Fear Manifests Nothingness

I first have to make a confession: when I first said in a discussion with Karen, "Fear manifests nothingness," I had an inkling I was making words up, but they still seemed to say what I was trying to get across. That being said, the Cambridge Dictionary does, in fact, define nothingness as, "a state or place where nothing is present, or where nothing important is present" (emphasis mine).

Bridging, blocking, babbling, asking unproductive questions; these are all examples of ways we express our fear on stage. If we look at the issue with a critical eye, we can see that a large part of our fear is fear of change.

Fear of change creates resistance, and this resistance presents itself in the forms mentioned above, among others. When we give into our fear and resist change, we are unlikely to create anything of value in our scenes. Acceptance (that old familiar, "Yes, and..." attitude) manifests story, scenes, and characters that move everything forward in a productive and cooperative manner. Fear grinds things to a halt, manifesting nothingness.

An extreme example of fear of change involves an improviser being faced with their own character's imminent death on stage (we've all been in that position ourselves.) An actor who gives into their fear of change will do everything in their power to avoid that death, causing the scene to lose any power it might otherwise have had. 

"Fear of change creates resistance"

An improviser who gives into and accepts their character's death has a powerful effect on the story; will the audience be appalled, saddened, amused, or happy at the death of the character? If you've created a strong character and set a believable environment, you have the ability to pull the audience along with you and elicit whatever response you want. Don't let your fear take that power away from you.

Die, already.

Happy improvising!

Always Move Forward, Even When Going Back

The following is an excerpt from our book, 

"The 5 Elements of Improv":

Improvisation has the inherent advantage of not being time-bound; we can move freely backward and forward, leaping through the time stream in the wink of an eye. With this freedom comes the danger of losing the progressive aspect of our story; no matter how we move through subjective time, our story must always move forward.

While time in the real world is perceived as being linear, in the arts it is highly malleable, subject to the whims of author, actor and improviser alike. We may start at point M, jump forward to point T one scene later, then flash all the way back to point B without causing so much as a ripple in the fabric of Space/Time. 

"Inexperienced improvisers 

tend to get themselves stuck 

in a linear time-stream." 

They have great difficulty tearing themselves free from the steady progression of a scene and jumping about in time. It’s almost as if they fear the repercussions of violating the linear model, or perhaps they are afraid of getting “lost” in time, never to find their way home again. To combat this fear, we must always keep in mind that we are in control of the process, no matter how “seat-of-the-pants” it might look or feel to the audience.

Feel free to move in terms of space, as well. So many improvisers find themselves rooted to the spot and fail to take advantage of scene changes to move the story forward. Perhaps since they have invested energy in setting the environment, they are reluctant to move on. If you find you're stuck in this position, uproot yourself; remember that no matter how realistic your environment may seem, it’s all in your head. Let it go. Embrace the freedom that saying, “Meanwhile, at the Blue Parrot Lounge,” affords you (we’ll discuss this in more detail in Chapter 4.) Audiences will become bored if you stay in one location too long (unless, of course, you have woven an especially enthralling narrative; if this is the case, they’ll stay with you until the end.) 

There are many excellent games and exercises which help fearful actors let go of their temporal and spacial anchors and roam freely through Space and Time. For now, though, let's explore the meaning of the title of this section, “Always Move Forward, Even When Going Back.” While it sounds self-contradictory, in reality it makes a great deal of sense.

"Ideally, when we are 

playing a scene we have 

some goal, whether 

we start the scene with it 

or discover it along the way." 

As long as we continually move toward that goal, we will keep the audience with us. On the other hand, if we stray too far off the path, we will lose the audience. It is important, therefore, that we always move toward that goal; everything we do of consequence in a scene (and there should be little, if anything, that isn’t) needs to drive us in the direction of that goal. If Hamlet strays from his path of vengeance, if the Phantom of the Opera gets bored with Christine, if Starbuck gives up his job as Rainmaker, then the audience is cheated and will walk out, either physically or, at the very least, mentally. We will have once again failed to fulfill our contract.

