Wavelength

Wavelength is an ensemble of professional actors and educators that uses the research-based benefits of humor, laughter and improvisation to train, motivate and inspire professional educators. Wavelength was founded in 1980 by Jim Winter, a former high school English teacher, who saw the connection between teaching and acting while he was studying improvisation at the famed Players Workshop of Second City in Chicago.

Winter convinced his fellow ensemble members that their ability to celebrate and satirize political and social situations would be a big benefit to educators. “Besides,” he told them, “if we focus our humor on education, we’ll never run out of material!”

Wavelength has performed its humorous and insightful keynote shows in over 2500 school systems for over 1.5 million educators in the U.S. and internationally. Wavelength has also developed teacher-training workshops that use theatrical and improvisational communication techniques to enhance educators’ creativity, collaboration and overall classroom efficacy.

All of Wavelength’s ensemble shows have been developed into award-winning DVD training packages. A typical Wavelength keynote performance runs approximately one-hour and is performed by a cast of five -- four actors and a piano accompanist. The performance includes a mix of audience-inclusive improvisations as well as scripted scenes, developed through improvisation and input from renowned educational consultants.

Wavelength’s technical requirements are simple: they just need to be seen and heard. They have performed in the most modest (and most elegant) of school settings for audiences as intimate as 35 and as grand as 10,000 teachers. Wavelength’s current ensemble consists of 25 actors and musicians trained in educational issues and improvisational performance. This number allows flexibility in booking and actor availability.

Notable performers whose careers include a tour-of-duty with Wavelength include actors Bob Odenkirk (Breaking Bad), Dan Castellenetta (Homer Simpson), T. C. Carson (Living Single), T’Keyah Keymah (In Living Color, Cosby); screenwriters Danny Rubin (Groundhog Day), Mary Ruth Clarke (Meet the Parents, Meet the Fockers), and Jon Rosenfeld (SNL writer and founder of Amsterdam comedy club Boom Chicago.)

Rated "the best in-service ever" by over 1.5 million teachers, Wavelength has created six live performances perfect for engaging and inspiring your audience. Through its history, Wavelength has become respected among teachers for its professionalism, cutting edge insight into educational issues, addressing controversial challenges in an engaging and eye-opening manner, and most of all, living up to its original and time-tested credo: Communication through Comedy.