iO Theater’s Marketing Intern Rach Granillo sat down with current iO Training Center student Anthony Corrado to ask him a little bit about himself and his experience thus far at iO.
Name: Anthony Corrado
Current Class: Improv Level 2 w/ Steve Plock Dumb John / The Armando Diaz Experience
Follow: @toekneecorrado on TikTok & Instagram to see his original characters & sketches
Rach Granillo: Who are some of your comedy heroes?
Anthony Corrado: That is a LONG list but one of the first that comes to mind is Jim Carrey. Probably because of The Grinch and having seen it at such a young age. As a kid, it was just a wildly entertaining movie, but as I got older I developed a much bigger appreciation for how he transforms into that character, and the physicality he utilized…just that transformation and commitment that he gives to any role. Anything he does, he is consistently all-in on that character, and I aspire to have that level of commitment to any character I may become whether it’s a gig for TV/film or a character in an improv scene. My favorite movie of his is Man on the Moon, where he quite literally became Andy Kaufman. I was fascinated by Andy from the day I discovered him, and seeing just how accurate Jim’s depiction of him was just astounded me. I had never seen anything like it before.
Honorable mentions for comedy heroes that I just can’t leave out: Bo Burnham, Fred Armisen, Kyle Mooney, Ben Schwartz, Horatio Sanz, Andy Samberg, Amir Blumenfeld from College Humor, Robert De Niro as Rupert Pupkin in King of Comedy, the list goes on but I’ll stop because it’s getting unhealthy.
RG: Why’d you decide to study at iO?
AC: I decided to study at iO because I had trained and performed at Second City for quite some time between the age of 18-24, and I loved it. I then had a job for a few years as a rigging electrician working on a lot of tv shows they film at Cinespace here in Chicago. That consumed a lot of my time (12 hour days, often 6-7 days a week). But I simultaneously grew a platform on social media doing some of my characters and skits, and once that became a full time gig, my schedule opened up more and I had time to get back to improv. I had to put everything on hold for about a year while I went through chemo for Lymphoma, but once I went into remission I had a conversation with my agents at Paonessa about wanting to get back into the swing of things, and they recommended I try iO. I always knew of iO so I was game, and from the first orientation there was something about it that felt more intimate to me than Second City. I also learned of all the different opportunities students have to perform in front of an audience during orientation, and that was something that seemed a little more difficult for me to figure out at Second City. I really appreciated the transparency, and sense of community.
RG: What’s been your favorite part of your experience here so far?
AC: I would say my favorite thing about iO so far has been the people. I know that may sound cliche, but when you know you are surrounded by people who genuinely just want to play, and try new things, it can be a very freeing feeling, and you can throw all of yourself into that without the concern of doing something wrong. I also love the approach my instructors all take, chiming in mid-scene to push us to dig deeper, that hands on method is very effective for me as a student.
