In November 2004, a group of nine actors stepped onto stage in a New York City theatre with a common goal — laughter. They call themselves the Harvard Sailing Team and their sketch comedy will be showcased in Stephens Auditorium at 9 p.m. Saturday.

From their first show, the Harvard Sailing Team continued to perfect their brand of comedy becoming a Youtube sensation with more than 40,000 subscribers in only a few years.

Harvard Sailing Team started as a group of friends sharing a major, wanting to do their own style of work as actors.

“We went to Atlantic Acting School, a satellite school part of the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU,” said Jen Curran, member of the Harvard Sailing Team.

“We didn’t form until after graduating. Our teachers always stressed the importance of creating your own work as actors … we sort of fell into sketch comedy because it was the cheapest — we needed the least amount of props or costumes and we were able to find some theaters in and around New York City that would give us time. And that’s how it all began.”

Harvard Sailing Team’s roots are in theater and live shows, but with increased popularity comes larger venues and more populated audiences.

“It’s totally different than performing for a 30-something New York City crowd,” Curran said. “A lot of the sketches we do are really big and loud and musical and physical and they can fill up the space of a huge venue … which we didn’t really set out to do, but that’s what ended up happening because we all trained in theatre, we all love to sing and dance and we’re sort of such theatrical dorks.”

Curran continued, “It’s really fun to perform for these huge audiences, in these really big venues, because they’re just there to have a good time and they’re laughing and they’re super receptive. It’s also fun to do our online hits for them. It’s like a band being able to do their single and so [the audience] really appreciates that and it’s fun for us.”

Releasing Youtube videos has exposed Harvard Sailing Team to the world, and they receive feedback from groups of friends all over.

“This may sound cheesy, but it’s very heartwarming” said Faryn Einhorn, another member of Harvard Sailing Team. “We’ll get some fan mail; [that tells us] our sketches are far more meaningful than we ever [intended]. We’re just trying to make ourselves laugh.”

Einhorn continued on explaining how their videos have impacted people. 

“Some of these videos bring friendships together and we hear about it. And it’s meaningful to people who are stressed out during finals week. Some people like to share it with their family when they’re home from break. Everyone gathers around the computer and watches their favorite Internet videos, and it’s very heartwarming to know that we can inadvertently be a part of that.”

At the end of the day, the Harvard Sailing Team is just a group of friends making each other laugh. They like to spend time reminiscing about their early years and looking ahead into the future.

“We’ve worked really hard over the years for something that we really love, and we all care about each other.” Einhorn said.  “And when we set out to do this, none of us would have, or could have, imagined where we would go with it.”