Iteration for Improvisers

I’ve seen it a million times. A group will “invent” a new form or game, practice it (or not), then throw it up on stage. Then they’ll keep throwing it up on stage whether it worked the first time or not. The assumption is that the group has to get used to the new form and that it’ll improve itself simply by being played through a few times without any conscious attempt to make significant changes. Of course, this is doing things the hard way.

Game designers are great at using iteration in their work. They’ll toss together some rules, crank out a prototype, and playtest it as soon as possible. Really, when it comes to designing a game, what could possibly replace the value of actual players interacting with this system you’ve set up for them? And, naturally, a game designer’s job isn’t complete once the game enters playtesting. In a way, that’s where the real craft begins. If it isn’t fun, it goes back into the workshop and tweaks begin. Too often, improvisers would be content to release the game as-is, no matter how tests went, and rely on the players of the game to just get used to it. That is no way to improve a game, and it’s no way to improve the structure of an improv show.

Improvisers: your form will not figure itself out. That doesn’t mean you need to trash it altogether. It means you need to critically evaluate what went right and what went wrong, and use your time wisely promoting the right stuff and excising the wrong stuff. This is true whether you’re playing Party Quirks or Harolds, Freeze Tag or Deconstructions. Test it, refine it, repeat.

Even a game has to hit the shelves at some point. Your brand new longform structure spends itself as soon as it’s implemented. It’s never complete. And so improv groups should never assume that the form is set in stone. If your second beats aren’t working, change your second beats. If your group just can’t do organic edits, don’t do them. Stop treating the form like it’s sacred. Only success is sacred.

I’m Doing Solo Improv On Saturday, July 18

It’s true!

It looks like my partner J Hobart B will be out of town for the next round of the Queen of Sharks CHOMPetition, which is SATURDAY, JULY 18 at 7 PM.

That being the case I am going to perform a solo improvisational piece that will make you laugh and laugh and laugh and vote and laugh, but ONLY IF YOU ARE IN ATTENDANCE.

I’ll sum it up thusly:  If you want to see me perform my one-man improvised show, you must catch it at the Chompetition this Saturday, because it will never be performed again.

Five bucks, pals.  Five measly bucks.

And my mom will be in attendance.  You get to meet my mom.

Miss this if you’re a schmuck.

Improv is a (beautiful) Pyramid Scheme

Big-house improv has its detractors and I was one of them for a few years.  I, too, saw organized improv as a sort of buy-in pyramid scheme.  It certainly is pay-to-play.  And after you’re part of the system, even if you start coaching other players as I’m trying to do more and more, it seems we’re all just spending each other’s money.  You pay hundreds, thousands of dollars to teachers and administrators who end up becoming coworkers and friends.  My expenses have supported the drinking habits of the very people who demand that I go out and drink with them every week.

This seems like madness, doesn’t it?  Well, it isn’t, really.  Any community demands a certain amount of buying in.  People pay to join bowling teams, congregations, scout troops, colleges, fraternities, dojos, congress, and street gangs.  Only prison is free to join.

The fraternities angle in particular rubbed me the wrong way for some time because I joined a fraternity at school.  People like to throw around the attack “I don’t need to pay for my friends, TYVM.”  But, yeah, you kinda do.  If you’re in college you’re paying tuition to stay there.  If you join other clubs you’re paying dues to them.  If you just stay friends with your buddies back home you’re commuting to be with them or trading Magic cards with them or paying to ride their sisters.

Improv is quirky because if you want to get sanctioned by a theater and put up shows under that theater’s official banner, you have to take their training courses.  That makes it less like a bowling team and more like a conservatory.  You go to shows at performance schools to watch students trained there put on shows.  Is that a pyramid scheme?  Well, yeah.  But the shows are good.

The difference between someone who forgoes the system and just improvises independently is that free agents miss out on a lot of great training, get far less stage time, and perform to slimmer audiences.  And in the end, it’s financially zero-sum either way.  No one is making any money at this.  We pay at first because we want in on the fast track.  And we keep paying each other with each other’s money because after a certain amount of time you get to just break even.  If you’re good enough, you can climb to the rank of “at least I’m not leaking cash all over the place for this anymore.”

And if product is the excrement of action, the effect of all this is a wonderful industry of hilarious and interesting people staging once-in-a-lifetime shows at the top of their abilities.  It’s expensive, it’s just a hobby, and leads nowhere productive.  Just like bowling.

Scoping Down

When you’ve set a big big goal for yourself and it’s killing you to meet it, often you’ll reassess your tactics.  When I set out on this current path my goal was “to find work as an actor or television writer”.  Like any other project with a goal, this one had three facets:  time, budget, and scope.  Of course the scope is the same as the goal.  That was my mission statement.  If was a business entity, a career in entertainment would ultimately be my product.

Now, I don’t want to crush any dreams, but I have realized that I’m not cut out for that goal.  I might have enough talent to make a reasonable living at it, but my ambition is lacking.  I won’t go on auditions or submit my work around because in the beginning that leads to fairly small potatoes.  In the end that’s all I may end up with because it turns out there are a thousand tall white guys with ukuleles trying to be Steve Martin to the Chuck Palahniuk generation.  My niche is an industry.  And that’s just in New York.

A less wise Phil, perhaps myself two or three years ago, would have looked at the limitations keeping me from this goal and tinkered with the expectations for budget and money.  Namely, he would have said something like “I don’t care how much it costs or how long it takes.  I’m going to rule this town!”  And that’s admirable and a completely rational way of assessing one’s goals.  Honestly, if you want something bad enough, you need to be willing to sacrifice everything you have to get it.  For most of us, all we have is time and money.

But remember that you were the one who set the goal up to begin with.  You’re playing a finite game because you’ve chosen to play it. Indeed, if you really had to be playing the game, you wouldn’t really be playing it.

What the hell am I talking about?  I’m talking about the third facet of your big big goal: the purpose itself.  I honestly believe it is my purpose to bring joy to this world.  I seem to have a knack for it, it makes me happy, and it makes others happy.  I’m just good at making people laugh.

That meshes cozily with life as an actor or comedy writer, but there are other ways to fulfill my purpose and make a living at something else.  Just like a character in a play has tiny little motivations that they seek beat-by-beat all in service of that character’s grand-arc motivation, I’ve come to realize that getting laughs on TV is not my purpose (necessarily).  It is a nice thing that could potentially happen to a guy like me.  But for me, that’s all it is.

Right now I’m still doing improv comedy shows.  I’d like to keep writing and performing in sketch shows.  Let’s be honest; I’d still love to get to write for a television show.  I connect with the universe a little every time someone laughs at my silliness.  But it’s all on my terms.

Relatively soon I’ll stop hitting the stage.  I’ll go back to school and follow some new adventure for a while until the wind blows me elsewhere again.  I’ve got other fish to fry, but I’ll never forget why I’m doing these things.  Why do I do anything?  To make the world smile.

If you want to know the meaning of life, here’s how you find it:

1. You can only know the meaning of your own life.
2. Look at your biggest goal and ask yourself why you’ve set it.  The answer may be an even bigger goal than that one.  Keep asking Why until there is no higher purpose.  You’ve found it.

And lo, a postcard did appear

My buddy J Hobart B (the “I” of Phil & I) went ahead and whipped up this splendid flyer for our Chompetition spot this Saturday.  Please come and vote for us!

boo-yah!

Check out Phil & I next week

Phil & I Chompetition Fight Song by Phil Wells

More info here (scroll down for deets).