It's been years in the making and now we can safely say that the first two episodes are in the can.

After years of writing and pre-production we finally filmed last week. We had a couple of cast and crew changes up until the last minute, but on the filming days everything went super well. Our one indoor scene was shot during the only bit of rainy weather and all the others were filmed outside in glorious weather. We couldn't get all of our supporters on set, but we were really happy with all of those that could make the date and who performed like pros!

Everyone was COVID-safe, the venue was perfect, the cast and crew were phenomenal and now we are passing the baton to our incredible editor for the next crucial stage.

We'll let you know when we're ready to premiere it online and - hopefully - show it to a live audience here in London.

Thanks again for all your love and support so far.

It's been over a year since I posted here, but the project hasn't been sleeping. It was for a while, but over the last few months, we've been setting solid filming dates, making sure we can be safe on set, scouting locations and putting the rest of the team together.

We're delighted to be filming at the end of August!

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and government lockdown guidelines, we are necessarily delaying our (June) filming dates until later in the year.

In the midst of the global crisis, our main concern is of course that everyone stays safe and well. Our producer is carefully navigating us through the change and we'll announce new filming dates when we have them. It may also mean that our cast or crew changes along the way because of other filming schedules, but we hope to keep everyone on board if possible.

In the meantime, me and Ed are cooking up community funtimes to virtually hug our lovely fans and funders. We'll be doing a daily episodic read-through online during the week we would have been filming and we'll be holding some romcom Netflix Parties too. Keep an eye on @sidelinersseries on Instagram and our Facebook pages /katyschutteimproviser and Edmund Fargher for news. 

Here's a quick update from HQ.

We're thrilled that we have a Director: Tai Campbell, Producer: Janet Awe and the character of Lindsay: Elly Burke firmly on board. We've decided on shooting dates which will be the last week of June/first week of July 2020. We're scouting locations and - very much like a heist movie - continuing to put the team together.
We've had a bit more private funding since the IndieGoGo campaign, so it looks very much like we can shoot not just the first, but the first and second episodes. 
Ed has found the swimming pool that I get to fall into in Episode Two, so that's excellent news. I have no idea whether it's heated or not...

If you've contacted us and offered your help, Janet has your details and she'll get in touch. 

We woke up this morning to find that our IndieGoGo had finished at £9,000.00 which is incredible news. That means we can definitely film our pilot. We are absolutely thrilled. 
We have been toiling away in the background to find all the right people and places and advice and now we get to relax on the funding front and move all our hard work to getting it done.
We didn't manage to post every single thank you and pie video on this site as we went along, but here's a pie supercut as a thank you for all your help with the IndieGoGo.

We're thrilled to have sold out two of our perks. That's all the pies in faces and both our private improv shows.

I'm up at 1am because my brain won't stop and I'm enjoying the irony of that happening on World Mental Health Day.

For our equally kind and sadistic followers, here is the fourth pie instalment, with more being filmed on Monday.

Well, it's turning around a little. We have some big donations in the bank and a lot of promised interest that we're gradually making real.

We have a new script supervisor who volunteered to help, which is amazing because that's a luxury crew member that we couldn't afford to hire!

In celebration of things looking positive, here's Ed getting pied in the face AGAIN. Oh, happy day.

Whenever I read about funding, I always come across the awkward middle slump; the bit half way through the month when you've picked up all the early adopters but you haven't got to the last-minute people yet. It's happening right here.

I'm plugging away at social media and people are helping out like legends, but we have been down on our targets for the last few days. 

Funding takes ages and it's like pushing a full time job into all the cracks where your other full time jobs breathe.

Delightfully, my students were talking about it in the pub last night. It's still on everyone's radar, we just have to make a few adjustments to perks, clear up some filmmaking jargon and double-down.

Most importantly, though, it's Ed's turn to get custard-pied.

As you may already have read, one of our first shows together (I'm sure it was our first duo) was a late night, ten minute bit show where one of us got pied when an alarm went off. The joke was to try and keep playing a regular improv scene without acknowledging it.

As a bit of misguided nostalgia, we've added a 'pie one of us in the face' perk to our IndieGoGo. At the time of writing, six people have already taken us up on it.

Now we are releasing one video a day of the ongoing battle. It's like a hostage situation for our faces.

We did it! Despite the horror of putting an ask into the world, we published our crowdfunder yesterday. It's been less than 24 hours and we're at 5%. 
You can contribute here.

Today we're at the Hoopla Improv Marathon where we perform for the third year running in a custard-pie grudge-match bit show. It's a pretty good reminder that this is all for a comedy show.