Wednesday 22 October 2008

Speak Your Brains*

Here's one for the comments section.

I am, as an exercise, writing an improv manifesto in order to facilitate this, I'm in the process of completing the task outlined below. I present it here for your enjoyment and edification.

Finish the sentence below in as many ways as you feel the need to, feel free to be positive and affirm ideals to aspire to or to add "not" and proscribe things that ought to be avoided. Go wild my kindred. Go wild...

"Improv should..."

Should what? Tell me.

*"Speak Your Brains" was a segment in the phenomenal British TV show The Day Today. Look it up.

Saturday 18 October 2008

Recently, Foxy wrote:

Anyhoo. I think a show needs fulfil any promises it has made to an audience. By which I mean if you're selling a show as funny, you have to bring the funny. Imagine going to the "action movie of the decade" and finding out that it's a period drama about a happy goatherd and his affable father. It would be totally contrary to your expectations and you'd rightly feel cheated.

I really like what you say here, Foxy. I wholeheartedly agree: If you advertise yourself as something, you had best live to the expectations you set with your billing. Else, you're misrepresenting what you do. You potentially disappoint the audience. You take their money and run.

Now, granted, given that improv is not rehearsed (at least in the same predictable sense as theater), there is some room for failure, and audiences should probably realize that (well, they probably already do, many seeing improv as "sub-prime theater" or "unfunny theater"). But performers, if they're going to charge admission and charge audience time, need to get to a level of performance such that failure happens rarely. Now, what is meant by "failure" is partially determined here by how you advertise your show, and partially determined here by performing to general theatrical conventions or standards (speaking so the audience can hear, etc.). "Failure" isn't some vague concept.

As for the necessity for comedy in improv, I can't remember offhand what I wrote earlier on the subject, but of those people who think improv must make the audience laugh, those people throw the word "improv" around as a synonym--nay, abbreviation--for the term "improv comedy." That is,

Given some people,
"improv" = "improv comedy"

This is not a mathematical equation, else it would sound contradictory. ("Comedy" would probably equal zero!) It's just a definition. It's saying that when someone says "improv," he means "improv comedy." This is to say that for these people, "improv" must make and audience laugh because, Hey, that's improv! (What they mean is "Hey, that's improv comedy!")
The discussion is much like this for these people: Should insurgents terrorize? Of course they should, if you use the word "insurgent" as a synonym for "terrorist."


Remember that the word "improv" refers to styles of many different things, not just comedy. A jazz musician could say "Let's improvise" and probably no one takes that to mean, "Okay, sure, let's put down our instruments, get up, and crack each other up with scenes." You village has just been wiped away by a flood. "We're going to have to improvise" doesn't necessarily mean staging a show; it means building your home out of sticks and mud.

Tuesday 14 October 2008

At Long Last, the Die-Nasty Write-up.

'K, it's been almost a month and I can really get my head around a lot of what happened.

First off, let me highlight how wonderful and awesome the Die-Nasty company is, add to that the phenomenal people from Rapid Fire Theatre and everyone else who I met out there. Except the guy at immigration.

Second, let me thank Mark Meer, Belinda Cornish and their dog Atom for being gracious and adorable hosts and a very cute dog. If you ever have cause to make a cake, these people are worthy recipients.

Thirdly (and finally) it wouldn't have been the same without the support and "mad skillz" of my fellow English, Adam Meggido, Sean McCan, Cariad Lloyd and Maya Sendall. All of whom are genius-level poets.

The Show.

OK. Show-Day -2. Wednesday
I've been in Canada for about 16 hours. Last night Cariad and I arrived in Edmonton and were taken straight into a workshop, then a pub, then the place we're staying at (Mark and Belinda's house is amazing and I still giggle with glee and excitement every time I think about the comic books, action figures or posters). Today we're hunting for some costume.

The setup for the show is this: "a family-run-business has won the lottery and is using some of the money to take the family and some employees to Hawaii." We're met by Matt Alden, one of the core company, who drives us around some good costume stores in a tiny car; wigs are bought and I pick up some fake facial hair and glasses. There's another workshop that evening, in which I acquit myself mildy better than the night before, but still not "well". The other UK participants arrive that evening and much fun is had in the pub. I have no idea what character I'm going to play at this point; I have this idea about being a cult investigator/de-programmer and hope that if I imply that one exists, there'll be a cult on the island.

I can't really account for Thursday. I think I bought a Green Lantern t-shirt and ate a twinkie. But more must have happened. In the evening Adam and Sean run an improvised Shakespeare/Musical workshop for the Rapid Fire guys. A lot of fun stuff is learned by many lovely people. I take the time to look up Hawaii on wikipedia, a pointless activity.

Anyhoo.

Friday rolls around. D-day.

I still have no idea what I'm going to play. I have a bunch of names in my head and some costume that seems to say "academic". The morning and afternoon is spent eating salmon and trying to convince Cariad to let us buy her some truly dreadful gold boots for a character.

People begin to congregate at the Varscona Theatre at around 1630, aside from those folks already there finishing the set, cleaning the theatre and preparing for the show. It's at this point that I, faced with the need to pick a character, decide on a few things.

