Zany humor, creative antics and some impressive feats of oddity were performed by Evan Young and Scot Nery during the Show Off Show for students, faculty and staff in Meadow Lodge on Tuesday evening, Aug. 28.

Young and Nery visit college campuses across the country, displaying their mixture of interactive comedy and feats, which include juggling, dancing, balancing, improvised humor, misdirection and crowd participation.

“The show’s been touring for six years,” Young said. “Scot is new to the show.”

The performers said they were a bit out of practice after having the summer off tour.

“This is our first show of the semester,” Young said, “so we’ve forgot a lot of it. But there’s a lot of ad-lib anyway, which Scot is really good at.”

Young and Nery played off each other and the crowd as they led off with improvised humor and crowd participation, while warming up with light juggling, dancing and general goofiness.

The performers then took turns spinning a digital “randomizer,” which selected each of their acts.

With every spin of the randomizer, the feats became more impressive.

Young stepped up for a feat that required a participant from the crowd. He balanced a skateboard atop a bowling ball he set on a metal carrying trunk.

With the help of crowd participant, Rebecca Fairbanks, sister of an IUS student, Young climbed atop the skateboard and balanced himself using Fairbanks’ shoulder. Nery handed Young a machete and a toilet brush.

He handed Fairbanks another bowling ball. Young told her to back up 10 feet, count to three and then throw him the bowling ball, so he could juggle it.

He quickly counted off, and Fairbanks tossed him the bowling ball on cue, which nearly knocked him over.

“You know I was just kidding about the bowling ball right?” Young said. “Most people hesitate on this trick, but you just fired it over.”

After the show, Fairbanks was still a little embarrassed, but in good spirits.

“When he said throw it, I just threw it,” Fairbanks said. “I just follow orders, because my dad was in the military, and I was in the ROTC program. I thought he was being serious.”

Even though Young and Nery were still smoothing out their performance for the year, Ana Sneed, elementary education senior, said she enjoyed the act.

“It was funny,” Sneed said. “I wasn’t sure sometimes if they were being serious or joking when they were dropping stuff, but it was good. The thing he did with devil sticks was fun. I really enjoyed that.”

Sneed said she would like if they came next year and performed at McCullough Plaza during lunch, so more people could see the show.

The Show off Show has performed on the IUS campus in the past, but this is the first year they did their act in Meadow Lodge.

“I was just tired of having it over in the Hoosier Room,” Channell Barbour, associate director of campus life, said. “Because I just felt like people wouldn’t come, so I thought maybe they would come if it was in the lodges.”

Barbour said, even though people came and went during the show, about 20 people stayed for the duration of the act.

By SAM WEBER

Staff

samweber@ius.edu