We Cause Scenes

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So Cody, do you want to start

passing out the flashlights?

Here's how I'd like you guys

to hold it.

I'd like you to hold a flashlight

with your left thumb on green,

your right thumb on red,

and your right index finger

on white.

And if you want to get fancy,

you can press them both at the

same time and it'll switch.

Right?

Uh... or you can you know, press

one quickly and press the other.

Is anyone definitely

afraid of heights?

Ready?

One, two, three, on.

On my cue:

One, two, three, green.

One, two, three, go.

Now with both lights up and

down in an alternating pattern.

Now move both lights

in random directions.

Start dancing.

Now start switching couples

randomly.

High energy.

This is the finale.

You're going about

your business,

maybe you work in a nine-to-five

job but on Tuesday night,

you know you've gotta go meet Charlie

Todd and his Improv Everywhere group

and... you have no idea

what this mission's gonna be.

When everybody's kind of in

on the joke,

everybody gets to feel like,

"Oh!"

That empowering feeling.

That is... why people

do Improv everywhere.

People are going

through their life,

in a very routine way,

and a very normal way.

And all of a sudden, there is

this thing that makes it "Now!"

This like, exact moment that's like "Oh!

I am very alive now!"

That's the end goal,

is that somebody goes home

and they're like,

"You'll never believe what I

saw on the subway today. "

I've never seen Charlie

drop sweat or look nervous

and yet he's accomplishing

all this things.

It's unnerving.

It's weird.

Welcome to the running

of the Bright Park Steaks.

Italy, and Sweden, and France.

Charlie Todd has planted

his seed, for sure.

When I first met Charlie,

he just told me

"I really like

organized fun. "

And that's all

Improv Everywhere is.

It's just him organizing fun.

I moved to New York

in... July of 2001.

I graduated college and then just

took two suitcases to New York City.

Directing, that's gotta be

an interesting thing.

How did you get into doing

that?

Well um...

I wanted to be a Drama major.

Wanted to be a movie star

when I grow up.

So um... decided

I'd audition for a play.

I moved to New York

to be an actor.

I thought maybe I'd... act in

plays or I'd direct plays.

Media now

is-is all sorts of things.

It's like your CD-R.

Uh... your, um, CD-RW.

Um, they got this new thing, it's just hitting

the shelves this Spring, called DVD-R.

I quickly realized that

that's a difficult thing to do.

You're absolutely nobody when

you arrive in New York City.

And there's hundreds, if not

thousands of people just like you.

I was in New York literally stuffing

envelopes all day at temp jobs.

But... every moment

when I was not doing that

I was trying to express

myself in a creative way

so that I could...

feel good about myself.

Almost every night that I went

out, I would do something weird.

I was constantly trying

to amuse myself.

And I was taking advantage

of the fact that nobody knew me

and that I could...

make a fool of myself

and there would be

no consequences.

About a month

after I was in New York,

my friends Brandon Arnold and Jon

Karpinos were visiting one weekend.

So when I went to meet Brandon,

he said "What's up, Ben Folds?"

And I was like,

"What are you talking about?"

He said

"Oh, that shirt you're wearing,

it makes you look

like Ben Folds. "

Right then, just a little, like

light bulb went off in my head

and I said "Let's see, if we can make

people think I'm Ben Folds tonight. "

We produced uh, cocktail napkins

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