Three Ingredients

agreement, reality, absurdity

Photo by Katie Smith on Unsplash

You need three things to make an improv scene good

• agreement

• reality

• absurdity

Let’s express them as directives

• agreement - say yes

• reality - play it real

• absurdity - play the game

Let’s explain each one by breaking them into sub-topics.

• agreement

  • adapt to each others’ choices

  • be changeable

  • rewrite your story

• reality

  • stay within the boundaries of emotional reality

  • justify and explain

  • use mapping to explain weird worlds

• absurdity

  • explore what’s unusual

  • follow the fun

  • play one notch below the top of your intelligence

These qualities fight each other. It’s hard to get all at once.

Too Much Agreement

If you agree TOO MUCH it’s not real. I’m thinking of scenes where people are so nervous to agree they do everything with 100% intensity and don’t really absorb what they’re doing.

“Oh my god I LOVE PICNICS! Thank you so much for this sandwich! You know what they say, a sandwich a day keeps cancer away! I’ve never had cancer!”

Okay, honestly, that’s making me laugh. Could be a good scene. But imagine that dialogue from someone who is not really taking in their own choices. That’s an “all agreement, no reality” scene.

Too Much “Reality”

Or you get a scene that is so focused on being real that no one adjusts. They deny, deny, deny. Picture an emotionless block doing a scene where they are buying a gallon of milk.

“Um, that’s not really how being a cashier works. Can I please just have a gallon of milk. What do you mean you know me? I don’t know you. You’re a cashier.”

They’re protecting reality but not budging at all.

Everything Is Unusual

And then the incredibly common EVERYTHING IS UNUSUAL scene. This is where everyone gifts themselves a funny thing with no regard to emotional reality or anyone else’s deal.

Person 1: “Excuse me, I have a job interview here in an hour.”

Person 2: (HUGE ALPHA CHARACTER CHOICE HERE) “Well, I ain’t stopping ya! Grab your butt and grab a chair!”

Person 1: “Oh, thank you.” (Grabs a chair, and moves it so they’re facing the wall)

Person 2: “Uh, hey, buddy you look about as turned around as a koala bear outside of a zoo!”

New character enters.

Person 3: “I’m the boss.”

Person 2: “Tell me something I don’t already know, like I don’t know it.”

Person 1: (still facing the wall) “Hi!”

Person 3: “I’ll be in my office watching the 1966 movie ‘Blowup’ directed by Michelangelo Antonioni.” (leaves)

If this sounds familiar, then you’ve probably seen a reunion show of a once-great improv team who hasn’t done a show in over 10 years.

Plugs

• 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 (also on my web site for more if you don’t want to buy from Amazon). 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.

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