Clowns Out: Clothes Off! is a night of improv, drag and clown burlesque performing to fundraise for Ypsi Pride and Black Pride Ypsi.
The event is at 7 p.m. Thursday, June 18, 2026, at hear.say brewing + theater at 2350 W. Liberty St. in Ann Arbor. Tickets are available for purchase online for $15 or at the door for $20.
The show will consist of improv performers guided by a comical host. After the improv performers are finished, The Good Trouble Makers troupe will perform a set of original performance art, event organizer Kulkiran Nakai said.
“What I love about this event is that we get to hear all about people that we usually just see. I think it's really important to uplift performers’ craft and their artistry, but also their voice: their story,” Nakai said.
The Good Trouble Makers is an improv group of queer drag performers that specialize in liberated improv.
“[Liberated improv] is something new and revolutionary, where improvisers are punching up at systems and never making fun of the storyteller, never punching down at people who are traditionally marginalized in society," Nakai said. "It is a really fun way to elevate improv and comedy, through the lived experience of other people's stories, and so we perform in a way that allows our storytellers to also feel dignified."
The name “Clowns Out: Clothes Off!” is meant to be a play on words for burlesque performing. It is meant to feel provocative and intriguing, Nakai said.
Burlesque performing is centered around the art of the tease rather than the idea of getting undressed. The striptease-like act is meant to tell a story that makes a statement. Statements can range anywhere from fun and artistic to cultural and political. Burlesque does not typically end in nudity.
“[Burlesque performing] is so dignified and elegant, and it has a diverse range of ways of expressing femininity or masculinity. So it's expression of your gender and of your sexuality, too. But it can widen the range of dignified, elegant, sexy, provocative, to campy and hilarious,” Nakai said. “I think it's also about consent. We are consenting to be perceived, to be even objectified. We're consenting for you to engage with us in that way. And then, because we are also the holders of the clothes, or the holders of how we move our body, we can also stop that consent. So, it feels like beyond just the optics and the visual of what you are seeing, there's also still a culture of choice, control and consent.”
Ypsi Pride is a free-to-attend evening of LGBTQIA+ centered events, sales and performances. This year, the festival is July 18, 2-10 p.m. in Depot Town.
Black Pride Ypsi is a non-profit organization that hosts queer community centered events and aims to create an accessible black queer community in Ypsilanti, according to its website.
