Improv comedians Colin Mochrie and Brad Sherwood — veterans of the popular television show “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” — perform together Sept. 10-11 at John Ascuaga’s Nugget.

Sherwood, a member of the television show and the Improv All Stars, thinks his job is the best of all worlds. Especially for a guy like him.

“I was always just the class clown, a slacker,” Sherwood said in a recent interview with the Reno Gazette-Journal. “This is like the closest thing to a slacker job. I mean, really, we don’t even have to memorize lines like all those hard-working actors. I’ve finally turned all that useless cutup ability into something marketable.”

Everyone is an improviser, Sherwood said.

“Improv is really just a funny version of what you do in your everyday life,” he said. “When you drive in your car, you improv. We all do it all the time. We’re constantly improvising. We’re dealing with the unknown so that it becomes known.”

But not everyone gets paid to improvise. So what qualities does one need to have to be a successful improvisational comedian?

“I think you have to be good at observing the entire world and the minutia of trivia,” Sherwood said. “If you’re a really good Pictionary and Trivial Pursuit player, you already have the makings at what makes you good at improv.”

One bonus to being an improv comedian is it is almost impossible to make a mistake.

“By the very nature of it, there is no right answer,” Sherwood said. “Because you’re making it up, there is no pre-ordained sequence of events that say, ‘This is the way it should be.’ We sort of fly in the dark from the beginning to the end. There is no defined trail, so technically, there are no wrong turns.

“I mean, you’re taking a wrong turn if the audience gets mad, starts booing you and gets up and leaves,” he said. “But if they are laughing at you, it doesn’t matter what you said.”

Sherwood also is a regular performer on the British version of “Whose Line” He appeared on the live episodes of “The Drew Carey Show” and “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” His past credits include a season on “L.A. Law” and as the host of “The New Dating Game.”

Mochrie is an alumnus of Toronto’s Second City, a training ground for other comedians such as Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner, Mike Meyers and Martin Short. He appeared for nine years on the British version of “Whose Line” and every season of the American one. He portrayed Eugene on “The Drew Carey Show.” He is involved in several Canadian television shows, and he appeared in the film “Lucky Numbers” with John Travolta and Lisa Kudrow.

Mochrie realized his talent for comedy when he was a shy teenager growing up in Vancouver.

“ I tried out for a school play on a dare, and when I got my first laugh, it was like a drug,” he said in a recent interview with the Northeast Times. “I came out of my shell a little and was more accepted by my peers. And that was that.”

He then went to theater school and began acting on the stage. He spent part of his early career in improvisational theater, performing in four productions and later directing three seasons with the National Touring Company.

He had his first audition for “Whose Line” when it was in its second year on the cable network Comedy Central, but did not receive the part. Never one to be easily discouraged, he re-auditioned two years later and became one of the stars of the show, following it from cable to primetime on ABC.