When Forrest Gump said, “Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get,” he wasn’t referring to something in Ames. Or was he?

The improvisational group The Clever Lemmings will hold its first public performance at 7 p.m. Saturday at the ACTORS studio, 120 Abraham Dr.

Admission to the performance is free.

Kari Varnum, member of The Clever Lemmings, compares improvisational acting to Forrest Gump’s famous quote because each performance is different.

“Improv is interesting; it’s never the same,” Varnum said. “It’s nice to go from playing a bus driver to a valley girl to a monkey.”

David Detlefs, the group’s coordinator and member, said that The Clever Lemmings is unique because it’s something nice and refreshing to have here in Ames.

“I think it’s something the town hasn’t seen before,” Detlefs said. “It’s live theater, which is entertaining.”

According to Detlefs, the audience will play the greatest role in TCL’s performance.

“They basically write the script for us,” Detlefs said.

To get the audience involved, the troupe will play games. The group may say the story takes place in a vacation spot and the audience’s role is to pick where that place is, Detlefs said.

The audience will make suggestions for the place, the problem and the characters in the story.

“Without an audience we can’t do a show,” Detlefs said. “They tell us what we’re going to be doing for the evening.”

The Clever Lemmings, which has been together a year, started out as a class that is taught at The Octagon Center for the Arts.

Detlefs, instructor for the improvisational acting class, saw potential in some of the students. He said they were good so he decided to give it [the improv group] a try.

“Most of them [TCL’s members] have next to no experience,” Detlefs said. “They might have done acting in high school.”

Varnum took the improv class at the Octagon and was later asked by Detlefs to be a part of the comedy group.

A secretary at Iowa State, Varnum has done community theater in the past. She also took an improv class while she lived in Los Angeles.

Varnum enjoys working with The Clever Lemmings because, “it’s a place where you can let loose, anything goes.”

Detlefs, a sales representative for Software Etc., has a strong theater background. He performed a lot while he was in high school. At the University of Northern Iowa he received a degree in theater. He has also been with Comedy Sportz, a nationally franchised improv group, since 1991.

The Clever Lemmings plan on doing some self-promoting.

According to Detlefs, the troupe would like to perform two shows a month. In addition, the group may hire itself out for Christmas parties and other events.