Sketch comedy group APAture 2004 Theater Featured Artists 18 Mighty Mountain Warriors perform Saturday, Sept . 25 at APAture's Main Event. Kearny Street Workshop's APAture: A Window on the Art of Young Asian Pacific Americans runs Sept. 14-25 at SomArts Cultural Center, SF. (Photo Courtesy 18MMW)

THE 18 MIGHTY MOUNTAIN WARRIORS: Quite possibly the world's most psychotic Asian American Comedy group, the Warriors have been together since 1994 and in that time have created 12 all-new material feature shows, 3 original collaborations with Culture Clash, Campo Santo and Latina Theatre Lab, and performed in New York City, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Chicago, Houston, and Phoenix, among other cities. Inspired by groups such as Monty Python's Flying Circus, Culture Clash, SNL, and Kids in the Hall, their irreverent style of skit comedy ranges from slapstick to political and takes no prisoners.

And more about the 18MMW:

THE 18 MIGHTY MOUNTAIN WARRIORS grew out of a comedy ensemble called the New Godzilla Theater in residence at Asian American Theater Company in San Francisco from 1993-1994. Since its premiere production, In Deep Shabu Shabu, in September 1994, the group has written and produced a dozen feature shows, performed numerous workshop productions and benefit one-night stands around the greater Bay Area, and toured nationally and internationally at colleges, universities, arts festivals and theatrical venues. The group is also known for its various .performances. at bars and clubs in San Francisco.s Japantown and Tenderloin districts. Over the years, the 18 Mighty Mountain Warriors have established themselves as a new force in Asian Pacific Islander American arts. They.ve been touted as the "Asian American version of In Living Color," were picked as the "Smash Hit" of the 1996 Hong Kong Fringe Arts Festival (the second largest in the world after the Edinburgh Fringe Festival), and were said to have "blown any episode of SNL out of the water in the past decade." They wield their unique brand of comedy--culled from influences ranging from Monty Python's Flying Circus to In Living Color to Culture Clash to Hong Kong slapstick comedies and action movies--both to entertain and to provoke thought about the issues that affect Asian Pacific Islander Americans. However, the cross-over appeal to non-Asian Pacific Islander American audiences is very strong as well, because the group approaches issues in a non-didactic manner and believes that laughter knows no cultural boundaries.