Impractical Jokers Live Show & Meet and Greet Experience

They say never meet your idols, but I met mine. We’ve had tickets for the Impractical Jokers live show since last March – Ben’s been joking pretty much since we got the tickets that this is the day in 2017 that I’ve been looking forward to the most. He might have been right, I’m still undecided.

Pictures in this post all taken by me. Credit if used.

If you’ve never seen the show Impractical Jokers, I feel very sorry for you. It’s quite literally the highlight of my week when new episodes are out and Ben often comments about how much I just giggle when it’s on. If you’ve never seen it, it’s a hidden camera comedy show, featuring 4 friends ‘who compete to embarrass each other’. Essentially they’re wearing earpieces and have to do what the other guys are telling them to otherwise they lose a point – at the end of the show the person who has lost the most has to do a punishment, which they can’t say no to. It’s silly and is exactly my kind of humour.

I discovered Impractical Jokers at a point in my life where I was thoroughly miserable, I was in a job I absolutely hated and it was the light in the week that gave me something to look forward to. I know that sounds over dramatic, but it’s definitely true. My love for the jokers extended past the show into Q and Sal’s podcast – ‘What Say You?’ by far my favourite thing to listen to at work, and into one Q does ‘solo’ from the rest of the Tenderloins called ‘Tell Em Steve Dave’.

When we saw they were touring we decided we were definitely going to go, and when I spotted that there was Meet & Greet tickets I said if they were under £X a ticket I was going to get them – they turned out to be more, but at that point I’d already planned in my head that I was going to be getting them so didn’t care as I was committed to the idea. I will say that it isn’t cheap to do – but when we sat down and thought about it we couldn’t think of people that we’d rather meet.

We went to the Impractical Jokers ‘Santiago Sent Us’ tour at Birmingham Barclaycard Arena on the 13th January. The Meet and Greet tickets included a bunch of exclusive merch for the meet and greet, and a signed poster, our tickets were central and within the first 2 rows. I couldn’t have had a better seat as we were sat under where Sal was standing for the majority of the show and he’s definitely my fave! The show was hilarious and was better than I was expecting, I’ve watched a few of their live shows that have been show on TV, but have always felt that they’ve had an air of being ‘filtered’ as they’ve been filmed for TV and this was definitely past the point of being TV filterable! There was exclusive clips that hadn’t been shown on the show and just general story telling and jokes.

The only part of the show which was spoilt for me was the creepy Motherfucker next to me who had a hoodie which zipped all the way up and heckled Murray the entire way through the show, I was seriously close to asking him to shut the fuck up.

Meet and Greet

The Meet and Greet took place after the show and was really badly organised, I blame the actual arena for this – we were all patiently waiting in our seats before someone came over to us as said ‘you’re meant to be over there’ and vaguely pointed to the back of the arena. We were then asked for backstage passes (which we had but they clearly said ‘these aren’t backstage passes’) the access was via the wristbands.

There were 48 people with meet and greet tickets and we were split into 2 groups to mingle with them. we were in the second batch to go in so had a wait into a corridor . Whilst waiting we were told about 653 times that we couldn’t take selfies with them, it got to the point where it became a running joke between us and another couple waiting that ‘just to be clear can we take selfies?’ to one of the women security guards who didn’t have a sense of humor – something I kind of expected to happen as there was a professional photographer included.

 We had about 6/7 minutes mingling with them with the opportunity to get ‘anything you wanted signed’ if I knew this it would have been more of a challenge of me to think of things. I’m going to write down what happened to give you an idea of what to expect but obviously each experience will be different, it’s as much for my benefit to look back on as my memory for this type of thing can often be terrible!

We were the second couple to go in the second batch, music was playing and Murray was dancing round the room before he ran up to the first couple and hugged the girl and shook the guys hand, the same thing happened to us, although was greeted with ‘hey baby’ (not forgetting that part in a hurry!).

We put the stuff we didn’t want signed down, and walked round the room to chat with them in small groups / solo. I had my nugget honey bear which will make no sense if you don’t listen to the what say you podcast, but it got a good reaction after I’d explained that our friend had to bring it over from Canada as we don’t have honey bears here – Q thought this was odd, but I explained having honey shaped like a bear was definitely weirder. Ben’s favourite is Q, so he creepily was staring at him without saying him – Q asked “what’s his problem” before I said “I’ve been asking myself that for ten years” before Ben snapped out of it and started behaving like a normal person again.

My Nugget was signed by Q & Sal – with the #GFY from Sal – a podcast mantra (Go Fuck Yourself), Nugget is going to take pride of place on my welsh dresser, between all my twee teacups, whilst I have to explain to everyone from now on why there is a signed honey pot, shaped like a bear. We also got the show program signed, and Ben also got Q to sign his phone case but sadly it’s already rubbed off! I think the fact there I was someone who was clearly a outside of what they just do on the show did get you a bit more time with them and something more to talk about than just Impractical Jokers.

At the end of the 6/7 minutes, which did feel longer than what it sounded – they get you to line up and take a picture as a group – I shuffled myself to being next to Sal cause he’s my fave and would have ran away to Staten Island with him had he of asked. They were all friendly and on a high from being on stage so were quite bubbly, if you’re a big fan then it’s worth the cost as a one off experience. They’re touring again in October and we’re planning on going to see the show, but probably not the meet and greet experience again as funds are tight for the wedding!

I hope you enjoyed the non-beauty post, I’d like to start including some more lifestyle stuff into my blog every few weeks, and hope this is the kind of thing you don’t mind seeing every now and again!

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