June 2012
2 posts
1 tag
Downright Upright: Support →
ryanjameshitchcock:
downrightupright:
What does it mean to you to support your teammates? Support, to me, is one of those words we hear all the time, but sometimes I wonder what that actually means, or, as Mick Napier often asks, “But what do I do?” Which is a fair question, I think. I love the concept of supporting my teammates and I…
I think treating your teammates’ offers as gifts and...
1 tag
May 2012
5 posts
3 tags
“We usually find [the show] could’ve improved if we had paid closer...”
– David Pasquesi, on the January 13th episode of Jimmy Carrane’s Improv Nerd podcast
This quote is definitely something that will spring to mind the next time I want to blame a scene partner for “not getting” my initiation
A.V. Club Interview With Tim Kazurinsky →
AVC: And Del Close was still directing at The Second City at the time?
TK: Oh yeah, he directed the three shows that I was in. Yeah, one as an alcoholic, the other one on heroin, and the other one: straight.
AVC: So you got to see the many sides of Close.
TK: The many sides of Del, yes. He went into aversion therapy in between shows one time—between shows that he brought up—so that when he...
1 tag
I Haz an Improv?: Crazytown vs The Real World →
ihazanimprov:
I recently won position of emcee of the Agents of Improv next year, which was a very pleasant and very surprising surprise. That is my news, on to my point.
Something that happens in Agents, and that I may have mentioned previously, is trips to Crazytown. The reality of the scene is something…
There was an interview with Convoy a while back in which I think Alex Berg...
5 tags
The Matt Besser Interview: Part One
downrightupright:
Matt Besser: [It used to be] ingrained in improvisers “Raise the stakes.” And we were like, “What does that mean to ‘Raise the stakes?’” That seems like a plot, like a plot concern to “Raise the stakes.” And raising the stakes usually means putting it into life or death situations. So it seems to end up in a small, narrow group of places, that tend to make the scenes more...
Billy Merritt's Improv Dance Party Pt2: Coach-less... →
improvdanceparty:
Or as I like to call them.. Charades!
I have been told by a few of my students that they’ve been doing practice sessions without a coach. They say it’s hard to find a coach, get the coach they want, or can’t afford one.
All well and good, but don’t think for a minute that you are improving…
This post I wish I could beam back in time to my college improv group (I was...
February 2012
5 posts
5 tags
Robots ate my pirate.
Over the past few months, I’ve been letting my pirate tendencies take over in improv scenes. I was playing confidently and having fun. The flipside to that is that when I initiated a scene off of an opening, it was often an idea right out of the opening, rather than an analogue or recontextualization of that idea. My second beats in Harolds were often time dashes for the same reason.
One of...
"We love you, you're perfect, now change." What do... →
Somehow I can’t see this guy going to a stand-up comedy open mic and saying “Ten comedians back-to-back-to-back!? Way too many! Please, break it up with a magician or a juggler or a slam poet now and then!”
shortmikeshort:
This is clearly written by someone who has been having trouble navigating the indie scene and the world of neophyte performers. A lot of shows exist just to...
BEN POPKEN IS JUST KIDDING: ACTIVATING THE GAME →
benpopkenisjustkidding:
“The comedy comes from how what you want is at odds of how you’re going about trying to achieve it.” - Neil Campbell
I got a new brain after going through the #DCM13 workshop taught by Neil Campbell, artistic director at UCBLA. In his view, there are three phases to “activating the game”…
Short Mike Short: Improv Ramblings: Looking for... →
One of my coaches, Drew DiFonzo Marks, had us do an exercise where the only objective was this: create the most ludricrous, awful story you can, i.e. something a sugar-high four-year-old might come up with. We were allowed to use any tool at all: dialogue, scene painting, narration, tag-ins, cut-to’s, just as long as the story was insane and non sequitur. I guess it was similar to the...
January 2012
2 posts
Teaching Interviews: Chris Gethard, Part 1 of 2
improvnonsense:
This is a series in which I ask great improv teachers to write down their thoughts on teaching improv. We start with Chris Gethard, who was the second person to ever run the UCBT-NY school after Kevin Mullaney.
Gethard wrote the first full curriculum for the school, taught dozens and dozens of very popular classes at all levels and also coached some of the best teams to ever...
I Started an Improv Blog.
Really surprised no-one had “improvblog.tumblr.com” yet, but here we are.
