Improv Shortcuts: Better Acting
Tricks that are actually "good" improv
This is another excerpt from my unpublished may-never-be-published improv book “Shortcuts, Gimmicks, Cheats and Traps.” It’s the “shortcuts” section.
“Shortcuts” are tools and tips that are easy and work in most scenes, most of the time. It’s like how most nutrition/exercise plans, regardless of their focus, will contain practical advice that’s generally helpful, like “drink more water.” It might not be the MAIN thing your diet needs, but it should help. These shortcuts are meant to be the “drink more water” of improv advice.
“When in doubt, confess” is a classic improv shortcut.
I broke these shortcuts into some subcategories.
Better Acting
Better Funny
What Do I Say Now?
Initiations That Always Work
Because these sections have the most substantial advice, I’ve included exercises for practice.
Here’s the “Better Acting” shortcuts.
Better Acting
Improv attracts amateur actors. Someone reads Tina Fey’s autobiography, sees that she studied at Second City, and signs up for an improv class even though they’ve never been on stage once. The result is that a typical improv class is filled with people who are comedy fans but simply have not practiced acting or even playing make believe. They mime tables and then walk right through them. They are told their spouse is divorcing them and they shrug their shoulders as if they have not heard.
They want to be better comedians, but what they need is better acting.
Becoming a truly seasoned performer can take years, but there are a few shortcuts to improve your acting ability right away.
Where Are You?
A big acting shortcut is to answer the question: where are you?
New actors step into an improv scene completely fixated on what they are about to SAY. They’re panicking, they’re hanging on to their sanity by their fingertips. All they know is that the suggestion is “pizza” and they want to say “Oh my God, look, it’s the biggest pizza ever!”
Worse, if a teacher stops the scene and asks them and of those things --- “uh, who are you? What exactly is going on? Why do you want this pizza?” they’ll freeze. They don’t know why they made those choices.
Instead, the teacher should ask: where are you?
Somehow, they just KNOW. “A state fair.” “My backyard.” Or “A picnic” or “a laboratory.” They don’t have to think about it.
Once the student has picked a where -- they will automatically know the answer to all of the other questions that an audience might have.
A state fair? The pizza is part of a contest. And they were hoping to win that contest, and are perhaps realizing they are doomed.
A laboratory? The pizza is a product of a mad scientist who has pushed technology too far.
My backyard? It’s a party, thrown by my spouse, who in fact loves pizza way more than me.
The WHERE is a shortcut to better acting choices.
EXERCISE: Start with a where.
An easy exercise. Two people up. One person starts non-verbally by just doing an activity. Then the second person comes in and confirms the location. It’s okay if the second person gets it “wrong” -- as soon as they’ve said something, the first person agrees. Now you have a location, and the actors can begin a scene.
Name Each Other
Names are powerful. Give a character a name, and you wake up the writer in your brain. Suddenly everything is specific, has a history, is funnier. It also makes sure you’re focusing on the other characters. Give names.
Names also inspire us to have personalities.
“I’ll have a coffee.”
“Coming right up.”
becomes:
“Margie, I’ll have a coffee.”
“You got it, chief! One cuppa Joe, coming your way!”
Caution: Names can easily be so funny that they can take over the scene. Though that can be fun too, see “Funny Names” in “Gimmicks.”
When I need to think of a name fast, I use friends I knew in middle school. I can think of them quickly, they’re real, but not cliche.
EXERCISE: Made-Up Proper Nouns
Two people up. The initiation and response -- and as many lines in the scene as possible -- must contain a made-up proper noun. People, movies, restaurants, streets, books that are made-up. Names of people must include first and last names for maximum fun.
“You busy today? I was thinking of seeing ‘Two Jerks and a Stick.’”
“I saw it last week with Regina Glynn.”
“A shame. Is she still a waitress at ‘Foot City?’”
“No, she works at ‘Boats, Boats, Boats’ now.”
Short scenes, because they become insane very quickly.
Philosophize
This is for when someone asks you to explain your self. Or accuses you of something bad.
“Want to tell me why you wrecked my car, when I WARNED you how important it was to me?” someone says to you.
Don’t solve the problem (“I’ll pay for it!”) and don’t rationalize yourself into being a reasonable person (“It was a bachelor party! I felt pressured to drink!”) -- instead, philosophize.
“You only live once, friend. And I like to live it FAST.”
Philosophy becomes a point of view, which becomes a comedic game. It becomes something you can find ways to do over and over.
Plus the ability to suddenly make a little speech is a good improv parlor trick.
“Why did you wreck my car?”
(Pulls up a chair) “I guess the answer is I have a lust for life. It seems we are all so careful these days. Technology, the 24 news cycle -- makes us all so cautious and scared. I suppose I’m rebelling against it. Lust for life. (puts hand on friends shoulder) That’s why I wrecked your car.”
EXERCISE: Just a stapler?
