August 2011
34 posts
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Improv Obsession: Always Be Safe When Improvising →
If you are following my improv blog, then you should also definitely be following Improv Obsession. Lot’s of great thoughts on theory and short essays that are certain to prompt a smart discussion. Check it out.
improvobsession:
I caught a Harold at UCBLA last week. Great show, lots of fun. But, something happened that made it clear why teachers always tell you to be careful and to make...
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More Experiments With Harold
Genre Montage
The Genre Montage works like this: The players will perform a montage of scenes, which means a series of unstructured and unrelated scenes based off of one suggestion. (There may be second beats and group games, though that’s not required.) However, each scene will take place within a known and established genre.
A quick note on what it means to play with genre: Play more...
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The House That Del Built: The Rehearsal Process... →
thehousethatdelbuilt:
Maybe it’s the weather changing—I don’t know—but people have warm-ups on the brain. I’ve had three email exchanges in the past few weeks talking about how to pick the right warm-ups, and how to connect your warm-up to the rest of your rehearsal.
So, first of all, let’s divide the warm-up into…
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Some General Good Advice for College Improv...
I write the following a few months ago when I visited my old college troupe at SUNY Fredonia. Now that a few them are following this blog, I’d like to republish it so that they can read it.
1) Reach out to the established professional troupes in your area. It can only serve to help you to have a good relationship with experienced performers. One simple trick: Take a field trip to see...
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Watchimprovobsession:
Mike Short, a wonderful improv mind, expanded and made my original post his own. Check it out if you’re not already following him.
shortmikeshort:
Any “rule” in improv should not be thought of as a hard and fast one. It’s really more of a recommendation. Perhaps prescription is a better word, because it only comes up when an improvisor needs to be told not to ask questions.
...
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“I’ve learned from experience that if you work harder at it, and apply more...”
– Louis CK via The AV Club
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Experiments In Harold
Pirate Harold, Ninja Harold
If the cast is finding frustration in the perceived rigidity of the Harold, we can run these forms as a remedy. The Pirate and Ninja Harolds are very simple forms: The entire cast plays a Harold as though they are Pirates or Ninjas. As in: if a group of Pirates got together to form an improv group and played a Harold, what would it look like? Every single component,...
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Group Games (cont.)
Advertising Executives
This simple game is described in detail in Truth in Comedy. Very simply, our cast will take on the roles of some advertising executives. After being given the suggestion of a new product, our executives will create everything for the campaign, from the slogan to the jingle to the spokesperson. The trick is that every idea must be greeted with an enthusiastic...
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Exercising Group Games
Impressions of Steve
So you know Steve? He’s this one guy, and he’s really unique, and we’re all gonna do impressions of him. Except we’re not going to say “here’s my impression of Steve,” we’re just going to launch into it. And of course Steve doesn’t exist; we’re going to figure out what he sounds like as we go along. This is the...
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What's a Group Game?
Very loosely, a Group Game can be any large multi-player and pattern-heavy scene, ususally involving the entire cast. In our standard Harold the Group Games occur after the first three scenes and then again after those scenes’ second beats. The overarching value in Group Games is that the entire team connects with a single, simple, fun, and clear idea. Group Games also have the ability to...
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The Congressional Impressionist: Ok lets do an... →
An interesting conversation on the value of warm-ups. Where do you stand?
halphillips:
siegel:
I hate warm ups. Oh god, I hate warm ups. Let me explain to you why I hate warm ups.
To be clear, I’m 100% in favor of checking in and connecting with your ensemble before taking the stage. However, ice breakers meant to loosen up a room full of strangers in a classroom setting have for some…
I...
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Wait! What's Going On? What Are You Doing?!
The following exercises continue working our walk-on skills from both the entrant’s point of view and that of the people already on stage. We’re also going to talk a bit about confusion and denying reality with these exercises.
Fuck With The Scene
This exercise begins with 2 players, Alex and Beth, on stage with a third player, Carl, offstage. Alex and Beth play a scene like usual....
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A Sample Harold
The following is a sample Harold I constructed a few weeks ago. This structure is occasionally referred to as the Standard Harold or the Training Wheels Harold. This structure is very simple to use and instills in its players very good habits to carry with them in any longform that they do. It’s a good idea to have many different scenes at the top. It’s a good idea to punctuate the...
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Your Improv Clothing
A quick note on improv clothing, only because I’ve noticed that this seems to have come up a lot recently. I’m not talking about what you should wear on stage (which should be non-distracting clothes you can easily move around in), I’m talking about how to treat the fictional clothes that your character is fictionally wearing.
First off: The clothes you have on are not...
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Can I Add to The Scene?
A Brief Note on Walk-ons
It my sincere belief that every scene is just fine being performed by the people who already there on stage. A good improv scene never needs anyone to add to it. An improv scene is not like a Civil War skirmish in which our sole tactic is to throw additional men into it. Ideally, the people on stage should be creating everything they need on their own. The only thing they...
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And Now, Our Show...
Openings
A Harold starts with an Opening Game. The purpose of the Opening Game is to generate ideas that we can then use throughout the rest of the piece. There’s a lot of different kinds of openings and each one has their tricks on what makes them work well. Plus, some openings will appeal more to the personalities of the people playing them and may play to their strengths better. Feel...
