You may know Ryan Stiles as the tall, elastic-faced and almost serenely confident improv performer on the ABC show “Whose Line is it Anyway?” which ran from 1998 to 2004.

Or maybe you remember him from his co-starring role as Lewis on “The Drew Carey Show.” which ran on ABC from 1995 to 2004.

Or maybe you’re one of the millions of fans of “Two and a Half Men,” in which case you know him from his recurring role as Herb Melnick.

However you may know him, you know Ryan Stiles is funny.

From his long face to his demeanor and delivery, Stiles seems born for comedy. For all his sitcom success, he prefers the games, laughs and inventiveness improv affords — and it’s improv that will bring Stiles and three of his friends to the Tower Theatre in Bend on Wednesday (see “If you go”).

Stiles was born in Seattle to Canadian parents who moved the family to Vancouver, B.C., when he was a boy. To the chagrin of his teachers, he began honing his comic edge when he was still in school.

“I was a pretty good student in middle school,” he said, “but they just gave me too much freedom in high school.”

A self-described class clown, he left high school before graduation to chase more laughs.

“I never got my diploma,” he said. “I don’t really miss (having) it.” His mom, however, does. “I’ll probably go back one day and get it for my mom,” he said with a husky laugh.

While still in his teens, he began telling jokes at bars and clubs around Vancouver, then performing improv, working with his eventual “Whose Line is it Anyway?” peer Colin Mochrie. In 1986, “Second City out of Toronto came auditioning across Canada and I ended up in that,” said Stiles, who eventually transferred to the Los Angeles branch of the famed comedy company.

Like so many great American shows, “Whose Line is it Anyway?” was first a British show, and Stiles became a regular part of the original British show’s cast in 1990.

In 1995, he joined the cast of “The Drew Carey Show,” followed by the American “Whose Line” in 1998. Stiles said Carey and the rest of the cast were like family, “You spend more time with them than your own family,” he said. “It was a great nine years.”

While enjoying his recurring role on “Two and a Half Men,” he makes clear the fact that he prefers improv. Sitcoms require a script. “It’s a lot of rehearsal and hitting your marks and reading what they tell you to read,” he said.

He keeps his improv chops strong performing four nights a week — with some of the same folks who will join him in Bend — at the Upfront Theatre, the 100-seat Bellingham, Wash., theater he opened in 2004.

“I built it after ‘Drew’ and ‘Whose Line’ ended,” he said, “so I’ve been working with younger people — well, people younger than me — so it keeps it fresh.”

He just learned a few weeks ago that “Whose Line” is coming back, he said, this time to The CW. He’ll be part of the cast, along with Mochrie and their longtime colleague from the series’ first run, Wayne Brady. The fourth seat will again be taken by a revolving crop of guest improv performers.

In a way, Stiles said, he prefers the longer-form games those headed to the Tower will see. “The thing about ‘Whose Line’ (is) you’ll just get on a roll, and then have to stop the action. You go to a commercial, or start a new game, (whereas) we just kind of barrel on through, and time flies quick when you’re doing it that way. And we’ve been able to do a lot of stuff we couldn’t do on ‘Whose Line,’ just out of time constraints and that kind of stuff.”

Stiles said he does most of his road performing in the winter, to get away from Bellingham, where he has three school-age children.

“It’s nice,” he said of occasionally hitting the road. “I have to pretend it’s not. I have to pretend it’s hard.”

But it’s also the only place he can relax, he said. “The only place I feel comfortable is on stage. I don’t like crowds and stuff; I’d rather be on stage. It’s the only place I can really do what I want and not have to worry about anything.”

If you go

What: Ryan Stiles and Friends

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday

Where: Tower Theatre, 835 N.W. Wall St., Bend

Cost: $50, plus fees

Contact: www.towertheatre.org or 541-317-0700