As we bounce backward and forward from one time to another we must always move the underlying narrative toward our goal, even if that goal changes during the course of the scene. Whether or not the audience is clear as to what that goal is (and sometimes they are not until the very point we reach it) is immaterial; they will know in their gut if we are wandering aimlessly instead of remaining laser-focused.

A note regarding flashbacks before we conclude this section: don’t be afraid to start a flashback (or a flashforward, for that matter) if you feel the urge. As with anything else in a scene, be certain that it adds to the narrative. A flashback simply for the purpose of getting in a cheap joke or pun is irresponsible. You insult your audience, your scene partner, and yourself by doing so. They can, however, be used to great advantage in setting up or explaining components of your scene: an ancestor getting cursed by a Gypsy, a wedding night promise coming back to haunt you, aliens landing 20 years ago and going into hibernation under your wine cellar. Don’t be afraid to use them (they can be great fun!) but always make sure they work with the scene’s progress, not against it.

No matter how you play with time in your scenes, keep the story moving forward. If the audience senses stagnation, they will abandon your story.

Happy improvising!

Like a Chainsaw in a Barbershop

The best comedies all have one thing in common: the characters who populate the story take everything that happens absolutely seriously.  Whether they are busting Zuul, attempting to land a pilot-less airplane, or questing for the Holy Grail, they do so with a mindset of absolute sober sincerity. Whether the comedy in question is the erudite pomposity of Noel Coward or the physical absurdity of the Three Stooges, it's all played with a metaphorical straight face; no mugging allowed.

If the characters in our comedies were to react in a manner unbefitting the situations in which they found themselves, the illusion would be broken and the suspension of disbelief would be shattered. For a comedy to truly succeed, it is imperative that the characters react to and interact with their own reality, no matter how ridiculous or insane, in a consistent and logical fashion.

Watching an improv scene unfold with the suggestion of "hair," we saw a customer enter a barbershop and sit down. A bumbling barber enters the scene. After examining his customer's hair for a moment, the barber grabs a chainsaw and starts it up. So far, nothing is necessarily going off track. The customer, however, does not react as someone would when faced with a murderous chainsaw-wielding barber. Instead, he turns his head calmly and comments on how nice the barber's "new chainsaw" is. 

Everything then goes downhill precipitously.

Countless appropriate reactions could have presented themselves; perhaps a blood-curdling scream from the terrified customer, followed by a hearty laugh from the barber as he gets rid of the chainsaw and explains it's a joke he plays on all his new customers. Not exactly brilliant theater, but appropriate within the context of the platform they created. 

Instead we watch as the barber fumbles about for a moment, suggests that perhaps he shouldn't use the chainsaw, and then lets it disappear from his hands, to evaporate into the ether. The scene meanders on for a bit, but nothing of note is accomplished. There is no miming of actual barber shop behaviors, no discernible characters, and no adherence to the environment created. In fact, there is so little environment created that there is little if anything to adhere to.

The point to be made here is to create your reality, stay true to the reality you've just created, and behave within that environment as characters naturally would. Will all characters behave as normal humans would in all situations? Of course not.

Not all characters

are

"normal" humans.

They must, however, behave in accordance with the character construct you adopt in order for the audience to accept your characters as "real" within the context of the scene. The audience may not consciously sense when an actor is not being true to the reality of the scene, but you can be sure they will sense it subconsciously, and that fact will color their perception of the scene, causing them to 

lose focus and drift.

The best comedy is played in all seriousness, from every insane minute of Monty Python to every childlike moment of Pee-Wee Herman's quest to recover his bike. Strive for that mindset, be true to the reality you create, and the humor with come of its own accord. 

Happy improvising!

A Question of Story

Re-reading the very first post on this blog, How Powerful Choices Beat Questions, I have the strong sense that I left the reader with the impression that I believe all questions are to be avoided.  "It cannot be said questions by nature are bad," I stated, but then I did not go on to explain when and how they can be "not bad".

It is undeniable that,
in most instances,
statements
are more productive than
questions.

Statements give more information and save time. There will be times, however, when a question can propel a scene in clear direction as well as, or better than, a statement might.