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Can I Get A Suggestion, Please?
A Quick Note on Using the Suggestion
Every* improv set starts with a suggestion. From short form to long form, suggestions begin everything we do. We get a suggestion not to prove that what we’re doing is made up, but rather to forge a bond with the audience. “See? Everything that happened in this show happened because you were here.”
On a technical note: Using the...
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Analogous Scenes
Let’s talk a bit about Analogous Scenes. Creating Analogous Scenes is a fun way to heighten the comedy of any situation by placing it in a surprising context. Imagine two schoolchildren trading lunches. That is a very normal behavior and there’s nothing particularly funny about it. Now imagine two soldiers in a foxhole trading C-rations in the manner of two schoolchildren trading...
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Following Characters
La Ronde
A structure known as the La Ronde is useful in figuring out how to follow Character Game. The La Ronde works like this:
Scene 1: Characters Alex and Bert
Scene 2: Characters Bert and Catherine
Scene 3: Characters Catherine and Dmitri
and so on, adjusting for how many players until the final scene is:
Final Scene: Characters Zelda and Alex.
We edit by tapping the player we want to...
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Workshopping Second Beats
Let’s begin the workshop. First we discuss the kinds of second beats with the group. Then we’ll do a couple of scenes, and after each scene ask everyone what they thought the scene was about. Follow it up by asking people to brainstorm what they might do for a second beat. There are no wrong answers here, we just want people to start thinking about possibilities.
What’s going to...
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I Did A Scene, Now I Gotta Do It Again?
Let’s start by talking about second beats. We begin talking about second beats by first talking about the first beats. The question of what to do in a second beat is answered by what has already happened in the first beat. The stronger our first beats are, the easier it is to figure out what do when it comes back.
I’ve identified three basic types of second beats. They are:
1:...
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Now That the Scene's Started, How Do I End it?
Editing
The conversation about editing should, ideally, get sprinkled in throughout the rest of workshopping. Because Editing is basically the ending of a scene, we can workshop other things within our scenes while also practicing our editing. When we introduce it, it is useful to discuss the few technical aspects to editing.
The simplest edit is the Sweep Edit. An improvisor jogs across the...
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But When are We Doing Scenes?
Longer Scenes
All right, enough exercising. Let’s get into some scene work. However, the first couple of scenes are going to be limited to two people and they will have a premise given to them to start. Feel free to invent your own scenarios as well.
Two people…
… waiting to go into a job interview for the same job.
… having just finished dinner, decide who pays the check.
… having...
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Getting Started
Today we’re assuming that we have a few people in the room who have never done improv before. This is the first practice session for the Improv Society. We need to introduce them to the basic tenets of improv. At the same time, we want to confirm our values and possibly break new ground with our veterans.
Starting Our Scenes
Have the improvisors make two equal lines on each side of the...
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For Fredonia
My old college troupe at the Fredonia Improv Society is a very dedicated group of kids who unfortunately exist in the middle of nowhere. They have to teach improv to themselves. Now, I do believe that you can learn improv on your own. You can go off in the wilderness and do scenes for 10 years and come back and know how to do improv. But we don’t have that kind of luxury. So, in lieu of...
The Big Bat →
The Bat is a longform performed in the dark. Audience and actors are unable to see each other. Every average improv stage show is bound to the normal rules of physics; the Bat lets the cast create flights of fancy and fun soundscapes those rules don’t allow.
Joy Joy Tragedy
Everything is improvised… except what is not. In this mostly improvised show, Amrita and Kevin mix the spontaneous with one scripted scene. Find out what happens when the playwright runs out of words and the characters take over. Which scene was written? Can you tell the difference?
The juxtaposition of improv to scripted, especially in the sense of creating improv so good that the scripted...
Bassprov: 'nuff said →
What:One of the most acclaimed improv shows of the decade. The award winning BASSPROV has played in over 30 cities across North America and is a critical and audience favorite.
Who:Joe Bill, Mark Sutton , a special guest
Where and When: Fri 7:00 pm at UCB Theatre Sat 7:30 pm at Hudson Guild Theatre
Twik: The Moebius
Twik performs the Moebius - one of the most challenging and radical forms of improv performed today. The Moebius begins with the last scene, then explores how the characters got into that predicament. You won’t know what’s coming, even though you do.
This is another group whose members I got to meet earlier this year. And I’m a fan of anything that plays with time. It requires...
Fredonia State Improv Society →
Naturally, I’m excited about these young kids because they are the current members of my old college improv troupe. I had the honor of teaching them some longform basics earlier this year, so I’m doubly proud that they’re now playing in DCM. Come check out these young bucks, won’t you?
Sun 12:15 pm at Urban Stages
WatchDictionary Soup chooses one word at random from the dictionary and creates an entire world around it, telling a story and creating a one-act play on the spot.
I’m looking forward to this show because I got to personally meet John and Keith during my visit to Kansas earlier this year. John and Keith are both very good actors, so even the simplest of forms is elevated when they perform. I...
