…Exploring the role of the prankster as artist, activist and social observer and the significance of the prank in society.
Author: Charlie Todd
Charlie Todd is a New York based actor, comedian, and prankster. He is the founder of Improv Everywhere, a New York prank collective that has been profiled by The New York Times, SPIN Magazine, and Rolling Stone (where his work was named "Hot Comedy" in the Hot List Issue 2005). Charlie has given interviews about his pranks to news outlets around the world including The Guardian in London, German Public Radio, and NHK TV in Japan. He brought Improv Everywhere to Aspen, Colorado in 2006 as part of HBO's US Comedy Arts Festival.
Charlie is a teacher at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, where he has written, performed, and directed comedy for the past five years. He has created many shows at the UCBT including PAID PROGRAMMING, FOUND ON CRAIGSLIST, and THE MP3 EXPERIMENT (all of which were Time Out New York critic's picks). He currently performs at the theatre every Saturday with the house team Reuben Williams and every Thursday with the UCBW, a ridiculous wrestling league he created.
Charlie has made appearances on LATE NIGHT WITH CONAN O'BRIEN, BEST WEEK EVER and VH1's 40 GREATEST PRANKS. He has worked on pilots for ABC and TBS, and he will soon appear in the THIS AMERICAN LIFE pilot on Showtime.
Charlie was named one of the "10 Funniest People You've Never Heard Of" by New York Magazine.
Cities participating in the global No Pants Subway Ride so far: Berlin, Boston, Calgary, Chicago, Dallas, Lisbon, London, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Melbourne, Montreal, New York, Phoenix, Porto, San Francisco, Seattle, Tokyo, Toronto, Washington DC
This past November, Improv Everywhere turned a pair of phone booths on 6th Avenue into coworking spaces. Real New Yorkers were invited to try out the new “WeWork Street” service and learn about the many benefits of outdoor coworking.
This unauthorized project was a collaboration with Deanna Director and Maggie McClurken, who we worked with on the Fake Apple Store project, as well as public space artist Jordan Seiler, who lent his phone booth expertise. This project was not a collaboration with WeWork, but we hope they like it and hope they will consider the idea for their ever-expanding empire.
Note from Editor Joey Skaggs: This brings back fond memories of my 1978 Disco Radio, a 4 foot by 2 foot by 8 foot wide radio on wheels, built by my New York SVA students for a class project. It was a commentary on the proliferation of loud disco radios blaring music throughout the streets of New York at that time. Students dressed in costumes, each with their own disco radio, wheeled the giant radio into Washington Square Park where they played music matching their costumed characters, all at the same time.
Charlie Todd’s wonderfully sweet Giant Boombox event, sponsored by Target, looks a lot less noisy!
Improv Everywhere’s Giant Boombox
We placed a 10-foot tall boombox on Pier 17 in Manhattan and waited for unsuspecting people to plug it in. Real New Yorkers worked together to carry the 160-foot long cord across the pier to an oversized outlet.
Once the boombox was plugged in, everyone was surprised by a massive holiday dance party with 100 acrobatic dancers, thousands of Christmas lights placed on two historic ships, and 10 hidden snow machines.
From Improv Everywhere: For our latest mission, we turned the 23rd Street 6-train elevator into New York”s newest Apple Store. We placed giant Apple logos on the sides of the glass cube structure, added fake Apple Store employees plus a line of 50 people waiting for the new iPhone X. With the famous 5th Avenue Apple Store under construction, we felt NYC needed a new glass cube Apple Store.
On Sunday, January 8th, 2017 tens of thousands of people took off their pants on subways in over 60 cities in over 25 countries around the world. In New York, our 16th Annual No Pants Subway Ride took place in windy 22F degree weather and was spread out over seven meeting points and eleven subway lines. Thanks to everyone who participated all around the globe! Enjoy the video!
