Strike Theater

Opening (2016)

Strike Theater opened in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 2016, filling a gap in the Twin Cities comedy ecosystem. The venue was established in the North Loop neighborhood, offering performance space alongside bar programming for comedy acts including improv, sketch, and stand-up. Strike positioned itself as a community hub for the Minneapolis comedy scene at a time when the city's comedy infrastructure was consolidating.

Programming Development

Strike developed a mixed-programming model combining live comedy performances with its bar and event space. The venue hosts improv house teams, sketch shows, and stand-up alongside private events. Strike's class offerings expanded to include long-form improv instruction, making it one of the Twin Cities' training options alongside HUGE Theater (prior to HUGE's 2024 closure).

Ongoing Operations

Strike Theater continues to operate in Minneapolis as a live comedy venue and training center, maintaining its position as one of the Twin Cities' primary comedy spaces.

Strike Theater presents a mixed programming model: long-form improv ensembles, sketch comedy, and stand-up alongside bar and event programming. The venue functions as a community space for the Minneapolis comedy scene, with class offerings and open mics complementing its curated performance schedule.

The Mess: a high-energy long-form improv showcase featuring Twin Cities improvisers, running since 2014 (pre-dating Strike Theater itself, and carried into the new venue). Vilification Tennis: a competitive insult-based improv format with rotating cast, hosted at Strike as a long-standing Twin Cities institution. ComedySportz and its spin-off RomCom: a ComedySportz Production, offering competitive audience-suggestion short-form improv in a sports-styled format. Improv-A-Go-Go: a Twin Cities showcase founded in 2002 and presented at Strike, open to all forms of improvised theater. BALLS Cabaret: an open-format showcase presenting seven-minute performances across music, comedy, and dance. Improvised Love Is Blind: a parody of the Netflix reality format. Resident ensembles include jorts!, Heaven's Precious Angels, and Babe Train.

Strike Theater, founded in 2016 as a registered non-profit by Mike Fotis and Joe Bozic (both Brave New Workshop alumni) and Allison Broeren (SlamMaster of Poetry and SlamMN!), established the North Loop neighborhood of Minneapolis as a permanent home for Twin Cities independent comedy. The Brave New Workshop lineage carried into Strike through Fotis and Bozic gives the venue a direct connection to the oldest continuously running satirical comedy theater in the United States, while the inclusion of Broeren's spoken word and slam poetry background shaped Strike's unusually broad programming scope across improv, sketch, stand-up, storytelling, and spoken word.

Strike's partnership with SEIU Local 26, the janitors, window washers, and security union, reflects an institutional commitment to labor community ties unusual in independent comedy venues. The venue's non-profit status has allowed it to operate I Wrote This For You!, a monthly showcase for new works in improv, music, and storytelling, providing a development platform for Twin Cities artists outside the commercial performance market.