Former neighborhood resident Molly Erdman is at the pinnacle of the improv comedy world, performing on the same stage in Chicago once graced by comic heavyweights Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner, Shelley Long, John Belushi, John Candy and Chris Farley. The former Lakewood resident and Greenhill student is a main stage player at Second City Chicago, but her mug might look familiar to you even if you’ve never taken in a cutting edge comedy show in the Windy City. You may know her as the feisty redhead waiting at the drive-thru window in a series of Sonic commercials that have been running since February.
Obviously you don’t live in Lakewood now. When did you live here?
I was born in San Francisco but I basically grew up in Dallas — first in Lake Highlands. We lived in Lakewood from 1980 to 1997. My parents divorced but still live in Lakewood.
How did you get into improv comedy?
I went to Greenhill. Actually, my senior year of high school I started an improv group with two of my friends in theater called “What Happens Next.” Ad-Libs had just opened, and that’s where we got some of the ideas for our improv games. In 1992, I went to college in Boston to study theater. They had an improv group, and I realized I liked improv more than traditional theater.
What exactly is Second City?
It started in Chicago in 1959. Second City’s claim to fame is as the home of political and social satire. The main part of it is basically comedy theater. It’s sketch comedy born from improv. So the audience sees the show from one part to the other, almost like they’re in on the rehearsal process.
A lot of famous Saturday Night Live alums came from Second City. Any aspirations to go “Live from New York?”
It’s funny, because when I first thought of Second City, I wanted to do “Saturday Night Live.” Now that I’ve been in Chicago for nine years doing improv, the path you take becomes more important than the end goal. But I will continue to work in comedy as a writer and performer no matter what.
Any exciting stories of agents and scouts looking for the next Will Ferrell?
Dan Bakkedahl got hired onto “Saturday Night Live” two months ago straight out of Second City (Bakkedahl also works as a correspondent for Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show”). Steve Carrell and Steven Colbert (former “Daily Show” correspondents; Colbert now has his own Comedy Central show, “The Colbert Report”) were at Second City in the early ’90s. I had only been working on the main stage a couple of months, and Lorne Michaels came by with a couple of writers from “SNL.” The writers and producer from “The Daily Show” came the same day. Two of the cast members got flown out to New York. That was the first time it really hit me. This is how it happens.