The key is to use the better form of question. Questions come in two general categories: open-ended and closed-ended. Closed-ended questions are those that limit responses to a very narrow range of answers, typically of the "yes/no" variety. They are polarizing, and give little useful information. Open-ended questions are those that require a more detailed response, one that can't be encapsulated by "yes" or "no".

When I was a corporate trainer, I would use the following example to illustrate the difference between the two types of questions. I would choose one member of the class and ask them to think of a favorite vacation spot. I would then ask them a series of yes/no questions to try and guess which location they were thinking of. It would go something like this:

"Is it Paris?"

"No."
"Is it Toronto?"
"No."
"Is it Mumbai?"
"No."

...and so on, until they have clearly gotten the point that I'm not about to guess it easily. I would then change up the question and ask, 

"What's your favorite vacation spot?"
"Boston."

...and voila! I had my answer in a single shot, and hopefully some of the class members would take this lesson with them out into the field and make better use of their questions.

In the world of improv,
where time is a precious
commodity, we cannot afford
 to lavishly waste time asking
unproductive questions. 

We must train ourselves so that when we do ask those infrequent questions, we make them productively open-ended. By doing so we add information to the scene and incorporate it with already-existing elements, moving us forward and advancing our story.

Happy improvising!

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: “Whose Line”

We make every effort to attend performances by local improv groups and watch online videos of companies all around the globe. It’s important from a learning perspective to do so; you can’t properly self-assess if you have no experience of what’s going on outside your field of vision.

In what will be a series of articles, we will be looking at some popular improv games and offering recommendations on how best to play them. Bear in mind, there are as many variations to games as there are groups; what we present here is simply an analysis of what brings out the best in the core games. It is a best practice to learn the game as it was designed before making changes; learn how to play by the rules, and you will learn when and how to break those rules.

The game of “Whose Line” goes many other names, such as “Blind Line” and “Pockets”. Whatever name you use, how you play it will decide how successful you are.

To play “Whose Line”, it is first necessary to have audience members write sentences on slips of paper. How many depends on how many actors will be in your scene. As a two-player group, we get four sentences each; usually three or four per player is enough. A suggestion is given by the audience and a scene is played. During the scene a player will take a sentence out of their pocket, read it aloud and incorporate it into the scene. Here is where things get fuzzy.

A natural inclination when first playing “Whose Line” is to preface the reading of the sentence either by saying, “As my grandmother used to say,” or “Let me read you something from the manual,” and then reading the line.  

While you may get a small laugh from doing so, you have missed the point of the game. 

The point is to use the sentences as dialogue, and then skillfully justify and incorporate it into your scene, moving it forward in a potentially new and interesting direction.

Refusing to use the sentence as dialogue is a fear reaction; it negates an actor’s responsibility for taking ownership of the line. It’s safe to place the words into the mouth of someone else, and it allows the scene to continue unchanged until it sinks to the level of boredom. 

Change is what makes scenes interesting; to refuse to change is to refuse to entertain.

“Whose Line” can be considered a game of “mini tilts”. A tilt is by definition something that pushes a scene into a new trajectory. It is necessary from a storytelling aspect to have tilts; they keep the story fresh and interesting. Every audience sentence has the potential to provide a tilt, but only if it is used in an active, not passive, manner.

We recently performed at a Moose lodge, and one of our lines was “Every start is a new beginning.” This line alone sent us, as a hotel maid and guest, spiraling into a love affair that would not have happened if not for the audience’s sentence. If we had read it as a quote from someone not present on stage, it may have gotten a chuckle from the audience, but the scene would have stayed where it was and been far less interesting.

It’s scary to have another person put words in your mouth. It’s challenging to have to incorporate a strange line into your scene immediately. It’s tough to avoid using the “I’m crazy” explanation when a bizarre sentence comes up. But then again, this is why we do what we do. To do anything less is to give into fear. 

Happy improvising!

Kurt Vonnegut's Rules for Writing

In his book Bagombo Snuff Box, Kurt Vonnegut listed these eight rules for writing short fiction. With little effort, they apply just as easily to the creation of an improvisation scenes:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.

2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.

3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.

4. Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.

5. Start as close to the end as possible.

6. Be a Sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them—in order that the reader may see what they are made of.

