The Circus Bar is in full preparation mode when I arrive to see one of the first shows of the Fringe Festival. Someone is balancing on the bar while organising a cable for the lights, a lone guitarist onstage is strumming his discord, and the smell of popcorn is pervasive.

There’s always a special thrill of audience anticipation for an improvised show. For the First Time, by Chasm Productions, is no exception. We are introduced to five players. They’ve been collecting responses to the question: “What did you wish for when you were at high school?” Topics range from having straight hair to owning a fighter plane. But cricket – predictably? – predominates and gets the best innings of the evening.

The first exchange between Jon (Cambell Wright) and George (Hugo Beale) about the size of one’s cricket bat is hilariously ambiguous with the curved balls of improvisation bowled to devastating effect. I’m reminded that improvisors can dob each other in with impunity, and that there’s always a way out.

We get introduced to Jon’s parents (Austin Harrison) and Varni (Simran Rughani) whose reaction to their son’s cricketing ambitions takes the story further. We meet school principal Sharon (Millie Osborne) and there are nostalgic references to School Cert and less nostalgic ones to NCEA. But her chief concern is the diagnosis of pregnancy at her school: the general uncertainty amongst the players about just how that occurred is a high point of hilarity.    

Improvised performance has to balance providing entertainment with an awareness of time. There has to be a denouement of sorts and we can feel the tension building as cricket metaphors are interspersed with fighter jet ones and pregnancy continues to be a concern.

Musician Isaac Thomas on guitar strikes chords to accompany action and we get an appropriate song from him to conclude the story.     

For the First Time is a triumph in the art of improv – may this not be a last time.

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