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.
Showing posts with label drama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label drama. Show all posts
Friday, 10 October 2008
Tuesday, 12 August 2008
The Big Link Rodeo
Stuff I saw that was cool. And loosely related to making stuff up.
Loosely.
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.
Tuesday, 29 July 2008
How I see improv
Last night my improv program had an informal performance. Foxy alludes to it in the prior post.
After the show, I was talking to one of the performers, who is a software engineer, who has presumably never performed onstage before, and who has never done improv for an audience before. He told me, "I think I'm addicted to improv."
I ended up sharing with him how I saw improv. This was an old view of mine that I rediscovered in talking to him. It basically is this:
Improv is unscripted drama. Pretty much the only difference between improv and plays is that plays have a script and improv does not. That means, in improv, the actors don't know what to say, but in plays, the actors do know what to say.
What that means in an improv class is that you are learning the structure of plays so that you can act them out in the moment without the aid of a script. You learn about the crafting of scenes and the crafting of plays. When you improvise, you basically become a playwriting collective: You use the structure of plays and follow that structure as your group performs.
Audiences unfamiliar with improv tend to see improv as saying funny lines. They think that when performers are onstage, they say funny line after funny line after funny line, and they have some mysterious gift or raging talent for saying funny lines.
But as you tend to learn in improv classes, your "lines" are really just behavior--behavioral reactions in the moment as you follow the structure of plays. You are doing something else other than saying funny lines. You are following playwriting techniques, and the result of following them sometimes is audience laughter.
When you analyze the laugh lines in an improvisation, abstracting them from the context of an improvised scene, you usually find there is nothing particularly funny about them. Instead, it is something about the moment that makes the audience laugh. In truth, it is usually what the improviser did that makes the audience laugh, rather than what the improviser said. The word "toaster" is not by itself very funny, but said in a particular context, at a particular moment, given the prior information in the improvised piece, and given the understanding of what the improviser's character may be trying to do, saying it may provoke an uproar in laughter to burn into an audience member's memory for a lifetime.
When you take an improv class, you realize improv doesn't have anything to do with saying funny lines. It is more about the interaction between characters, their conflict, and the movement toward a decision in that conflict. Granted, talk is definitely an element of the improvised scene, but it's not the focus. If you focus on the speech in great improvised scenes, you will usually find that it doesn't explain why they were so great. Instead, if you focus on the choices of the improvisers and the context in which those choices occur, you will have a better understanding of what made great improvised scenes so great.
So you learn about choices in an improv class, not about saying funny lines.
Granted, the focus is obviously going to depend on the beliefs of the improv teacher. Indeed, there are improv teachers out there who do care about saying funny things, and they may even denigrate you for your failure to say funny things. (I'm definitely not one of those teachers!) In rough, the approach may be a little bit different if you're talking a short-form improv class or a long-form improv class. In a short-form class, you may learn techniques that will make the audience laugh. In a long-form class, you don't really do that. Instead, you learn techniques to perpetuate improvised scenes. Essentially, in a long-form class, you learn about the creation of unscripted drama, while in a short-form class, you learn about the creation of audience laughter.
As a side note, though: To date, I've never really taken a short-form improv class, only listening to what others have said about it and about classes, coupled with what I've seen of short-form improv.
... So that's how I see improv. I come from the long-form perspective, so that's probably why I emphasize the dramatic elements of it (i.e., its play(writing) elements) rather than its comedic elements (i.e., its laugh-inducing elements). There is no right or wrong way to see improv, unless perhaps you set a way as right or wrong or subscribe to a particular mindset that sets a right or wrong way to see improv.
After the show, I was talking to one of the performers, who is a software engineer, who has presumably never performed onstage before, and who has never done improv for an audience before. He told me, "I think I'm addicted to improv."
I ended up sharing with him how I saw improv. This was an old view of mine that I rediscovered in talking to him. It basically is this:
Improv is unscripted drama. Pretty much the only difference between improv and plays is that plays have a script and improv does not. That means, in improv, the actors don't know what to say, but in plays, the actors do know what to say.
What that means in an improv class is that you are learning the structure of plays so that you can act them out in the moment without the aid of a script. You learn about the crafting of scenes and the crafting of plays. When you improvise, you basically become a playwriting collective: You use the structure of plays and follow that structure as your group performs.
Audiences unfamiliar with improv tend to see improv as saying funny lines. They think that when performers are onstage, they say funny line after funny line after funny line, and they have some mysterious gift or raging talent for saying funny lines.
But as you tend to learn in improv classes, your "lines" are really just behavior--behavioral reactions in the moment as you follow the structure of plays. You are doing something else other than saying funny lines. You are following playwriting techniques, and the result of following them sometimes is audience laughter.
When you analyze the laugh lines in an improvisation, abstracting them from the context of an improvised scene, you usually find there is nothing particularly funny about them. Instead, it is something about the moment that makes the audience laugh. In truth, it is usually what the improviser did that makes the audience laugh, rather than what the improviser said. The word "toaster" is not by itself very funny, but said in a particular context, at a particular moment, given the prior information in the improvised piece, and given the understanding of what the improviser's character may be trying to do, saying it may provoke an uproar in laughter to burn into an audience member's memory for a lifetime.
When you take an improv class, you realize improv doesn't have anything to do with saying funny lines. It is more about the interaction between characters, their conflict, and the movement toward a decision in that conflict. Granted, talk is definitely an element of the improvised scene, but it's not the focus. If you focus on the speech in great improvised scenes, you will usually find that it doesn't explain why they were so great. Instead, if you focus on the choices of the improvisers and the context in which those choices occur, you will have a better understanding of what made great improvised scenes so great.
So you learn about choices in an improv class, not about saying funny lines.
Granted, the focus is obviously going to depend on the beliefs of the improv teacher. Indeed, there are improv teachers out there who do care about saying funny things, and they may even denigrate you for your failure to say funny things. (I'm definitely not one of those teachers!) In rough, the approach may be a little bit different if you're talking a short-form improv class or a long-form improv class. In a short-form class, you may learn techniques that will make the audience laugh. In a long-form class, you don't really do that. Instead, you learn techniques to perpetuate improvised scenes. Essentially, in a long-form class, you learn about the creation of unscripted drama, while in a short-form class, you learn about the creation of audience laughter.
As a side note, though: To date, I've never really taken a short-form improv class, only listening to what others have said about it and about classes, coupled with what I've seen of short-form improv.
... So that's how I see improv. I come from the long-form perspective, so that's probably why I emphasize the dramatic elements of it (i.e., its play(writing) elements) rather than its comedic elements (i.e., its laugh-inducing elements). There is no right or wrong way to see improv, unless perhaps you set a way as right or wrong or subscribe to a particular mindset that sets a right or wrong way to see improv.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
