Ross Bryant

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Ross Bryant is an American writer, performer, and improviser based in Los Angeles who spent formative years on the Chicago improv scene before relocating to the West Coast. He is a Second City Mainstage alumnus, a member of The Improvised Shakespeare Company and Baby Wants Candy, a television writer and performer, and a teacher at the World's Greatest Improv School in Los Angeles. His screen credits include The Good Place, Crashing, and I Think You Should Leave, and he has written for Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Bryant built his improv career in Chicago, where he trained and performed in the long-form tradition centered on The Second City. He joined the Second City Touring Company and later advanced to the resident cast of The Second City Mainstage, one of the most competitive performance positions in North American comedy. At the Mainstage he wrote and performed in the critically acclaimed revue Let Them Eat Chaos and earlier co-wrote revues for UP! Comedy Club, including One Nation Under 1% and American Mixtape. He also appeared in Second City's Guide to the Opera in collaboration with the Lyric Opera.

After relocating to Los Angeles, Bryant became a regular performer with The Improvised Shakespeare Company, the ensemble specializing in fully improvised Shakespearean-style comedy. The company performs regularly at the Largo in Los Angeles and tours nationally, including performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. He is also a regular member of Baby Wants Candy, the long-running musical improv ensemble based at UCB. Both companies represent sustained commitments to specialized forms of long-form improvisation beyond the Harold framework.

Bryant's screen work includes appearances in The Good Place on NBC, Crashing on HBO, and I Think You Should Leave on Netflix. He served as a writer on Mystery Science Theater 3000 and has co-written original television pilots sold to Pop TV, Warner Bros, and Showtime. His stand-up and improv work has taken him to Just For Laughs, Bonnaroo, SF Sketchfest, Outside Lands, the Ford Amphitheater, and the 92Y. He teaches improvisation, performance, and writing at the World's Greatest Improv School in Los Angeles and has taught at the Second City Training Center. He is also a cartoonist whose animations have appeared on Comedy Central Digital, and he hosts the horror-comedy improv podcast Push the Roll.

Historical Context

Bryant's trajectory from Second City Touring Company to Mainstage positions him within the most established route through the Chicago improv institution, one that has produced more professional writers and performers than any comparable training pipeline in North American comedy. The revue format he worked in at Second City requires performer-writers to develop material collaboratively under time pressure for a live audience, producing a skill set distinct from the long-form ensemble work associated with iO and Annoyance.

His dual membership in The Improvised Shakespeare Company and Baby Wants Candy represents a particular kind of post-Chicago career: specialized long-form ensembles with distinct constraints, one working within Elizabethan register and structure, the other within musical improvisation, both requiring performance disciplines that differ substantially from general-form improv. This specialization reflects a career built on mastery of particular forms rather than institutional leadership. The Improvised Shakespeare Company's model of fully improvised Elizabethan-register performance has developed a following significant enough to place the ensemble at major institutional venues including the Kennedy Center, a level of institutional recognition that distinguishes it from most improvised-form touring companies.

Legacy

Bryant's Mainstage credit connects him to Second City's deep alumni lineage, and his work with The Improvised Shakespeare Company has given him a presence at major institutional venues including the Kennedy Center. His television and writing credits represent one of the more varied portfolios of any active improv performer, spanning sketch writing, pilot development, and television performance across multiple networks. His teaching at WGIS and at the Second City Training Center extends his practice into curriculum and mentorship for the next generation of comedy performers and writers. The range of his output, from improvised Shakespeare to horror-comedy podcasting to sold television pilots, represents an unusually wide creative portfolio for a performer whose career began in Chicago improv. His work with Baby Wants Candy, one of the longest-running musical improv ensembles in the country, adds yet another specialized form to a career defined by formal variety.