UCB's founding members announce reunion performance

If you know any astronauts, don’t tell them: The original Upright Citizens Brigade will be reuniting for a special performance at Carnegie Hall next year.

Amy Poehler, Matt Besser, Matt Walsh, and Ian Roberts — the comedy quartet who became the founding members of the UCB — will bring a performance of the long-running A.S.S.S.C.A.T. improv show to the hallowed concert hall for one night only on Thursday, June 28, 2018. The entire show will be improvised based on a single audience suggestion (no pressure, random audience member).

“Twenty years ago we started doing improv in a bar where we could barely hear each other,” Amy Poehler said in a statement. “Now we are going to do our show at Carnegie Hall where you can hear a pin drop. New York has been pretty good to us.”

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In addition to co-founding the theater that would become the epicenter of our current improv-industrial complex, the Poehler-Besser-Walsh-Roberts group also starred in a cult-favorite Comedy Central sketch series, also called Upright Citizens Brigade; the show aired from 1998 to 2000.

The foursome’s on-stage reunion will serve as the kickoff for the 20th annual Del Close Marathon, a days-long improv festival named for the man whom many consider the father of modern improv. This year’s edition takes place June 23-25 and includes a long list of comedians, including (fellow UCB original) Horatio Sanz, Bobby Moynihan, Sasheer Zamata, Jason Mantzoukas, and more; you can see the full list here.

The 2018 Carnegie Hall event will take place at the Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage. Tickets will be available in May of next year at carnegiehall.org.