Rebekka Johnson & Anne Gregory

THE RETREAT is a campy variety show that mimics an overenthusiastic kick-off event for a corporate retreat for the fictional company Men-ses Period Panties. It pokes fun at the boring jargon, toxic positivity and team building nonsense inherent to the business world. Hosted by comedians Rebekka Johnson (Netflix's GLOW) and Anne Gregory (NBC's Parks and Recreation) and produced by UK's own, Kate Nash.

Get Tickets Here - SUN OCT 8 @ Lyric Hyperion

ANNE GREGORY is a writer, actor and comedian. She has written on TruTV's comedy Those Who Can't, Adult Swim’s animated comedy Mr. Pickles, Momma Named Me Sheriff, MTV's Punk'd, and Awesomeness TV’s Betch Sketch. As an actor she has appeared on American Crime Story: Impeachment, Adam Ruins Everything, Parks and Recreation, Those Who Can't, Drunk Wedding, HBO's Funny or Die Presents Punk'd and many commercials. Anne's true love is live comedy, she has done a ton of sketch and improv at places including Upright Citizens Brigade.

REBEKKA JOHNSON is most known for portraying "Dawn Rivecca" on Netflix’s critically acclaimed, award-winning series GLOW. She appeared with her musical comedy trio, The Apple Sisters, at venues all over the country and on late night shows on television. Rebekka recently wrote, directed, and starred with Kate Nash in the short film Wild Bitch, which premiered at SXSW and won "Best Thriller" at Hollyshorts. She also co-wrote and directed the comedic feature film Step Aside which is currently in post-production. Other notable credits include: Sex Lives Of College Girls, The Babysitters Club, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Arrested Development, This Is 40, Bridesmaids and Boiling Points.

THE RETREAT is a sketch variety show that lampoons the idea of corporate retreats, toxic positivity, white feminism, and "SHE-E-O's". Have you both spent time in these environments, and when did you realize you had to start making fun of it?

Living in Los Angeles, we are surrounded by this woo woo girl-boss nonsense. It’s the land of GOOP, wellness wackiness and capitalism disguised as feminism. We both have spent a ton of time in these environments - we even took an online course in manifestation that ended up being an actual cult. Yikes. We had to make fun of this new age bullshit to hide our shame.

What kind of freedom or pleasure do you take in performing these girlboss-ified characters for an audience?

It’s freeing to play delusional narcissists. Both Rebekka and I are huge people pleasers (a lot of women are) and the characters we play don’t care about pleasing anyone but themselves. It’s totally liberating to play women who lack self-awareness.

You both work in film & tv in addition to being live comedy performers. Do you find yourselves returning to the stage and rediscovering anything about being a performer that informs your work performing or writing for the screen?

We both took a step away from live performances after having kids. Rebekka kept doing shows here and there but Anne pretty much stopped. We spent time on writing projects and acting in front of the camera (on TV shows and in film), but we missed the thrill of acting like fools in front of a crowd. It is so much fun to return to performing live theater regularly. Connecting with the audience and hearing their laughter is everything.

Will you describe a particularly ridiculous, theatrical moment, bit or joke from THE RETREAT, to give us an idea of how it feels to watch?

We are wildly ridiculous throughout the show - our characters are heightened versions of girl bosses - but probably our most insane bit is synching our periods with the audience to increase our revenue. We howl together at the blood moon. It makes no sense but is very fun and absurd.

If you performed in another live show together, or produced & co-hosted your own talk show, what would they be about?

We perform The Retreat in Los Angeles and have a new fake company each month. If we had our own show, we would love to do a female-based sketch show or a half-hour comedy centered around the ridiculous characters we’ve created in our live shows.

Can you tell us about some other female-driven shows you've seen at Fringe this year that you would recommend checking out?

Definitely! We loved Avital Ash’s show “Avital Ash Workshops her Suicide Note.” It was heartfelt, personal and extremely funny. Bonnie He’s clown show “A Terrible Show for Terrible People” is also excellent as is the Norwegian clown show “Trolls.” Each of these shows are bold, irreverent, unique and hilarious.

Photos by Dora Paphides