7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To hell with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

Note that Vonnegut himself admits that rules are meant to be broken, but the application of these principles will undoubtedly make for more interesting improv. 

Happy improvising!

The Story You Should Be Focusing On

If you're looking for a book to help you learn the "How" of improv, there are dozens of them out there. If you are, instead, looking for the "What" of improv, you'll be hard pressed to find anything of worth, at least anything specifically designed for improvisation.

Let's take our first foray into the "What." We will start out by explaining what the "What" isn't: the "What" isn't the rules of improv; it's not telling you the mechanisms behind good improv. Instead, it focuses on the substance of what you're creating, the "stuff" of good improv. If the "How" tells you how to nail boards together, the "What" helps you design your Dream Home. It gives you the wherewithal to know how many bathrooms you want, where you want the bedrooms, and whether you want a crawlspace or a finished basement.  

Here is your first Guideline of What: 

Never mistake activity for story.

Too often we've witnessed weak improv actors stroll out onto stage after receiving a suggestion like, "shoes," and begin a scene where someone is shopping for shoes. "Do you have this in black?" one actor asks. Will his scene partner move the story forward by having some strange flashback involving black sneakers? Will he pique our interest by saying, sotto voce, "My wife loved black shoes..." Will he surreptitiously pass his fellow actor a note, saying (even if it is a cliché,) "The owl hoots at midnight?" No. He will say, "I'll check," rummage around a bit, and come back either saying "Yes we do," or "No we don't." 

Activity, not story.

"Doing something" is not enough; while it is a starting point, it must be used to launch us into story. We are here to be interesting, not funny. Shopping for shoes in and of itself is not interesting; we must make it so by building story. The only way we can do that is by letting go our fear and journey into the unknown. What do I mean by that? Let's dissect it. 

When we enter into an activity, we are doing something for the sake of doing it. Again, someone walking into a shoe store is not in and of itself a bad thing. Where we go after that initial offer is what counts.  

When we are fearful of the unknown,  

we fall back on the familiar, 

clutching it like a time-worn teddy bear to our bosom. We go shopping, we go to the doctor's, we have arguments that go nowhere, we sit in our imaginary living room, refusing to go out to the club in our shiny new suit. We become mundane. Mundane is not interesting. Mundane is the death of improv. 

What is interesting is the "tilt;" when we take the mundane and twist its nipples until they hurt. This does not mean we must go to the absurd, although that is a valid option. We simply have to chuck our fear and take that leap of faith, just like Indiana Jones while seeking the Grail. When we move past our fear and boldly go where no improviser has gone before (two nerd references in one paragraph! Score!) we then begin to craft a story. 

Story is the narrative. It's the tale we tell that pulls the audience in and wraps them around our little fingers. It starts with a kernel and build through struggle and conflict until it reaches a climax, providing the release. That's where the laughter comes from. Cheap laughter comes from the joke. We leave it to the stand-up comics to do that; we craft laughter from the telling of stories. Laughter is the result of tension and release. If you've ever watched a horror movie with a group of people you have seen the mechanism at work: tension is created when we see a character walking backwards through the dark woods, then when they bump into something and scream we laugh when it turns out to be their best friend (who will probably be eviscerated within the next two minutes.) 

Bear in mind: "struggle and conflict" does not mean fruitless argument. It means the putting up of roadblocks and hurdles and the subsequent overcoming of those impediments. Can good story be created from argument? Yes, but it takes a very skilled improvisor to keep it from slipping into the mundane. Audiences want to see your character changed by the end of the scene. If there is no change, then there was no story. They could have changed status, they could have achieved their goal (love, money, a really good pina colada,) they could have died. We fear change in real life; improv is not real life. Change is crucial. Change is not boring. 

Would you go to a movie, spend ten bucks for a ticket and twice as much for a bucket of popcorn, then be happy sitting in the dark watching some guy shopping for shoes? Would you watch "Inception" time and time again if Leonardo DiCaprio was sitting in his doctor's office reading "Hilights?" Think about it next time you dive into a scene. 

Create the interest; create the story.

Happy improvising!