Improvisational comedy does not take itself too seriously, at least according to Jesse Greaves-Smith, former DU graduate student and current Skintight Outrage advisor and performer from Denver.

In its fourth year of existence at DU, the Skintight Outrage Comedy group is still going strong. Its core group of comics that have been there since the start performed last Wednesday night in Lindsay Auditorium in a show that did not elude stereotypes.

“You have to put people on edge and see what’s funny,” said Greaves-Smith.

On Wednesday, the group performed a host of improv games— from ‘My Life as a Musical’ where performers must break into song during a scene, to ‘Text Talk’ which requires one actor to only use words found in an audience member’s text conversations, to ‘I like my men/women like I like my…’ where the audience provides a noun which the actor must then compare to a quality that women or men and that thing share.

“I like my women like I like my foot cream: working,” one of the comics joked on Wednesday night after an audience member offered up foot cream as the comparison.

And Greaves-Smith thinks addressing these stereotypes can be productive.

“I think because it’s comedy you can get away with a lot more,” said Greaves-Smith. “A joke that involves stereotypes can be partially funny but if it’s not well done you wonder if you’re pushing the stereotype line.”

But according to Greaves-Smith, it is never really certain whether using stereotypes challenges them or leaves audience members laughing at the very issue the joke attempts to confront.

“Especially on a college campus where people become more politically sensitive the question is always ‘Does someone in the audience feel like they’re being laughed at?’” said Greaves-Smith. “It depends a lot on the audience.”

Greaves-Smith also participates in improv at the Bovine Metropolis Theater at 1527 Champa St. in downtown Denver.

“There is less editing, less political correctness,” said Greaves-Smith, of his experience performing comedy at downtown. “There is much more commentary on race and color.”

Comedy is all about coming into a situation and finding the most surprising outcome to a joke or scenario, according to Greaves-Smith. Skintight Outrage strived to capture this quality of improv on Wednesday night with scenarios like a film noir spy battle set in a Starbucks that relied solely on who wrote the best Batman gobstopper fan fiction.

“You come into more situations looking for options and new ways to look at it,” said Greaves-Smith. “The whole way of improv is to go with the unexpected route.”

And with no script to memorize, that is often the only route.

“That is part of the advantage that you don’t have to rehearse,” said Greaves-Smith. “You don’t have to memorize lines and you can basically perform anywhere.”

The group has come to rely heavily on a core group of male seniors since its first year in existence. Skintight Outrage hopes to attract new members, particularly female members, this year to carry on their legacy.

And according to Greaves-Smith, it just happened that the main group that stuck around all these years did not include great female representation.

“Some of it is the gender confidence thing of, unfortunately in our society, a lot of females are just more stage shy,” said Greaves-Smith. “You see some of it in the comedy and I am hoping that we get a bunch of females to audition.”

Skintight Outrage auditions for this quarter were held on Sunday and are held at the beginning of each quarter throughout the year. The group performs every other Wednesday at 9 p.m. in Lindsay Auditorium. For more information visit their Facebook page.