1. I've bought a false moustache and intend to wear it.
B. The english accent is a novelty here. I'll abuse that and be English.
iii. I've got tweeds, fake glasses, a corduroy jacket and they seem to feel "right" as costume.

And so, Professor Steven Doctors is created.

Someone told me that the 53 hour is like a breeding ground for your bad habits, and Doctors is a manifestation of all of mine. He turns very rapidly into a high status buffoon, the sort of character who talks the talk but can't back it up. He is also fairly emotionally isolated. This turns into a problem for me in the dark hours. Fortunately, he's also fun to play and entertaining to watch (I'm told).

Now then, the format of the show is roughly this. Every 2 hours there is an interval. This serves a number of different purposes. The audience can easily mill around, stretch their legs or go buy food and drink. Similarly the cast can also go grab some food or whatever, step out back for a smoke or fresh air. Towards the end of the interval, the cast congregates in the basement where Dana Andersen (the Director) takes a roll call of participants for the next two hours. Those performers who are "in" then join a circle and chant to build energy. We all then run upstairs to the entrance at the rear of the auditorium.

What follows happens at the start of every two hour segement; they're called the Hot Thirties. Each character (sometimes in pairs) is announced by the Director, they run down the stairs into a spotlight where the character performs a short monologue about something. Frequently about their experiences so far, hopes for the future or their feelings. This works quite well as an introduction to the story for new audience members. This done, Dana then sets up scenes and casts them from his notebook and mic stage left. And the show takes off...

Now then. This is a huge post. You've got the form and the run up. You'll get the rest in a couple of days.

Friday 10 October 2008

Improv Vs. Comedy 2: This time it's personal

Hello Ben. Hello blog readers. Hello monitoring software. It's been too long.

Does improv need to make an audience laugh?

Short answer, no.

If you're after a longer, more rambling reply (and I suspect you are), then I'd say that improv doesn't need to make the audience laugh any more than a play does. Or a book, tv show... whatever. Drama can be just as entertaining as the funny that improv usually busts out, insofar as a hardcore need for amusement goes, I think audiences like variety - who doesn't? A bleak script/show tends to benefit from the contrast of some form of comedy; it can serve to juxtapose whatever tragedy the piece is about. It doesn't need to be funny, but it doesn't need to not be.

There's a common view that because most (frequently all the shows a given person has seen) improv shows are comedic, all improv shows are comedic. It isn't true and it bugs me plenty, but we're dealing with a funny old art form. It's been around in a coherent form for at least 500 years (that might warrant a guest blogger to explain properly by the way. Watch this space...) and so few practitioners seem to want to do more than emulate Whose Line.

Wait.

I'm off topic.

Anyhoo. I think a show needs fulfil any promises it has made to an audience. By which I mean if you're selling a show as funny, you have to bring the funny. Imagine going to the "action movie of the decade" and finding out that it's a period drama about a happy goatherd and his affable father. It would be totally contrary to your expectations and you'd rightly feel cheated.

Improv can and ought to cater to a range of tastes. We've all (I hope) seen beautiful improvised moments of deep anguish, blazing anger or poignant emotional truth that have stood out in a show precisely because they weren't funny. They were real, beautiful moments of drama, joy, whatever. And here's the kicker folks, not being funny makes you funnier.

I've only phrased it like that to keep you interested, I'm a shill.

Improv, to my mind, is about stories not comedy. Comedy is great, it's phenomenal at killing stories, which means it's a brilliant finishing move. But if all you've got is gag after gag after gag, it's going to get samey. And, as we all know, samey leads to fear, fear leads to hate and hate leads to bland shows.

And don't nobody pay for bland. Except maybe the Amish. (I wonder if they'll email and complain? Are there cyber-Amish? "We only use Windows 3.1. Every subsequent O/S is evil. Eeeeeevil.")

The trick I refer to is this: imagine the joke you could crack after 20 seconds. Now don't do it, keep playing it straight. Try making it to 40 seconds, then a minute. Then bust out the funny! Whatever gag will have more impact, simply because it contrasts. It's a change from what has gone before. Moreover, it's probably the end of the scene which makes you seem funnier! Pow! Zap! Blam!

My point, far from it though I may be, is this:

Improv in a vacuum doesn't need to be funny.

Improv that wants people to pay money to come see - moreover, that wants those people to come back to see it again - doesn't need comedy. It just has an easier time acheiving his goals with funny than without.

I don't know anyone who's looking to see a really well improvised tragedy. And maybe that's because nobody's selling yet...

I guess my short answer is in the second paragraph.

And it's this: "[improv] doesn't need to be funny, but it doesn't need to not be."

But what do I know? I am, after all, just a humble tailor.

Monday 6 October 2008

Group Mind

This past January, I gave a lecture-seminar for the New York Society for General Semantics. It was titled "Developing the Experience of Group Mind." Specifically, I spoke of the long-form improv experience of group mind, and how as an improv teacher I develop an improv group's group mind.

The journal ETC: A Review of General Semantics published it as an essay. Feel free to give it a read. You can find the essay here.