Please kill me is amazing. In improv in Australia my punk equivalent is personally buying a bunch of drinks every show night because if our team doesn’t buy enough drinks the bar will probably kick us out and most the team have to drive to the venue. It’s badass.
I remember doing a literal “improvised Law & Order” for a while, and I had a blast always trying to work in the guy-who-will-not-stop-loading-boxes-while-talking-to-cops.
I've never loved medium form as a term. Mostly because it's part of the idea that long form = scenic and short form= game.
I could get really in the weeds here and start drawing graphs but from my perspective, these are long form performance games. You can have a 3-5 minute improvised scene (short/scenic), a highly structured 30 minute genre piece with multiple suggestions (long/game). Conversely you can play a traditional "short form game" like Freeze Tag more scenically using the "freeze" device to edit/transform scenes. And god knows, I've seen "long forms" where all the editing and scene painting etc etc create nearly zero scenic content. It's all on a spectrum in terms of where the focus of the piece is. And um... I feel similarly strongly about the term Monoscene - which is just a scene ...that's long.
lol at "Would anyone had done punk rock music if you had to intern for a club to get stage time, that paid maybe $20 a show?"
Lots of people start their own punk bands and only ever throw free/cheap shows. Just like lots of us who do improv never interned for a theater for stage time and just put on our own shows. Or focused more on standup or clown or some other form of comedy that doesn't have internships and just requires getting on stage and being funny. The idea that it's a good thing that people are interning for stage time rather than earning it by being funny or good at the craft is exactly why UCB became a place filled with mediocre performers that were good at navigating bureaucracy and developed a reputation for being a multi-level marketing scheme (and for the record to prevent a straw man type response, I'm not saying UCB only had mediocre comedians who were good at bureaucracy but there were a ton of them alongside the genuinely funny people).
But maybe I don't get it and the real punks are the people who intern to be handed an opportunity by a system designed to profit from unpaid labor (by people whose parents pay their rent) not the artists who just get out and do their thing.
yes, my example of interning is not a good example of doing hard work. sorry! truly. did you really read this and think "wow, he's going hard against people who think interning is bad?"
No I didn't think that but the intern thing really struck a nerve with me because of the combination of being condescending to punk rock and holding up the worst part of improv culture as a virtue.
I see. Enjoy being mad at the one example, and ignoring the whole rest of the piece which says "this book on punk rock is cool" and "i respect people from small scenes who build their own audiences."
Also you're using your email platform to joke about how maybe you making kids intern unpaid for stagetime makes you more dedicated to your craft than Iggy Pop. If anything, you're probably mad someone pointed out the hubris there.
Well you said something suspect, and I responded as an opinionated comedian and reader of your Substack. And you asked what seemed like honest question "did I read this and think you're going hard against people who think internning is bad?" And I gave an earnest answer. And then seemingly you got defensive and told me to enjoy being mad. So I told you exactly what part of being mad was fun ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You never enjoy being mad? If I never enjoyed being mad I'd go crazy growing up in the United States.
Please kill me is amazing. In improv in Australia my punk equivalent is personally buying a bunch of drinks every show night because if our team doesn’t buy enough drinks the bar will probably kick us out and most the team have to drive to the venue. It’s badass.
I'll bet you'd enjoy reading "Among the Thugs" by Bill Buford.
Loving your reports from the present and the past, Will 😀
I remember doing a literal “improvised Law & Order” for a while, and I had a blast always trying to work in the guy-who-will-not-stop-loading-boxes-while-talking-to-cops.
I love performing in the festival scene in the UK. It’s so much fun! Audiences there love comedy in a way Americans generally can’t compete with.
I've never loved medium form as a term. Mostly because it's part of the idea that long form = scenic and short form= game.
I could get really in the weeds here and start drawing graphs but from my perspective, these are long form performance games. You can have a 3-5 minute improvised scene (short/scenic), a highly structured 30 minute genre piece with multiple suggestions (long/game). Conversely you can play a traditional "short form game" like Freeze Tag more scenically using the "freeze" device to edit/transform scenes. And god knows, I've seen "long forms" where all the editing and scene painting etc etc create nearly zero scenic content. It's all on a spectrum in terms of where the focus of the piece is. And um... I feel similarly strongly about the term Monoscene - which is just a scene ...that's long.
Say hi to Jim Woods for me.
lol at "Would anyone had done punk rock music if you had to intern for a club to get stage time, that paid maybe $20 a show?"
Lots of people start their own punk bands and only ever throw free/cheap shows. Just like lots of us who do improv never interned for a theater for stage time and just put on our own shows. Or focused more on standup or clown or some other form of comedy that doesn't have internships and just requires getting on stage and being funny. The idea that it's a good thing that people are interning for stage time rather than earning it by being funny or good at the craft is exactly why UCB became a place filled with mediocre performers that were good at navigating bureaucracy and developed a reputation for being a multi-level marketing scheme (and for the record to prevent a straw man type response, I'm not saying UCB only had mediocre comedians who were good at bureaucracy but there were a ton of them alongside the genuinely funny people).
But maybe I don't get it and the real punks are the people who intern to be handed an opportunity by a system designed to profit from unpaid labor (by people whose parents pay their rent) not the artists who just get out and do their thing.
yes, my example of interning is not a good example of doing hard work. sorry! truly. did you really read this and think "wow, he's going hard against people who think interning is bad?"
No I didn't think that but the intern thing really struck a nerve with me because of the combination of being condescending to punk rock and holding up the worst part of improv culture as a virtue.
I see. Enjoy being mad at the one example, and ignoring the whole rest of the piece which says "this book on punk rock is cool" and "i respect people from small scenes who build their own audiences."
Not gonna lie, it's fun to roast the shit out of the "I should be proud of the unpaid-intern-to-stage-time system I was a part of at UCB" attitude.
Yeah you seem fun!
Also you're using your email platform to joke about how maybe you making kids intern unpaid for stagetime makes you more dedicated to your craft than Iggy Pop. If anything, you're probably mad someone pointed out the hubris there.
Well you said something suspect, and I responded as an opinionated comedian and reader of your Substack. And you asked what seemed like honest question "did I read this and think you're going hard against people who think internning is bad?" And I gave an earnest answer. And then seemingly you got defensive and told me to enjoy being mad. So I told you exactly what part of being mad was fun ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You never enjoy being mad? If I never enjoyed being mad I'd go crazy growing up in the United States.
hahah i don't know. I always do it in conjunction with a theater and i just rely on them to promote. I am... lazy?