Day and we're reminded of the second scenario completed from our first #Inktober challenge in Fall 2024. "Arlecchino's Arborous Adventure" takes elements from a commedia pastorale but grounds them in tricks and fake illusions of a traditional "street" commedia situational romantic comedy farce!

(Also by amusing coincidence, both commedia plays we performed this month also have the foolish harlequin as part of the title!)

Follow us and check back often for more updates on potential plays and our eventual selection!

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #Comedy #Mask #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #MySCA

When we heard tabletop creators had declared Monster Week 2026 (April 20 - 24) to be about the Fae, we had to celebrate with a clip from our fairy funny farce "The Hazards of Hunting Red-Caps" - though our commedia dell'arte referenced actual historical scholarship about the fae during the Society for Creative Anachronism's time period which can quite differ from D&D as Brighella here points out!

An expanded version of "Red-Caps" has been a consideration for our Pennsic Performing Arts Tent show. Someday, some fae!

#MonsterWeek #Fae #Fairy #Fey

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #MySCA

Choices, choices... What commedia dell'arte shall we bring to Pennsic 53 this July and August?

Today is Earth Day and we're reminded of the second scenario completed from our first #Inktober challenge in Fall 2024. "Arlecchino's Arborous Adventure" takes elements from a commedia pastorale but grounds them in tricks and fake illusions of a traditional "street" commedia situational romantic comedy farce!

(Also by amusing coincidence, both commedia plays we performed this month also have the foolish harlequin as part of the title!)

Follow us and check back often for more updates on potential plays and our eventual selection!

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #MySCA

This Saturday (April 25) is the 20th birthday of The Confused Greenies of Players' Patchwork Theatre Company so let's hear some words of (comedic) wisdom from Players of the Patchwork! Here's one to describe how we face the chaos of live theatre...

"Obstacles? I like to think of them more as... opportunities." --Aaron Teiser

#MondayMotivation: April 20, 2026

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #OSU #OhioState #OhioStateUniversity #Birthday

Thanks to April Fools Day it's also National Humor Month! But today marks Humorous Day, to remind us to find the funny in every situation so we're encouraged to look on the bright side and embrace laughter as good medicine!

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #MySCA

On Saturday, April 25 we celebrate our troupe's big 20th birthday so we're doing a retrospective countdown!

Year 11 (2016 - 2017) was our first time crafting and bringing a full three-act production to the Popular Cultural & the Deep Past historic conference at the Ohio State University Center on Medieval & Renaissance Studies with our thematic commedia dell'arte parody of magic and fantasy!

Year 12 (2017 - 2018) we joined famous commedia dell'arte troupe i Sebastiani to finally stage "The Heterodyne Boys & the Race to the West Pole" to adapt the play briefly seen in the pages of the "Girl Genius" gaslamp fantasy graphic novel series and with the creators themselves in the audience as Comic Guests of Honor at Marcon!

Year 13 (2018 - 2019) we went back to school - specifically to Miskatonic University that was experiencing "Tentacle Difficulties" in our first Lovecraftian Cthulhu Mythos inspired parody farce for Cleveland ConCoction's eldritch horror themed convention!

Year 14 (2019 - 2020) featured a touring run of one of our favorite commedia dell'arte plays, a fairy funny farce called "The Hazards of Hunting Red-Caps" that we performed three times for Ohio State University, three times for Pennsic, once for Midrealm 50 Year, and more!

Year 15 (2020 - 2021) fell entirely into the pandemic social distancing era but that didn't stop us from staging virtual shows over Zoom including the premiere of Mistress Aibhilin inghean Daibhidh's three-act commedia dell'arte "The Calendimaggio Affair"!

Follow us and check back soon for the final set of years!

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #ClevelandConCoction #Pennsic #PennsicWar #SCA #SocietyForCreativeAnachronism #Birthday #Anniversary #20Years

While we may not normally celebrate a holiday called "National Cheese Ball Day", last weekend for a medieval and Renaissance conference on stargazing at Ohio State University, Arlecchino (and other commedia dell'arte) went to the Moon in hopes it tasted like a big round ball of cheese! Spoiler alert: it did not!

(Pardon the poor footage; we had some technical difficulties with our camera during the performance.)

#CommediaDellArte #Commedia #Improv #Improvisation #Theater #OSU #OhioState #OhioStateUniversity #ScienceFiction #SciFi #Renaissance #History #Conference #ScienceFiction #SciFi