This Wacky NJ Improv Group Riffs Off Audience Suggestions

Lunatic Fringe, which currently performs in the Glen Ridge train station, has been garnering laughs for nearly 30 years.

group of 5 people smiling
Lunatic Fringe, an amateur improv group, has been performing in Glen Ridge for 28 years. Photo: Courtesy of Lunatic Fringe/Deb Maclean

In 1997, the Spice Girls were the biggest pop group in the world, and Tamagotchi toy pets were all the rage. It was also the year that Lunatic Fringe, an improv group now based in Glen Ridge, began taking audience suggestions to create a particularly wacky form of comedy.

“We’re the Rolling Stones of improv,” says Deb Maclean, founder of the group and still its leader. “Who stays in a comedy group for 28 years?”

The group got its name from Luna Stage, a theater company originally located in Montclair. It performed there until Luna left that space, passing through five more venues before finding its current home at the Glen Ridge train station.

With shows costing $10 ahead of time and $12 at the door, the prices seem frozen in time, too.

Paul Murphy, usually clad in a Hawaiian shirt, is the only one of the original crew members besides Maclean. Their only concession to age, she says, is that Murphy no longer lifts her up over his head as part of a swing-dance routine during the company’s theme song.

Unlike stand-up, in which comics sometimes pick on audience members, Lunatic Fringe keeps the whole thing friendly and has fans who have been with them since the start. “It’s a place to laugh and have a good time,” Maclean says. “And the scarier the world gets, the more important that is.”

Check lunaticfringeimprov.com for the schedule, or call 973-429-1527 for information and reservations.

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