The Big Link Rodeo

Stuff I saw that was cool. And loosely related to making stuff up.

Loosely.

• An article from the Guardian about how improvisation is finally catching on in Britain that either fills one with hope for the future or mild irritation at the masses of improvisation in Britain that is overlooked by the author. I went for hope, this from readwriteplay is a smarterer response.
• Found on boingboing about a week ago is this interesting article on how social science is starting to catch up with magicians in terms of understanding the processes of manipulating peoples attention.
• Awesome graphic design for improv shows and the like including a super-sweet poster of the Harold. If I can find out how to buy it, I'll throw a link up here.
• And finally, some friends of mine are performing in Showstopper! an improvised musical in Edinburgh. Now. Soon. Later.
  

That is all.

You may go.

Natural Laws of Improv, 2 in a series of more than 1

4. Guns kill people. They do not wound, miss or jam.

5. Taxidermy is an overwhelmingly popular vocation, despite most "professional" taxidermists being "mad".

5.1 The same is true of dentistry.

6. Despite the fact that most animals are able to talk, their owners are never previously aware of it.

7. Most patients, when presented with a clean bill of health, will either insist that they are ill or claim (and they're frequently correct) that the doctor is a fraud.

Also, in our continuing series of Facts About Del Close, I presesnt this nugget:

Del Close once mimed a hammer so convincingly that it is, to this day, on display in The Louvre.

The Opening

In Harolds, you have a part called "The Opening." For years I've been referring to that as "Ideation." I call it that because that's the function of the opening as I see it: It is to generate ideas.

Before I started calling it that, I noticed a tendency amongst improvisers in shows I saw. They would take a suggestion and then do an opening, but from what I could tell, the opening had little to no bearing on their improvised scenework. As a result, ignoring their opening made their opening a futile inclusion in their Harold. Their opening was rendered pointless.

A dramatic approach to Harolds necessitates that each part included in the Harold has a function. So, your opening had better have some function in the Harold, else it is worth considering chucking. But chucking something from an honored form is not something you want to do recklessly. I see the situation akin to staging a play: You don't willynilly cut parts of plays just because you don't understand them; instead, you seek understanding why they're included, and if you really can't find an answer, then you consider cutting.

Since the opening is seen as necessary, what is its function in the Harold? The function of the opening is to generate ideas. These ideas are generated from the suggestion, for the Harold. The improvisers thus gain "a pool of ideas" from which to pull when they improvise. They don't have to continually invent as they're onstage. Instead, they merely need to pluck ideas from the pool to use in their scenes. This makes the opening very, very important to the Harold, not something to be ignored.

It is the pool of ideas generated during ideation that generally dictates the Harold. Ideally, every idea generated during ideation is used in the Harold, and furthermore, every idea connects with every other idea. "Every idea connects." No idea is wasted, forgotten, or disregarded. Every idea is revered. Improvisers are obligated to find ways to connect ideas over the course of the Harold.

So lest you forget the importance of an opening, refer to it as Ideation and you won't forget. The opening is there for you to generate ideas for use in your improvised scenework.