More progress...

So, I am incredibly proud of myself after last night's show. I really feel like I've come out of my shell or judging and fear in the last few performances, and gotten so much more ballsy. I've always been able to tell when something needs to happen onstage, but there's been a little voice inside that says, "No, better let so-and-so do it, they'll be really good/funny/better than me." I think I can safely say that I have shut the voice down.

Quick plot (such as it is) recap. The show began with a birth, which is generally an improv kiss-of-death, but I guess we're to the point where we can start breaking some of the "rules." Amy's character gave birth to two boys, who had to be dragged literally kicking and screaming out of the womb. She then gave birth to the ugliest girl ever (Eileen, who took what was given to her and made it stellar--her faces were priceless), and the story centered around her brothers' attempts to make her feel "special" and "beautiful," which was shot to hell when she began killing people with her ugliness. We had a prison scene, etc.

Here are my favorite moments from the show last night (though these things never keep well in the re-telling):

In the beginning, the brothers send their sister to play in the pond, and the fish (me, Amy, and Karen) ran screaming offstage. Huge laugh. And then, as the brothers sang a tender song to their sister, the three of us slid our legs onto the small stage from outside and did a little Esther Williams style arm-swinging and backup singing.

Toward the end, the mother decides the kids are no good, and we shoved them back up the birth canal, which was funny in and of itself, but led to a gorgeous split scene: pregnant Amy with me and Karen on one side--the three in utero on the other. Bryce had a hysterical moment about spotting a frito on the floor, and went to reach for it. I immediately jumped behing Amy, and stuck my hand down as if from her vagina, being Byrce's hand finding the corn chip. This led to my being born--finally, a beautiful, blonde, blue-eyed child. And the three of them lived on in the womb for 30 years.

Another huge laugh, and I was tickled pink at my own move. Used to be, that was the kind of thing I would think, but not do, and somehow, in the last few weeks of shows and Storysets rehearsals, I've broken through that barrier. I wish I knew exactly how, but I'm just really happy to have gotten here.

Some Activities from Tonight's Show

pushing and pulling rope
filing, searching for papers
banging a gavel
drawing strike posters
striking

So far behind...so much good stuff

Since I last reported in, we had a great show, another great class, and tonight, a really good show. Maybe not as kick-ass as last week. We were down to 8, and played in groups of 4, which was a stellar size. Just perfect. Loved my group...we seemed to bring out the best in each other. I felt much more confident, though I didn't make a ton of initiations. It was more like I always knew what to do with what was given, and had no doubts.

I really feel like being in class at the same time as the show is making a huge difference for my play. We worked on heightening in two-person scenes this week, and I have to say, I nailed it. Strangely enough, and surprisingly, several of my classmates had a rough time with some of the exercises tonight, but everyone seemed to make progress. We also did a round of Slackers, which I love, and again, seemed to flummox some really good players. At any rate, I really think that class helped propel my play in the show tonight.

I have never felt as confident on an improv stage as I did tonight. I was playing ballsy, and making lots of initiations, and they were getting picked up and deepened and heightened all over the place. I really had fun. We had a workplace romance that evolved into striking workers, a serial killer on trial, credit problems, friends who didn't agree on the place of women...it was totally fun. Several people commented on one of my lines, which got a very gratifying laugh. It was something to the effect of (after being told by my friend that women shouldn't work, they should just live off of men) "What must you think of me, with my job at the rope factory? You must think of me as so common!" Not as significant out of context, but my favorite line of mine.

More actions

Filing
Typing
Ironing
Answering Phones
Watering Plants
Cooking eggs while camping

Another Good Class

More progress on the storytelling front. We started with a little talk, and I brought up the lovely reality and efficiency of Daseriski, and we talked about how that comes from listening really well and agreeing in such a way that you explore deeper and deeper, rather than just agreeing and yes-ing the scene to death, piling on new information.

John took us through more conducted stories, and blew it out so that eventually we were taking over the story, switching up narrating and acting...it was great. And it looks like we're just 7, which is a really nice number, especially for this sort of playing.

This is so rewarding.

A Great Show, and Not A Great Show

Went with my husband and a friend to see Dasariski, a three-man long-form show at IOWest. He called at 8:30 at night to see if I wanted to go to a 10 pm show, and I was not excited, but said yes. So glad that I did. It was certainly some of the best improv I've seen in a long time, if not ever. So grounded, and real. The three guys listened so well to each other, and nothing was wasted. It was a beautifully efficient way to play. People with relationships, doing things, talking, and making connections. It made me realize that as much as I love playing the Hothouse style, I do miss that mundane, every day humor. So often in the shows at Hothouse, it becomes an epic journey, or fantasy, or worse, political commentary.

God save me from political commentary in improv. I'm not saying it can never be done, but in my experience, it falls on its face every time. First, it becomes boringly predictable, and even if the jokes are clever and funny, it also presupposes that they players and audience have the same perspective. Even shows which are constructed to deal specifically with politics get tedious, like the show one of my fellow players was in recently. She is always a joy to watch, but the group in general was so bogged down and self-limiting with their chosen subject matter. Anyway. Which leads me to my show this week.

Well, a dud happens eventually, even in scripted theatre, so I shouldn't be as wrapped up in this as I am. But I'm really frustrated, partly because I felt like I was playing pretty well, and making some personal progress. I felt like I (and the rest of my group) got mired in some improv quicksand: a lack of 2-person scenes (pointed out by my husband), realistic characters and situations, and scenes in which either nothing happens, or in which people talk about something happening, but never do it. I was also frustrated with the lack of listening. My husband pointed out a few good plays I made that no one picked up on, as well as offerings by other players. And it devolved into politics in the end, and what can you do but go along and make everyone else look good? Nothing, that's what.

Ah, well. You win some, you lose some. I have some big ideas to discuss in rehearsal on Wednesday, and some places I really don't want this show to go.

New Class, New Energy

Storysets: the potential to be really awesome. I'm hugely excited and energized. There are 8 of us, and John really emphasized us as a cast doing rehearsals rather than students in a class. We spent the first hour or so in discussion, throwing ideas around about production values: costumes, lighting options, music, setting, props, etc. The focus, as the title suggest, is on telling a story, so we worked on how to frame it, so it's not just a bunch of folks running around a bare stage. Chris and I have talked about ideas like this for years, and really enjoyed good examples of it, like the Doubtful Guests. We've also seen tons of shows where the players were entirely hamstrung by their framework or characters or subject matter, so the challenge is to put something on it that makes it interesting without being totally taken over by those choices. We talked about the possibility of using archetypes (who were are naturally) to establish personal costumes, and then using props, or different colors and sizes of fabric (my idea, which I think it pretty cool) to flesh out our characters. We talked about building some blocks to use as a set, and about using color. I love it all.

We then did a junk set, and I loved playing with these folks. All familiar except one, and another who was missing class tonight. John led us through a couple of Who-What-Where exercises, focusing on jumping onto all of that information quickly, but patiently. I could feel myself being more ballsy, which was hugely gratifying. I'm excited to see how much of that I can bring into the project 22 this weekend. John led us through a couple of conducted stories, which were hysterical, and really proved his point, that establishing your environment first, then layering in characters (as specific as possible), and activities/events, it's much easier to build a story and draw the audience into it.

Very excited. Did I say that already?