Greg Proops

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Greg Proops, born October 3, 1959, in Phoenix, Arizona, is an American improvisational comedian, stand-up comic, voice actor, and podcaster who trained with the improvisational group Faultline at San Francisco State University and subsequently relocated to London, where he became a regular performer with The Comedy Store Players and on the British Whose Line Is It Anyway? on Channel 4 (1989-1999). He then joined the American adaptation of Whose Line Is It Anyway? on ABC (1998-2007) and its CW revival, spanning the complete arc of the format's broadcast history on both continents. He is the host of The Smartest Man in the World podcast, which surpassed 550 episodes by 2025, and the author of The Smartest Book in the World (Simon & Schuster, 2015).

Career

Greg Proops was born on October 3, 1959, in Phoenix, Arizona, and grew up in San Carlos, California, in San Mateo County in the San Francisco Bay Area. He attended the College of San Mateo, where he formed an early comedy duo with a partner named Brakeman. He transferred to San Francisco State University, majoring in theatre, and became involved in the improvisational group Faultline after volunteering during one of the group's performances, which constituted his formal entry into improv training.

In the mid-1980s, Proops formed an improvisational duo with Mike McShane. The pair gained attention in the Bay Area comedy scene, and both came to the notice of British television producers Dan Patterson and Mark Leveson, who were developing Whose Line Is It Anyway? as a television format.

Proops relocated to London in the late 1980s and became a regular performer at The Comedy Store on Oxendon Street with The Comedy Store Players, the resident improvisational ensemble that served as the core performing community from which the original British Whose Line Is It Anyway? drew its cast. The Players included Paul Merton, Richard Vranch, Josie Lawrence, and others who became central to the UK series.

From 1989 through 1999, Proops appeared as a regular performer on the British Whose Line Is It Anyway?, hosted by Clive Anderson and broadcast on Channel 4. He appeared in approximately 67 episodes across the series' run, joining the casting alongside Colin Mochrie, Ryan Stiles, Josie Lawrence, Tony Slattery, and others. He continued performing with The Comedy Store Players throughout this period, including an appearance at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre.

Proops was among the first American performers to establish a sustained presence in the British improv television tradition. The Proops and McShane pairing is frequently identified as the catalyst that brought an American improvisational sensibility into the British Whose Line format, which had previously drawn its cast primarily from the British stand-up and sketch comedy community.

From 1998 through 2007, Proops appeared as a core cast member on the American adaptation of Whose Line Is It Anyway?, hosted by Drew Carey and broadcast on ABC, appearing in approximately 56 episodes of the ABC run. He has made recurring guest appearances on the show's CW revival, which began in 2013, making his presence continuous across the format's history from its British debut through its American revival.

In 1999, Proops voiced Fode and Beed, the two-headed podrace announcer in Star Wars: Episode I, The Phantom Menace. His other voice acting credits include the animated series Stripperella and roles in Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas.

As a stand-up comedian, Proops has performed internationally, including at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, in Amsterdam, Helsinki, Stockholm, Oslo, Auckland, and at Shakespeare and Company bookshop in Paris. He has released eight comedy albums, including The Resistance (2018). Since 2010, he has hosted The Smartest Man in the World, a weekly podcast typically recorded live before audiences, often with his wife Jennifer Canaga. By 2025 the podcast had surpassed 550 episodes, covering current events, politics, celebrity culture, books, music, baseball, and theater.

In 2015, Proops published The Smartest Book in the World (Touchstone, Simon & Schuster), a nonfiction collection incorporating material from the podcast covering film recommendations, poetry, baseball statistics, history, and historical figures.

Historical Context

Greg Proops's career trajectory, from San Francisco Bay Area improv groups through The Comedy Store Players in London to both the British and American editions of Whose Line Is It Anyway?, documents the movement of American improvisers into the British television comedy ecosystem at the moment when the British version of the form was being translated for broadcast audiences. His path preceded the American adaptation by approximately a decade, establishing his practice in the British tradition before returning it to an American broadcast context.

The Comedy Store Players, with whom Proops performed during his London years, represented the improvisational mainstream of British comedy in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The group's regular Monday night shows at The Comedy Store on Oxendon Street constituted the primary ongoing public presentation of longform and game-based improv in London during a period when the form was not institutionally established in Britain in the way it was in Chicago. Proops's sustained presence in this context gave him access to the British tradition's development from the inside.

His presence across the complete arc of the Whose Line Is It Anyway? format, from the British Channel 4 series that premiered in 1988 through the CW revival that continues as of 2025, makes him one of the few performers whose participation spans the entire documented history of the format in broadcast television. The longevity of this association, combined with his independent stand-up touring record, documents a career that has sustained itself simultaneously across television ensemble performance, solo stand-up, and podcasting across more than three decades.

Legacy

Greg Proops's participation in both the British and American editions of Whose Line Is It Anyway?, spanning the format's complete broadcast history, places him in a small group of performers, alongside Colin Mochrie, Ryan Stiles, and Wayne Brady, whose combined records document the form's evolution from British late-night television to American primetime and subsequent revival. His presence across multiple decades of the format makes him part of the most sustained improvisational performance record in broadcast television.

His Comedy Store Players work in London during the late 1980s and early 1990s contributed to the development of British improv television's aesthetic and casting conventions at a moment when the form was establishing its broadcast identity. The Proops and McShane pairing's role in bringing American improv sensibility into the British Whose Line format is documented in accounts of the show's casting and development.

The Smartest Man in the World podcast, which exceeded 550 episodes by 2025, established Proops as a podcaster whose audience engagement extends his improvisational performance capacity into the long-form conversational format, reaching audiences who encounter him in a different mode than the television game formats through which he was originally nationally known.