Amy Lisewski is a professional improviser, entrepreneur, and speaker based in San Diego and anywhere adventure leads her. 

As the founder and owner of Finest City Improv, she is continually growing San Diego’s largest community of improvisers and a training program that has brought more courage and joy to thousands of people.  

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Experience

From Librarian to Improviser

Amy trained in improvisation and sketch comedy at the world-class Second City and IO West and with dozens of top teachers in Chicago, LA, and New York.  She studied Communications and Acting at Ithaca College. 

An ‘introverted extrovert’, Amy worked in both television and information research and management before founding Finest City Improv.   Amy holds a Masters in Library and Information Science from San Jose State University (CA) and helped biotech and high tech companies like Diversa, Verenium, and Synthetic Genomics improve their knowledge management for more than 15 years through her consulting company, Essential Information Partners. She is an alumnus of Teach For America, where she served two years teaching in New Orleans Public Schools from 1998-2000.

In 2012, after 3 years of splitting her time between San Diego and LA to study improv, Amy decided to stop the flow of improvisers heading north from San Diego (including herself!) by creating Finest City Improv, a home for long-form comedy improv in San Diego.  Since then, she has brought dozens of top improvisers to San Diego from LA and beyond to help grow the San Diego improv scene with workshops and guest appearances. She developed a 6-level curriculum to teach people how to improvise both on and off the stage and mentored dozens of top talent to be effective improv teachers.

Combining her love of improv with her experience in business and communications, Amy created the Tap Into Improv program for organizational and leadership development and has facilitated hundreds of workshops across the US for companies like WD-40, GoPro, Kaiser, and Reef.  She regularly works with top-level transformational mastermind groups to challenge participants to expand their comfort zones and boost their leadership confidence using improvisation.  She was a featured speaker at the Transformational Leadership Council, founded by Jack Canfield, in 2019.

In 2018 she created Speak Up!, a seminar to empower women and teens to find and use their voice more often at work or school in pursuit of their goals as leaders in their fields.

Amy's book, "Relax, We're all Just Making This Stuff Up!" was written to help anyone benefit from the principles and practices of improvisation both at work and in life. Available from Amazon and Audible.

improv book

Awards & Appearances

News Media, Podcasts, events

Amy has been nominated for both Connected Women of Influence and Women Who Mean Business awards. She was featured as a “Kick-ass Entrepreneur” in the San Diego Union-Tribune and profiled for her work with businesses in the San Diego Business Journal and on KPBS. Finest City Improv appeared in Entrepreneur Magazine for our work helping team's use "Yes! And..." to ignite creativity.

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Amy has served as an announcer for TEDx San Diego and host of San Diego X’s “BrandDiego” Awards. She was a co-presenter for the 2016 San Diego Film Awards

Watch

Amy discuss her book and how improv helps create courage and joy on Tonight In San Diego and on the CW Network’s San Diego Living (video no longer available).

Presenting "How To Take Over The World Using Improv" at Ignite San Diego.

Amy’s sharing her story about helping people find improv in San Diego as part of the One Day in San Diego video series.

Listen

This month, FCI founder Amy Lisewski was featured LIVE on CBS 8 on two separate occasions. She was invited on to talk about FCI’s growing involvement with the San Diego Tourism Authority. In this flagship program, the city of San Diego i...

Amy Lisewski is the founder of Finest City Improv and the San Diego Improv Festival. As a keynote speaker, Amy helps companies improve communication and collaborations using improv skills. She is also the author of Relax, We’re All Jus...

Founder and owner of Finest City Improv, Amy Lisewski was a recent guest on the podcast, “Tales from the Teacher’s Lounge.” A podcast dedicated to the art of teaching improv, host Lauren Morris delves deep into the world of teaching imp...

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