Anatomy of a Sketch: ‘Chola Abogada’ - by Omar
If you’re been to a few LCP shows over the years, you’ll notice that we’ve done a few “Best of…” shows and that there are sketches that have survived for years and years and years (sometimes to our dismay).
The reason is that it’s a lot harder than it sounds to write an hour and half of a good, original material for a brand-new show. (Nevermind the process of filming video sketches or rehearsing live stuff: it always begins with long writing meetings, revising scripts and lots of discussion and ideas.)
Sometimes, ideas for sketches float around within the group for years without ever getting written or performed. “Chola Abogada” (and similarly, “The Sign Guy”) from our most recent show, “AlienNation” is a good example. This sketch dates back at least three or four years. I don’t remember if it was while we were on tour or whether it was while we were performing “Citizen Quien?” but I remember specifically coming up with the idea while talking to JoJanie Segura. We started riffing on the idea of a bad, unprepared, floja TV lawyer who somehow wins every case.
JoJanie started doing the voice of the character, “Oye, judge… like, I object, and shit!” and the sketch practically wrote itself in my head.
Sounds easy, right? Well, I didn’t end up writing a draft of the sketch for maybe two more years. When I finally did, it was written as a filmed commercial for a fictional TV show on Si TV.
These were the opening lines:
(This is done in rapid-fire TV show-commercial promo style.)
VOICE-OVER
(Over black screen until title cards)
From the semi-acclaimed creators of Brownsville Legal –
TITLE CARD: “BROWNSVILLE LEGAL” in heavy, large type, white-text-on-black.
VOICE-OVER (CONT’D)
– and Univision’s crossover hit “LA LEY Y EL ORDEN… DE MI CORAZON” –
TITLE CARD: “LA LEY Y EL ORDEN” in same heavy script as before, but froofy pink cursive below on “… de mi corazon”.
VOICE-OVER (CONT’D)
– comes a new prime-time legal eagle.
When we started writing the sketches that would make up “AlienNation,” I brought the video version of “Chola Abogada” to the table. We read it and it got a good reaction, but it felt light on jokes while simultaneously being too long. There wasn’t a lot of characterization to Maria Villanueva, either. Most of her dialogue sounded like this:
MARIA
You see? See? Right? He didn’t do it! Riiiight?
Quien te crees, right? Riiiiiight?
Part of the problem for me, as the writer, was that JoJanie wasn’t going to be in the sketch and I had a hard time picturing anyone else doing the role, despite the talents of our actresses. The sketch went through several frustrating drafts. Other cast members shot off suggestions for jokes. An addition I’d made that would give the sketch more structure and a quick-moving story was added, taken out, then put back in. (One note that I have written on the top of a draft that still exists on Google Docs: “This draft was read on Tuesday. Working in some joke additions from 5/29 meeting — omar.”)
The biggest change we made, however, was transforming the sketch from a video to a stage production. We realized somewhere in the writing process that we had lots of video sketches and too few stage ones. We also had limited time to get all the videos we had written shot and edited. “Chola” was a sketch that seemed like it could work on stage, even though we’d never done a courtroom sketch that wasn’t a video. That scared me a little: I remember one sketch festival we went to where it seemed like every white sketch troupe had at least one silly courtroom sketch. I was worried it would just look and feel flat on stage.
Luckily the drafts of the sketch were getting better and the jokes were getting stronger. And I got very lucky in the casting of Karinna to play the character. Going a bit off of some characters Karinna has done in the past (specifically a character she played in the Teatro Humanidad show “Luminarias”) I made the character less goofy and more aggressive. We put together a voice over that Mical recorded at a studio with some video titles to give the sketch the feel of a TV show promo.
Once we were happy with a final draft, the sketch went away for me. I wasn’t in this show, so I only got to see a few rehearsals, but every time I saw the interactions of the cast members and Adrian’s direction, I got happier and happier. I was beginning to feel like the sketch, which is a goofy piece with some silly dick jokes and weird puns, was actually going to work:
PROSECUTOR: Your honor, I object.
MARIA: (Turns on PROSECUTOR) Oye! You’re an attorney, right?
PROSECUTOR: Yes.
MARIA: Pues, I’m a-’turn it around on YOU! Comprendes, Mendez?
What finally makes the sketch work on stage is how well Karinna sells the character, how quickly the sketch itself moves from scene to scene and how Nick, Mical and everyone else play their roles perfectly straight. It also contrasts nicely with the rest of the show: we have some pretty political material, some dance numbers and a lot of video in “AlienNation.” “Chola Abogada” works because it has a different tone (certainly goofier) than a lot of the rest of the material. That’s been one of the great things about writing for the group: I think we have a definite point of view as a group, but within that point of view, several different voices and comedy styles. You could go down the line and very clearly see how the sketches I write are very different from what Adrian writes and that what Adrian writes is very different from Raul, Mical, Karinna, Danu or Raul’s stuff. But they all fit in the LCP mold and putting them all together into one show makes for a good mix.
The take-aways, I guess, are not to give up on a good idea (or a moderately decent idea that can be polished later), even if it takes years to get it on stage. It also helps to know who’ll be performing what you’re writing: knowing an actor’s strengths can help you draw up better material for them. And, when in doubt, ask the group for help. We’ve gotten pretty good at injecting decent sketches with infusions of table-read suggestions and turning them into great sketches.
[Read more…]