Ariel Greenspoon Always Shows Up

You know that scene in Mis­sion Impos­si­ble, where Tom Cruise ziplines into a secure vault, to pur­loin the price­less data that will save the world? (I for­get the plot, if there is one.) You can thank movies like that for almost depriv­ing us of this week’s guest’s com­e­dy career, because they inspired a young Ariel Green­spoon that her ulti­mate des­tiny was to be a world class bank robber.

Thank­ful­ly for the com­e­dy world (and the secu­ri­ty of the nation­al bank­ing sys­tem) Green­spoon piv­ot­ed to some­thing a lit­tle safer (though admit­ted­ly rarely as fis­cal­ly reward­ing). Her child­hood expo­sure to the medi­um came through love of car­toon sta­ples like The Simp­sons and Ren & Stimpy and sketch leg­ends Kids in the Hall. Throw in Strangers with Can­dy and you’ll quick­ly appre­ci­ate her comedic influ­ences. When she stepped on stage at the bright-eyed age of 4 in a com­mu­ni­ty the­ater pro­duc­tion, it was an ear­ly con­fir­ma­tion for her that per­for­mance was where her life was headed.

Hail­ing from West Vir­ginia and Mary­land, Green­spoon amped up her pur­suits of sketch and improv when she land­ed in New York. Among many oppor­tu­ni­ties, she spent time train­ing at the world famous Upright Citizen’s Brigade The­atre. Before long, the now-famil­iar rite of pas­sage in the com­e­dy world came up: move to Austin, or to Los Ange­les. We’re eter­nal­ly grate­ful (and humbly cer­tain) to a chance encounter with a dude ranch help­ing her make the right choice to join our community. 

Green­spoon pro­duces at a hec­tic pace: whether act­ing, singing (some­times with fiancé and Austin come­di­an Rob Gagnon), and teach­ing and per­form­ing sketch and improv at Austin’s well known The New Move­ment The­atre. She found­ed The New Move­ment show Bad Exam­ple, and runs a week­ly all-female troupe show there called Garage every Wednes­day at 8pm. Greenspoon’s open-to-any­thing spir­it and moti­va­tion gush­es in the inter­view with Valerie Lopez; I think the fact that the first Google result for her name is a YouTube video of an inter­pre­tive dance with a bot­tle of hon­ey is the per­fect metaphor for how she’s game to attempt any­thing and have a blast in the process. 

Keep up with Ariel Greenspoon’s many, many appear­ances around town and on the big and small screens by fol­low­ing her on her web­site, on Last Gas Com­e­dy, and on Insta­gram and Twit­ter. Catch her in Garage every Wednes­day, and Sand­box every Tues­day, at The New Move­ment Theatre.