Two people up. One person says to the other “What’s the big deal? It’s just a [blank]” and the blank can be any object. A stapler, a bowl, a car, a chair. Something mundane, like a pencil, is better than something exotic, like a unicorn.
Then the other person gets indignant and makes a speech about why that thing is important. “Just a stapler? JUST a stapler? Let me tell you why this stapler is so important!”
Say how the object is a symbol for bigger things, rather than a plot. Like “This stapler represents the forces that bind us together!” is better than “I used this stapler to fight off a mugger!” although as I type that out, I realize that’s also good.
This is meant to be fast. You can do this with a class standing in a circle, with people taking turns.
Be Like Metal: Heat Up Fast, Cool Off Fast
Emotions are an amazingly powerful ingredient in an improv show. You don’t have props, set design or music -- but you have YOU. And I apologize for how ironically robotic this sentence is BUT: Humans are fascinated by emotion. So do it. Get emotional.
You may protest: I shouldn’t be fake though, right? People will know if I’m totally lying?
To be honest, even completely forced arbitrary emotions that you pick at random tend to be fun. Bursting into improv tears, or breaking out into a full smile, or turning on your heels in disgust -- even if it’s out of nowhere -- makes the audience sit up straighter and say to themselves “Hey, something interesting is happening.”
Yes, it is BEST if your emotions are motivated by the scene. Be in the moment and commit. This is just another way of saying “be a good actor.”
If you get emotional and it doesn’t help, you can always just go back to neutral. There isn’t really damage from a quick emotional outburst.
Boring metaphor alert: In chemistry, the amount of energy it takes to change a material’s temperature is called its “specific heat.” Aluminum has a low specific heat, for example -- it gets hot fast and cools off fast. Water has a HIGH specific heat.
Be like metal -- get hot fast, cool off fast.
You CAN go too far. If you’re a screaming lunatic multiple times, or constantly run at 100% energy -- and there are those types of actors -- you will lose the audience’s attention. But for the large subset of improv students who were more comedy fans than actors, I say to you: get emotional. It will help.
EXERCISE: Emotional Quadrants
Mentally divide the playing area into four equal squares. Assign an emotion to each one. Start with basic ones: happy, scared, angry, sad.
Two people up. They do a scene, and they must move around as they do it. As they enter new areas, they must immediately have the emotion of that square. It’s not required to explain why your feelings are changing, but it’s okay to. Notice how easy it is to justify changes in mood.
You want big changes, big emotions. They actors should keep moving around during the scene and changing their emotions. They can invent reasons for moving or just wander around. There should be times when they are both in the same square, and times when they’re in different ones.
The scene doesn’t have to be good. You’re just exercising what it feels like to act with feeling.
Give An Emotional Why
When you are accused of doing something unusual, or unflattering, or funny — say yes to it, and give an emotional why.
Meaning that you did what you did because of something emotional.
“Why are you firing me? I’m the best employee you have!”
“Because I am sad. You’re better than I am and I can’t have that. Get out.”
Newer improvisers give circumstantial whys — an explanation that is more reasonable, but less interesting.
“Why are you firing me? I’m the best employee you have!”
“Budget cuts! I have to fire someone!”
Realistic. But not fun. We want behavior we can repeat. Emotional whys give us that.
Shortcut within a shortcut: The seven deadly sins -- pride, gluttony, lust, envy, sloth, greed and wrath -- each almost always work as an emotional why.
“I want to eat this piano.”
“Why?”
“Pride.”
Pride works as an explanation for unusual behavior almost all the time. Lust can get dicey, but it also works a lot. Sloth is situation specific. Wrath works a lot, and is also a very funny word for someone to say.
“What are you firing me? I’m the best employee you have!”
“Wrath.”
Exercise: “Can you tell me why you do this?”
Two people up. Give a suggestion. Initiator says “Hey can you tell me why you always do… (weird behavior)?” “Weird” can be any degree of strange and does not have to be funny. The responder agrees they do it and gives an emotion as an explanation. “I do always lick my sandwiches before eating them, and that is because I am scared of them.”
There you go. Those are my shortcuts for being a better actor.
Plugs, Ongoing
Screw It, We’re Just Gonna Talk About Comics - Comic book podcast, hosted by my brother Kevin and I. We are preparing to do a series on legendary comics writer Keith Giffen!
Clubhouse Fridays - WGIS’ weekly improv show. Fridays 7pm at The Clubhouse. Free!
The World’s Greatest Improv School: The improv school I run with Jim Woods and Sarah Claspell. We’ve got classes online, in LA and even a few in NYC!
How to Be The Greatest Improviser On Earth - My improv book, available at Amazon. Kindle or print. It’s a hodge-podge of advice I wrote in 2016 about doing improv. If you’re broke and want a free PDF version just email me and I’ll send it over.
Lots of great advice in here. Really like the philosophize tip, that’s definitely something I’m gonna play with here the next few weeks to spice things up.